Journal 3-3/12/09

As a group, we question her biased opinion on the drugs that many mental patients take and are prescribed. They may work not well for her, but for others the drug may have a different effect since they affect everyone differently. To check this information out, we could do more background research on the drugs that she talks about in the book and read up on them. There are many studies being done on drugs dealing with mental ill patients and depression patients, so they would help with clearing the air on the drugs.

Another thing that we question as a group is the hospitals/institutions that she is staying in. Since she is a patient on the inside, she is biased towards where she is staying and how much she is paying etc. She doesn't know how much or the kind of outside work that is being done to keep the place running and functioning as a hospital. To get more information on this subject, it would be a good idea to research the kinds of places that she stays. This would be a little difficult because Vincent used pseudonym names for the places she stays at, but we would research in general the types of places. For example, a public mental hospital, a private Catholic hospital, and then a sort of "new age" hospital.

To make the information presented easy to understand, Vincent talks as a normal human being. Her writing is a very loose style, and she doesn't use a lot of jargon to try to make her sound more professional. She knows a lot about the subject, so she knows how to word her knowledge and explains the types of drugs that we aren't familiar with.

There are many places where we could look for more information on this topic. W.H, a reviewer on amazon.com, recommends The Center Cannot Hold by Elyn R. Saks, The Quiet Room by Lori Schiller, and An Unquiet Mind by Kary Redfield Jamison for more material on mental illness and it's treatment. Books are a great way to learn more information about an unkown topic. Another great way to learn more is to get in contact with a Psychiatrist and talk with them because it would be a good biased in contrast with Vincent. We could also try to visit a mental hospital to try to experience it first hand.