Hidden Valley Road, Robert Kolker

 

Hidden Valley Road: Inside the mind of an American family by Robert Kolker was recommended by my parents.  It is a story of a mental health problem that runs through a large family.

Started: 5/25/2021
Completed: 5/28/2021
Recommendation: Highly Recommended
Recommended By: My parents

Words for which I sought help:

aphasia -- loss of ability to understand or express speech, caused by brain damage

funicular -- a cable railroad, especially one on a mountainside, in which ascending and descending cars are counterbalanced

obstreperous -- noisy and difficult to control

Review:

I really did not want to read this book.  Who wants to read about the horror of a bunch of schizophrenic children?  In general, I'm not thrilled about large families either.  My parents, however, insisted that this was an important book to read.  So, I read it.

Make sure that your prenatal vitamin has lots of choline.

All of the children in this family suffered.  They suffered because of mental illness and an inability to provide help (in part because the family was too large for a single income).  The healthy children suffered from physical abuse (both received and doled out) as well as the anxiety and other traumas that comes with living among the mentally ill.  The family was too large for the parents to provide the intense and personalized support that normal children need, forget the support that mentally ill children require.  It is clear that even with time and resources, these parents had some serious problems themselves that would have prevented them from providing the kind of loving environment the children needed.

It is amazing that science can study a family like this.  It is not amazing that such a family exists.  I just don't know what to say.  This book is absolutely worth a read.  It is worth suffering through the appropriately described trauma.