Cell 2 Soul: The Humane Health Care Blog

Giving You Drugs Won't Help Your Husband

“Are you not giving me any medicine?” her patient asked?

Ms. Shahab was silent for a moment, and then said with a sympathetic gaze, “Medicine for you will not cure your abusive husband.”

"The therapist was born in the isolated Afghan village she still lives in, in 1987 or 1988 — she is not sure. Her father was shot and killed at his mosque shortly before she was born. The reasons for the killing remain unclear, but it shattered their family and forever changed life for Ms. Shahab and her two siblings.

Ms. Shahab and Client (NY Times)

"A marriage was arranged to a man almost 20 years her senior when she was only 13. But the marriage did not stop her from completing her education. She took two of her youngest children with her to school, placing them at the kindergarten as she attended classes."

She is now a therapist in the village, caring for women battered by family and war.

This is an inspiring article:  Afghan Therapist Finds Empathy is Good Medicine.

 

A 500 Pound Amoeba

 

A 500 Pound Amoeba
and Other Psychiatric Tales

 

Steve Sobel is a practicing psychiatrist in northern Vermont. "A 500 Pound Amoeba" is a collection of 10 compelling vignettes of patients with psychiatric illnesses. These comprise depression, mania, OCD, body dysmorphic disorder, borderline personality, generalized anxiety disorder, schizophrenia, acrophobia, psychotic depression, and dementia. The stories are told with great sensitivity. Each one is divided into two parts. The first describing the illness as appreciated from the patient’s vantage point and the second explains the clinician’s approach and touches on the doctor-patient relationship.

We have all known patients like the composites Dr. Sobel eloquently conveys. As physicians, we have all had patients like these. Sobel’s narrative style is easy to read and follow.  These tales afford profound insights into the illnesses covered.

This slender volume of less than 130 pages will make compelling reading for physicians, mental health professionals, trainees, medical students and all others with an interest in mental health.  Sobel has a humble, gentle, compassionate writing style and the tales are memorable. The narrative form employed also serves as a template for the presentation of similar patients.  Reading "A 500 Pound Amoeba" one recalls Oliver Sacks' "The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat" but I found Sobel's book less didacticand more humane.

A 500 Pound Amoeba is available at Amazon for around $10 and also on Kindle for $7.