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Kay Redfield Jamison

Kay Redfield Jamison Quotes

Psychologist

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Famous Kay Redfield Jamison Quotes

“Far too many doctors-many of them excellent physicians-commit suicide each year; one recent study concluded that, until quite recently, the United States lost annually the equivalent of a medium-sized medical school class from suicide alone. Most physician suicides are due to depression or manic-depressive illness, both of which are eminently treatable. Physicians, unfortunately, not only suffer from a higher rate of mood disorders than the general population, they also have a greater access to very effective means of suicide.”

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Book:An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness
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“There is an assumption, in attaching Puritan concepts such as 'successful' and 'unsuccessful' to the awful, final act of suicide, that those who 'fail' at killing themselves not only are weak, but incompetent, incapable even of getting their dying quite right.”

SuccessfulFailingDyingConceptsWeakSuicideKillingFinalsAwfulAssumptionIncapableIncompetentPuritanUnsuccessful
Book:An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness
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“Manic-depression distorts moods and thoughts, incites dreadful behaviors, destroys the basis of rational thought, and too often erodes the desire and will to live. It is an illness that is biological in its origins, yet one that feels psychological in the experience of it, an illness that is unique in conferring advantage and pleasure, yet one that brings in its wake almost unendurable suffering and, not infrequently, suicide.”

FeelsDesireSufferingPleasureBehaviorUniqueAdvantageBasesSuicideIllnessMoodRationalPsychologicalBipolarManicErodeWill To LiveRational ThoughtUnendurableManic Depression
Book:An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness
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“It is tempting when looking at the life of anyone who has committed suicide to read into the decision to die a vastly complex web of reasons; and, of course, such complexity is warranted. No one illness or event causes suicide; and certainly no one knows all, or perhaps even most, of the motivations behind the killing of the self. But psychopathology is almost always there, and its deadliness is fierce. Love, success, and friendship are not always enough to counter the pain and destructiveness of severe mental illness”

KnowsSelfReasonEnoughPainMotivationDiesCoursesCausesDecisionBehindsEventsSuicideComplexesKillingIllnessCommittedMental IllnessComplexityFierceSevereTemptingPsychopathologyDestructiveness
Author:Kay Redfield Jamison
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“When people are suicidal, their thinking is paralyzed, their options appear spare or nonexistent, their mood is despairing, and hopelessness permeates their entire mental domain. The future cannot be separated from the present, and the present is painful beyond solace. ‘This is my last experiment,’ wrote a young chemist in his suicide note. ‘If there is any eternal torment worse than mine I’ll have to be shown.”

PeopleIfsThinkingLastsYoungMinesEternalSuicideNotesPainfulMoodExperimentsSparesTormentHopelessnessSuicidalDomainSolaceParalyzedChemistSuicide Note
Book:Night Falls Fast: Understanding Suicide
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“Looking at suicide—the sheer numbers, the pain leading up to it, and the suffering left behind—is harrowing. For every moment of exuberance in the science, or in the success of governments, there is a matching and terrible reality of the deaths themselves: the young deaths, the violent deaths, the unnecessary deaths”

MomentsRealityGovernmentPainYoungSufferingLeftNumbersBehindsTerribleSuicideViolentSheerUnnecessaryLeft BehindMatchingExuberanceViolent Death
Book:Night Falls Fast: Understanding Suicide
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“Suicide is a particularly awful way to die: the mental suffering leading up to it is usually prolonged, intense and unpalliated. There is no morphine equivalent to ease the acute pain, and death, not uncommonly, is violent and grisly. The suffering of a suicidal is private and inexpressible, leaving family members, friends and colleagues to deal with an almost unfathomable kind of loss, as well as guilt. Suicide carries in its aftermath a level of confusion and devastation that is, for the most part, beyond description.”

WayWellsKindPainSufferingDiesLossLevelsDealsMembersSuicideGuiltLeavingViolentIntenseConfusionAwfulEaseDescriptionCarrieColleaguesSuicidalFamily MembersAftermathDevastationUnfathomableMorphine
Book:Night Falls Fast: Understanding Suicide
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