Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family Hardcover – Illustrated, April 7, 2020

Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family by Robert Kolker is a very highly recommended true family drama and medical detective story following the Galvin family.Between 1945 and 1965 Don and Mimi Galvin had 12 children, 10 sons first and then 2 daughters. Later 6 of the boys were diagnosed with schizophrenia. This is the inside true story of their family, including the violent wrestling matches between the older brothers, the seemingly perfect father, the control Mimi exercised over them, the hidden sexual abuse, and the feelings of abandonment by younger siblings. Once their first born, Donald, began exhibiting mental issues and was later diagnosed as schizophrenic, they tried to keep the truth hidden as long as possible. By the 1970's six of their sons who were diagnosed as schizophrenic and the families secret could no longer be hidden. Soon Mimi was spending all her time and energy trying to help the "sick" boys while basically leaving the "healthy" children to their own devices.It is also the story of the history of schizophrenia and the medical advancements made during this time. Kolker follows the background information about the history of schizophrenia and the psychiatric, chemical, and biological advancements in treatment were interesting. The various treatments the brothers endured are shared and the struggles they had taking their medication as the professionals searched to find a treatment that worked for the brothers. Because so many siblings in one family were diagnosed with schizophrenia, the Galvins became one of the first families to be studied by the National Institute of Mental Health is the search for a genetic marker for the disease. Samples of their DNA are still being used in genetic research today. This research continues to influence treatment, prediction of the disease occurring and hopefully a way to prevent the disease in the future.This is in turn a heart breaking and fascinating well-written and researched account. It is truly an honest portrait of a family in crisis. Kolker follows each family member, their place in the family, and their story with empathy and honesty. It is easy to judge Mimi's actions, but at the same time impossible to do so unless you were in her situation. She really seemed to handle the mental breakdowns of her sons as most people from her generation would and her own background also influenced this. The recounting of the family's history and suffering is handled with compassion. This is not always an easy read, but it is an eye opening and engrossing narrative.

Well written, fascinating story, especially if you have an interest in psychiatry.

What an amazing story and family. I feel like I have been on a roller coaster ride. I highly recommend this book for anyone who has family with a serious mental illness or who has an interest in how society treats or mistreats those who have a serious mental illness. This books focuses mostly on schizophrenia, but as you read through the experience of the family, individual family members, and the research, you realize that there is likely a spectrum that includes schizophrenia, bipolar disorder (manic depressive illness) , autism, or any condition that includes psychosis.“Each passing year brings more evidence that psychosis exists on a spectrum, with new genetic studies showing overlap between schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, and bipolar disorder and autism.”“For a family, schizophrenia is, primarily, a felt experience, as if the foundation of the family is permanently tilted in the direction of the sick family member.”How profoundly families are affected by mental illness. Both the “abnormal” family members and the “normal”.This excellent achievement in story telling is the true story of a family in Colorado who had 6 sons out of a family of 12 children, who developed schizophrenia. The disease manifested differently in different sons, but the results for the family were fairly devastating. Those children not diagnosed were terribly affected by inattention, abuse at the hands of the schizophrenics, or non validation of their altered lives and experiences because of parental overwhelm in dealing with the sick.“By one measure, those diagnosed take up a third of all the psychiatric hospital beds in the United States.”“One out of every twenty cases of schizophrenia ends in suicide.”We are treated here to a history of the nature versus nurture debate. The Freudian approach. The terrible mother approach. “Mother blaming became an industry standard for psychiatry”. And then the search for a genetic cause as the psychoanalysis approach was discarded for more biological constructs is disease. “For decades, doctors have been treating schizophrenia pharmacologically without a clear understanding of the biology of the illness.”Many promising avenues of research are presented, showing an almost certain genetic causation.“families with a history of schizophrenia seemed more than four times as likely as the rest of the population to pass along the condition to future generations—”Some potential treatments are discarded because of lack of potential financial gain by the pharmaceutical industry. Some changes have even made their way into changes in prenatal vitamins as a means to prevent the development of these significant mental disorders.“In 2017, the American Medical Association approved a resolution that prenatal vitamins should include higher levels of choline to help prevent the onset of schizophrenia and other brain developmental disorders.”What we must conclude is that the complicated picture is one of a blend between nature and nurture. An inherited genetic tendency towards schizophrenia which blooms with life stressors watering and tending the substrate in the brain. We hear of excessive pruning of synapses in adolescence as the disease is taking hold, robbing the person of brain power they would need to have to more normally handle life as they pass through adolescence (when schizophrenia generally begins manifesting) and adulthood. We see how nicotine receptors in the brain are so intimately involved and this is why people afflicted are so addicted to smoking, as it has a calming affect on this parts of the brain negatively impacted by the disease.“The α7 receptor, however, stood out from the crowd because of its special relationship with nicotine. No one experiences this more vividly than habitual smokers: Nicotine has a way of turbocharging the effects of the acetylcholine that this receptor needs in order to function, and smokers—or the α7 receptors in their brains—like it when their acetylcholine is turbocharged. This is the feeling cigarettes can give smokers—that way nicotine has of focusing their minds for short periods, or calming them. Could it just be a coincidence, Freedman wondered, that many schizophrenia patients—Peter Galvin among them—can’t get enough cigarettes? For very brief moments, nicotine may offer them at least some relief from their delusions.”You may ask how this affects you? Why should you be interested? Well, we all pay for untreated mental illness in one way or another. Societal resources are drained. We lose potentially productive members of society, people who might have much to teach us about different ways of seeing “normal”. But nearly half of school shooters show evidence of either developing, or already fully manifested schizophrenia. Most schizophrenics are not violent, but clearly there is something here. And then remember the spectrum. For those of us who painfully watch ill family members, worrying about losing them to incoherency, to violence, or to the clutches of a profession that clearly does not know enough to affect a cure, this is important material that gives hope that more understanding is coming, and with it more effective treatments and even preventive strategies for identifying those at risk and treating before these devastating illnesses take hold and begin their destruction.Excellent read!

La narrativa de Kolker nos remite a terrenos inquietantes de la dinámica familiar y las enfermedades mentales que con frecuencia se soslayan, anteponiendo la necesidad de pertenencia social a la de procurar una solución a males que desde tiempos freudianos la psiquiatría no acierta a concertar.

Siamo negli anni '40, la vita di Mimi e Don Galvin era perfetta, o almeno così sembrava: dopo la fine della guerra Don ottiene un ottimo impiego nell'esercito e il nucleo familiare non fa che allagarsi. Dodici bambini in tutto, dieci maschi e due femmine, tutti dal bell'aspetto e intelligenti.Ma le cose iniziano a cambiare quando il maggiore dei figli, Donald, inizia a comportarsi in modo strano seguito da altri cinque dei fratelli minori.In questo romanzo autobiografico si ripercorrerà la tragica storia della famiglia Galvin, sopratutto dal punto di vista della figlia minore Mary. Non mancano sezioni esplicative sulla neuropsichiatria e sul suo sviluppo.Un colpo allo stomaco.Un resoconto brillante, pagine pregne di dolore e sofferenza e una ricerca scientifica ancora aperta.La scrittura di Kolker è molto coinvolgente e riesce a trasmettere il senso di oppressione e disorientamento che i membri della famiglia Galvin hanno vissuto per anni.Il senso di pesantezza che aleggiava a Hidden Valley Road attraversa le pagine.Il libro non si limita a raccontare la storia dei singoli componenti della famiglia ma offre anche una panoramica sulla schizofrenia in generale, sui suoi sintomi e sui suoi effetti sulle relazioni interpersonali.A volte la lettura può risultare lenta ma a me è piaciuta molto. Consiglio libri su : @modularbookshelf

Unglaublich bewegende Familiengeschichte, die in diesem Buch sachlich und trotzdem mit viel Herz und Respekt erzählt wird.Das Buch würde ich jedem empfehlen, der sich mit dem Thema Schizophrenie beschäftigt oder daran interessiert ist.Die Kapitel über die Entwicklung der Forschung haben mir geholfen die heutigen Diagnosekriterien besser zu verstehen.

Historia verídica.

✒ Book Review:HIDDEN VALLEY ROAD by Robert Kolker 5/5 👌🏼📖"He was the perfect son in his parents eyes....but he had know even in his teen years that something was off." Robert KolkerI am huge nonfiction reader, and this title Hidden Valley Road was the catch for me to buy this book, plus seeing the cover of the book with 12 children is incredible! The book takes deeply dive in the darkest family secret.Author takes good care of developing the characters of the Galvin family, and you can feel when something deeply is happening. Robert Kolker has done great homework and hand out interesting knowledge about the changing attitudes towards Schizophrenia along the way from that time to today.For me it is fascinating and also heartbreaking story. I recommend this book to everyone who have an interest in the mental illness, because you can learn something new reading the Hidden Valley Road. PS: English isn’t my mother tongue. I apologize for my mistakes. 🤗