“There was a way in which, for some people, the hospital could be a refuge or a haven, and I don’t think that’s true anymore.”
Photo-Illustration: by The Cut; Photos: Michael Lionstar, Penguin Random Houseauthor Susanna Kaysen got treatment after a suicide attempt in the late 1960s, she encountered a burn victim who had set herself on fire. In the memoir, Kaysen wonders about the moment the woman lit the match, questioning whether she’d felt the same “inspiration” that Kaysen herself did before swallowing a bottle of painkillers, walking out into traffic, and collapsing.
I’m glad I left so much out. One shouldn’t say this about one’s own work, but I think it’s one of the good things about the book that I left so many particulars about myself out. I wouldn’t put anything more in. There’s a kind of blankness, to some extent, to my portrayal of myself. It leaves a lot of room.
As you note, the mental-health field and inpatient care has changed a lot since your time in the hospital. People don’t stay hospitalized for as long, and stigmas about mental illness are waning in some ways. What do you see as the most positive changes you’ve seen in the field of mental-health care today?I think there’s a little less stigma, but that has a bad side, which is that people tend now to medicalize themselves and to say,, when maybe they’re just sad.
I think perhaps people underestimate just how disruptive the pandemic has been. It isn’t over, but we’re pretending it’s over because we have to live with it the way it is now. But those two years were so incredibly upsetting for everybody. Even if you didn’t get sick yourself, even if you didn’t lose a family member or a close friend — and there’s very few people who didn’t — what happened to society was terrifying, especially if you were young. I’m not young anymore, and it terrified me.
I’m miserable. Life hasn’t turned out the way I wanted or the way I thought it would be. I’m 19 and I never went to my high-school graduation.It probably varies. There’s a certain safety in naming things; it closes off thought. It’s not accurate to say it absolves the person of responsibility, but it kind of does.
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