Creating A Bipolar Memoir: Mind Gone Awry

My mother always imagined I would be a writer. I don’t think, however, that she could have imagined me writing the book I did. After all, a book with the title, “Mind Gone Awry,” does not instill confidence of a literary type, a memoir no less of insanity. But, that’s the book I wrote, which leaves someone asking, “Why did you write this book?”

Bipolar since the age of 25, I have gained a lot of knowledge about the disorder, not only as an author, but as a licensed therapist bent on treating those who share this diagnosis. I also share my stories with my clients, tales of dark passages through madness, sprinkled with novel, lighthearted punctuation on occasion. Hearing my reflections about my delusional state from the past seems to help my clients relate to their own traumas and their own struggles with maladaptive thoughts, behaviors which stretch the meaning of normalcy. “I feel heard,” they say. So at some point I started to write my stories down, which gave me a reason to write, “Mind Gone Awry.” If hearing my experiences helps others to come to their own epiphanies about their lives, it is a good thing. Eventually, I came to think I could reach a larger audience beyond my office door that might benefit from my story, 35 years of a life filled with hope, persistence, and the notion of success in the face of the odds against it. I believe I can make a difference.

But, it’s not just a story of recovery, a pleasant lighting of positive themes. It’s also an honest review. I didn’t say it was easy. It wasn’t then and it isn’t now, but it is doable. As I try to be a faithful chronicler of what I went through, in the course of living a life, I have not written just a story of someone who is trying to present himself as heroically inclined. A life lived is not always pretty; mine certainly has not been.

Education can be a wonderful thing. It is another reason I wrote, “Mind Gone Awry.” To illustrate the darkness that often enshrouds mental illness is to help the general public better understand the subtle nuances of mental illness and mental health. Frequently, there are a multitude of images in the public mind of what mental dysfunction is like and these can be frightening. Mixed into this milieu that encompasses the bits and pieces of public perception is a story like mind. It is important if we are to make public policy on this issue that we do so from an informed perspective. And so, I add my voice to the dialogue, another reason why I wrote, “Mind Gone Awry.”

Available through my website: Kerntherapy.com or on Amazon.com.

“Nothing equals reading about someone from someone
who’s been there and has the expertise to explain about it.”
Reader, Sylvia Cary

“Kern’s book provides valuable insight and vivid imagery into the mind
of a person suffering from bipolar disorder. It’s an inspiring story of
his journey from mental illness to mental health professional.”
Reader, Carolyn Sax