This is a striking book: the title, the cover, and the intensity of the first part of the book which embeds the reader in Horatio Clare's experience of mania. That was a difficult read, it was overwhelming: "Give us a break" I thought... but that's the point, he didn't get a break, he largely didn't recognise the need for a break and he conveys all this so effectively. To the reader, privy to his thoughts, he is clearly 'mad' but as is clear from the account and his much later discussions with those involved, he was also skilled at withholding all his perceptions from others. But eventually his admission to hospital is legally compelled. Clare is fearless in his analysis of himself, the effect his condition had on him personally and also those around him who loved and cared about him throughout. Many people make time to talk with him when asked afterwards about his experience, their involvement in it, or with our approach more generally to mental illness - from the Chief Superintendent of police in the area and NHS management, to those trialling new strategies or critiquing old ones, to a ward nurse and the social worker who effected his section. It was particularly interesting to hear of his interactions with Andrea Jenkyns MP which provide a distinctly mixed picture of political involvement in the mental health arena. The book is in three parts, the first details his last months of extreme mental ill health and the effect it had on everyone around him. The second is about his time in hospital and his diagnosis and the third is about his experiences when he was discharged and the challenges he made to his diagnosis.

Heavy Light: A Journey Through Madness, Mania and Healing - Goodreads Heavy Light: A Journey Through Madness, Mania and Healing -

The writing was good but at times, could be a little disjointed and harder to follow. Especially the first few chapters but that was the madness talking so I don’t think I should have expected different necessarily. I listened to this as an audiobook read by Horatio Clare himself, which I think added to the experience since it was able to capture his emotions on the topic far better than if I had simply read the words. Another gem read during 2020/ 21 - what an amazing read by one of the most eloquent authors I have encountered.

A brilliant first person account of the experience of mania with psychosis - if you want to know how it feels then this is the book to read. I noticed some criticism about the author's privilege but it can also be said that by having access to money, transport and connections further afield than home when in this mental state it can be possible to put onself in situations of greater risk to personal safety.

Heavy Light: A Journey Through Madness, Mania and Healing Heavy Light: A Journey Through Madness, Mania and Healing

After a lifetime of ups and downs, Horatio Clare was committed to hospital under Section 2 of the Mental Health Act.I thought this was a brilliant description of what it’s like to be in the throes of mania and psychosis and I really appreciated his brave honesty. It was interesting to contrast how much was going on under the surface with how much he let on to the people around him. There really is a bravery in writing about a total breakdown of the senses and mental processes that make us who we are in our lived experience. It is such an unusual ordeal for most of us to comprehend, that shifting of reality and otherness of existing. This book starts of my the first few chapters describing the inside of Horatio’s head when he’s in the throes of madness. It that way, it was very chaotic and surprising. The next part described his time on the ward and the last bit was a mixture of his personal recovery and treatment plan as well as a dive into the current systems and thinking in mental health care today. So this book was both personal and factually informative. It certainly gave me new ideas and perspectives on mental well-being. And the author’s stake in his own care gave this book a personal touch. The second half is incredibly engaging. Clare describes everything in a way that makes it easy to relate to, or to sympathise with, or at least to understand, from both his perspective and those around him. Parts of his experience, I could definitely feel myself relating to. In particular, the moment when he is in the gallery, when he feels like everyone around him knows he is from the psychiatric hospital, that everyone is hyperaware of him. Same feelings, different reasons for them. And when he goes on to talk about how he will not let the breakdown define him, that resonated deeply with me. I will define myself, not let those things that others see as 'abnormal' define me. Erasing the line between normal and abnormal, and the sentiment of healing, not curing, is something I think needs to be better taken onboard. I had already read Horatio Clare's book, The Light in the Dark which was about him coming to terms with a diagnosis of a kind of extreme, SAD condition known as cyclothymia and how he attempts to weather a winter in the Yorkshire Dales. He is an extraordinary writer and his nature writing, which infuses much of his travel writing and his writing about mental health is beautiful and luminous. In this book, he continues where The Light in the Dark left off, and shares his experience of a full mania which involved hallucinations, harming himself and finally being sectioned.

Heavy Light by Horatio Clare | Book review | The TLS Heavy Light by Horatio Clare | Book review | The TLS

It's no wonder that Clare is especially skeptical of prescription drugs as a treatment for people suffering mental health issues. Side effects from these drugs can leave a patient reeling and getting off the drugs can be just as dangerous as the manic episode for which they were prescribed. Clare's distrust of the drugs prescribed is so great that he decides to wean himself off his drugs without telling his partner, who is understandably terrified he'll start having delusions if he stops taking the drugs. Happily, Clare does not relapse, but he attributes this to keeping his stress low, avoiding pot and alcohol, and meeting with a therapist. He points out that many people do not have the resources and support network that he has. They can't spend money on a therapist and so languish on waiting lists. He believes more government resources need to be earmarked for mental health and social support, but sadly, that doesn't look like it will happen. One section I found very interesting involves Yasmin Ishaq from the Kent Open Dialogue Service. She discusses how the language we use to talk about patients is important - for example, referring to them as 'non compliant' or 'not having insight' can be damaging and dehumanising. She uses a therapy based on dialog with the patient and trials seem to indicate it could have positive results and be much cheaper than traditional methods for treating mental health issues.

One of the most brilliant travel writers of our day takes us us now to that most challenging country, severe mental illness; and does so with such wit, warmth, and humanity, that, better acquainted with its terrors, we may better face our own' Reverend Richard Coles

Heavy Light Album Review | Pitchfork U.S. Girls: Heavy Light Album Review | Pitchfork

The writing was almost bleak in its honesty, raw in its sincerity and brutally self-effacing. Clare's description of his "breakdown" or manic episode which resulted in him being Sectioned under the Mental Health Act is heartbreakingly authentic and I feel his bravery in exposing not only his experience but that of his wife/his children/his friends/his family.Two thirds of the way though he finds a psychiatrist who gives house room to Clare’s ideas on treatment and says ‘At last I was being listened to’. I understand the frustration but the others listened too, they just didn’t agree. The last third is least good, with some journalism on austerity which I agree with but is quite light weight and Open Dialogue, which seems to be the solution, but is barely mentioned. Mental illness is deeply complex and contested and it is too much to ask that he can provide the answers. Whereupon it appears medication (or was it something else?) pretty much immediately removes all the delusions (other, arguably, than that he is perfectly fine) During the later section of the book where he rightly questions many of our models and practices, he doesn't seem to reflect at all on this occurrence. Nor on his repeated assertion that he knows the triggers for his illness and 'just' needs to avoid them... but doesn't (and, I suspect, will not, consistently, for reasons it might have been interesting to explore) This is, soberingly, not his first memoir of emotional distress, dysfunction and mental ill health, nor, arguably, even his second. Partly a tribute to those who looked after Horatio, from family and friends to strangers and professionals, and partly an investigation into how we understand and treat acute crises of mental health, Heavy Light 's beauty, power and compassion illuminate a fundamental part of human experience. It asks urgent questions about mental health that affect each and every one of us. Heavy Light is the story of a a journey through mania, psychosis and treatment in a psychiatric hospital, and onwards to release, recovery and healing. I thought that most of this book was astounding. I have never read a more enthralling and completely terrifying account of psychotic delusions. What is almost harder to bear, clearly for him, is the impact on his wife and family. His account of his treatment by psychiatrists is highly critical, while much more praise is given to others in mental health services and especially the police. He is also interesting how his class and education help him elude services which probably wouldn’t happen for others.