Sharing our Stories

Some of you know this already, but I guess I am officially outing myself on now:  for the past year or so, I have taken my long-standing interest in how people tick and have used that to embark on an exploration of the medical field.  As part of that interest, I have maintained a subscription to an American based medical blog called Kevin MD, which recently published a piece by Mark Vonnegut, the son of the late American author Kurt Vonnegut.

I knew from my pastime reading of Vonnegut senior's autobio (A Man Without a Country) that his son was a physician. Mark is mentioned occasionally in that book, in what appears to be an affectionate relationship of quiet comfort and intimacy.  Given that A Man Without a Country is an autobiography, Vonnegut senior limits himself to a witty discussion of his personal struggles and his own angst with humankind’s peccadilloes.  Thus, it was eye-opening to come across this personal piece about a physician’s tussles with mental health, written by Vonnegut’s paediatrician son.  

In an example of what can still manage to pass us by in the age of information , a subsequent quick perusal of the internet revealed that “younger” Vonnegut has been extremely forthwith about his struggles for mental health and the impacts his condition has had on his work as a physician. In his latest post for KevinMD, itself an offshoot of another piece for NPR’s Boston news station, Vonnegut explores the intersection of creativity, the arts and mental health.

Now this is a subject that has always fascinated me!  My engagement on the matter has ranged from frustration with artistic friends whom it appeared were deliberately attempting to live out some artist-as-damaged-goods ideal, to my own random curiosity about how Robert Schumann’s syphilis (or whatever mental health issue it was) effected his artistic output, to the possible positive and negative effects artistic practice has had in my own life.

In his article, Mark Vonnegut talks about the transformative power of artistic output on both artist and society. He contends that the arts have stabilized and given purpose to many an unstable personality. At the same time, he draws a very definite line-in-the-sand between disordered thinking and affective disorders.  For example, an artist struggling with feelings that are off-base is not necessarily illogical, and that the thinking of “so-called normal people”, is not by consequence any more logical (read: better). 

The WBUR article and subsequent panel discussion (available as an audio file on the webpage) took a slightly different bent than the Kevin MD article. Here are links to both in case you are interested in further reading and listening: A doctor shares his Story about Overcoming Mental Illness and Dr. Mark Vonnegut: On Creativity, Being ‘Crazy’ And Getting Help.

On a final note, during the past year of study I’ve been introduced to a compelling thread in psychological literature; a thread dedicated to exploring the intersection of rationality and emotionality.  Perhaps being a woman as well as an artist has informed my extreme curiosity in this field of thinking and feeling – there’s nothing like internalizing a perception that your contributions are thought of as overly emotional (and perhaps inherently lesser) to mute your participation in society.  For those interested in learning more, Antonio Damasio’s work provides a nice introduction to this area of study. Now, why the Toronto Public Library only has 3 copies of Descartes Error, God only knows[1]!

Cheers,

Michelle