I recently received a press release about HealthBookSummaries.com, a new website that provides condensed summaries of health books for free.

Always interested in freebies, I registered (yes, you have to register), sent an email about the site to three of my friends (you get a free copy of Natural Appetite Suppressants for Safe, Effective Weight Loss when you do), and then began browsing the free books.

So far, the library only consists of a handful of health books, and I didn’t see any that are directly related to mental illness; however, I did find a few that were related to mental health, the mind, thought processes, prescription medicine, etc., including:

• Selling Sickness: How the World’s Biggest Pharmaceutical Companies Are Turning Us All into Patients
• The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter and Miracles
• Natural Health Solutions: And the Conspiracy to Keep You From Knowing About Them
• Beyond Medicine: Exploring a New Way of Thinking
• Spiritual Nutrition: Six Foundations for Spiritual Life and the Awakening of Kundalini

If any of these sound interesting to you, or if you want to find more, check out HealthBookSummaries.com. Or, read on for the press release to learn more about the site.

Revolutionary HealthBookSummaries.com service delivers summaries of top health books from the industry’s best authors for free

The top health information from the industry’s best authors is available in book summary format from a new service that delivers this important information directly to readers.

(September 17, 2008) — A new service launched by health authors Mike Adams and Kevin Gianni will utterly transform the way the average reader gets their health information.

HealthBookSummaries.com delivers condensed summaries of books on health, nutrition and natural living… all for free. The website works with the industry’s top authors and publishers to obtain the rights to publish summaries of the very best books on health, fitness, nutrition, green living, and much more. Information-rich summaries of each book are then created and put into non-copy-protected, downloadable PDF files (Adobe Acrobat) that can be printed or read on any computer.

The service is funded by select sponsors whose ads appear in the summary documents. Current HealthBookSummary sponsors include Organic Food Bar, Wellness Resources, Nutrex Hawaii , Vitacost, Living Fuel, Boku Superfood, Bodhi Soap Nuts and Renegade Health. These sponsors cover the costs of producing and distributing the book summaries, giving registered readers full access to the most concentrated source of health knowledge that’s ever been offered at no cost.

Readers who wish to sign up for the service can just go to www.HealthBookSummaries.com and enter their e-mail address for immediate access to the summary downloads.

“To create HealthBookSummaries.com, we’ve selected the very best books from pioneering authors who truly ‘get it’ about nutrition, disease reversal, green living and fitness,” says co-founder Adams . “These are authors like Dr. Gabriel Cousens, David Wolfe, Ray Moynihan, Bruce Lipton, Brendan Brazier… readers can invest just a few minutes reading HealthBookSummaries and they’ll be exposed to the knowledge benefits that would normally require hours of time.

Each summary is available at no charge by registering at www.HealthBookSummaries.com/Register.html. Companies interested in sponsoring future summaries can contact Health Book Summaries Inc. by e-mailing sponsors@healthbooksummaries.com.

Image: SXC

Post from: Blisstree

HealthBookSummaries.com Offers Health Books For Free

Hey everyone, the contest results are in!

AngieLov is the winner of a copy of Dr. David Clarke’s They Can’t Find Anything Wrong! 7 Keys to Understanding, Treating, and Healing Stress Illness!

Thanks to everyone who entered (and especially to those of you who increased your odds by entering more than once!), and stay tuned for another book giveaway next week!

Image: Dr. David Clarke/Sentient Publications

Post from: Blisstree

Winner Of Dr. David Clarke’s They Can’t Find Anything Wrong!

In July 1993, after a tumultuous relationship filled with emotions from each end of the spectrum and everywhere in between, C. Comfort Shields’s college boyfriend and first true love, Ben, drove from Washington, D.C. to Maine and shot himself in the head, completing the suicide he’d been flirting with since she met him 18 months before.

What Shields didn’t really know at the time, however, was that the 18 months she knew Ben was just the tail end of a mental hurricane that had spiraled so out of control no amount of love from anyone could have kept Ben alive. How does one compete with an army of prostitutes, years of troubled family relationships, and deep insecurities and confusion galore?

There comes a point when a person’s only hope for life is his will to keep breathing, and Ben just didn’t have that will anymore.

Surviving Ben’s Suicide: A Women’s Journey of Self-Discovery is exactly what the title suggests. It’s the memoir of a woman who doesn’t just survive the suicide of a loved one, but who also grows along the way and becomes more aware of herself, her abilities, and all the things over which she has no control. And, while the journey of self-discovery is never truly complete for any of us, Shields is one of the lucky few who has grown enough to realize her past is an assortment of valuable experiences and memories – some crystal clear and others a bit out of focus – from which she can find guidance but in which she should never remain for too long.

Naturally, Shields experiences a montage of emotions after Ben’s suicide. Like many survivors, she feels somewhat responsible for Ben’s success at killing himself. She wonders if there were anything she could have said or done differently to prevent his death. Shields is also angry, comparing Ben’s exit to the accidental death of her high school friend and wondering why Ben would choose to take his life when her friend’s had been unwillingly taken from her.

She also feels a bit “left out,” as she was Ben’s girlfriend (not his wife), and not only struggles with Ben’s family’s decision to keep some things private from her, but also struggles with finding resources geared toward people who’ve lost girlfriends and boyfriends to suicide.

As the years pass, however, Shields begins to use her experience with Ben and his suicide to handle new situations. She realizes she can’t “save” a depressed friend she suspects may be suicidal and actually backs out of the friend’s life to allow the girl to seek professional help. And, when she almost loses her first son in delivery and does lose a twin during her second pregnancy, she understands even as a mother she can’t fully protect her children or be completely responsible for their development.

Often times we must rely on help from professionals, and sometimes even they can’t control or fix everything.

Reading Surviving Ben’s Suicide is akin to picking up the phone or sitting down to coffee with a friend you haven’t seen in a long while – a friend who’s experienced some pretty intense things in your absence. From the day she meets Ben to the day she marries her husband, Shields covers various time periods in her memoir, informally blending them all together to tell her story. I am very glad I listened.

To learn more about C. Comfort Shields and Surviving Ben’s Suicide, visit ConfortShields.com.

Image: Amazon

Post from: Blisstree

Book Review: Surviving Ben’s Suicide

It took me much longer than I anticipated to read Bruce Goldstein’s Puppy Chow Is Better Than Prozac – The True Story Of A Man And The Dog Who Saved His Life. Not because the book was a difficult read (on the contrary, it was quite an easy read, especially given Goldstein’s conversational writing tone) and not because I didn’t like it (I did like it). It took me so long to read the book because once I sat down to read, I was completely engrossed.

So, I quickly learned that I could only curl up with Puppy Chow Is Better Than Prozac and a cup of coffee when I had absolutely nothing else to do for the rest of the evening, which turned out to be about one evening every week or two.

Not an ideal reading speed, but well worth it.

It’s clear throughout the beginning of the book that, had he never had bipolar disorder, Bruce Goldstein might have been one of the people who contribute to the stigma that surrounds mental illness. Quietly, of course, and perhaps completely unknowingly, because he doesn’t strike me as the kind of person who would have openly and consciously stigmatized; Goldstein was simply a product of a society that, for the life of it, still isn’t as educated about mental health as it should be – a society that can’t get past the “crazy people in the movies, psychopathic killers” who surely were the kinds of people who needed psychiatrists. It seems his thoughts during the beginning of his symptoms, and then treatment, are not really about getting better, but about hurrying up and getting better because he’s not crazy damn it and no, no, no he’s not bipolar and he’ll be damned if he takes medication.

That is, until he can’t handle the knives in the kitchen sink telling him to kill himself anymore.

Over the course of 41 fairly short chapters and an epilogue, and in a tone that suggests the two of you are sitting on a park bench having a regular conversation, Bruce Goldstein very openly tells the story of his beginning battles with bipolar disorder, his struggles with finding the right mental health professionals and “cocktail” of medication, and his decision to wage war with Hurricane Bertha in order to claim Ozzy, the black male Labrador that plays a key role in saving Goldstein’s sanity, and possibly his life.

Like all new dog owners, Goldstein soon discovers that raising a puppy isn’t all slobbery kisses and wagging tails. Once Goldstein feels comfortable enough with Ozzy to actually take him home, he realizes owning a dog is work. Real, committed, sleep-deprived work. (I laughed at Goldstein’s frustration at trying to potty train Ozzy, and his excitement when he eventually started adding one, two, and three hours to his sleep schedule – I’ve been there!)

Unlike many new dog owners, however, Goldstein realizes that he has to learn how to manage his bipolar disorder and take care of Ozzy.

Dog poo won’t wait on the owner’s depression to pass before it needs to pass, after all.

In addition to forcing him to leave the house, showing him unconditional love, and reminding him that the world doesn’t stop spinning just because the throes of mania are on the horizon, Ozzy also teaches Goldstein a very valuable life lesson about patience. One passage that stuck the most with me comes from Chapter 18, page 143:

Patience, now there’s a new word in my vocabulary. There weren’t any short cuts. Raising a puppy was going to take a lot of time and energy. I had a lot of hard work ahead of me. Starting immediately.

Not only is patience something dog owners have to learn, but it’s also something people with mental illness have to learn. Goldstein clearly illustrates the importance of patience when he tells us about his frustrations with trying to hurry up and get better, i.e. find the right mix of therapy and medicine to get control of his bipolar disorder, and some people think Goldstein isn’t being rational when they find out he wants to add the additional patience-zapping presence of a helpless puppy.

However, after conquering manic shopping sprees for pet supplies, surviving their first serious trip to the vet’s office, and making tons of new friends, Goldstein and Ozzy triumphantly emerge from the sleepless nights and pee-stained hallways as an unbeatable team.

I highly recommend Puppy Chow Is Better Than Prozac to anyone with a mental illness or a loved one with a mental illness. Not only does the book offer a good look at the struggles and successes a person with a mental illness experiences (as well as all the other health problems and situations we experience in life, such as Goldstein’s Crohn’s Disease and devastating break up with his first true love), it also offers insight to additional recovery options. While I don’t think taking on more responsibility would be the right choice for everyone (we’re all different), it was right for Goldstein and it may be right for others.

To learn more about Bruce, Ozzy, and the book that’s made them famous, check out the Web site, Puppy Chow Is Better Than Prozac. And, if you’ve already read the book and want to share your thoughts, feel free to leave them in the comments!

Image: Courtesy of Da Capo Press/Perseus Books

Post from: Blisstree

Book Review: Puppy Chow Is Better Than Prozac

Last week, I published an interview with Dr. David Clarke regarding his professional experiences with stress illness and his book on the subject, They Can’t Find Anything Wrong!: 7 Keys to Understanding, Treating, and Healing Stress Illness.

This week, Dr. Clarke, Sentient Publications, and I are offering you the chance to win your own copy of They Can’t Find Anything Wrong!

To enter the contest, you must:

• Be at least 18 years old and live in the continental United States
• Leave a comment on this blog post giving an example of one side effect of stress you’ve experienced. The side effect can be mental or physical. Note that comments like “awesome contest!” or “I want to win!” will be disqualified if they don’t also include one side effect of stress you’ve experienced. (Too, you can enter the contest as many times as you like, but each entry must contain a different side effect of stress you’ve experienced.)
• Make sure you enter a valid email address in the comment box labeled “Mail.” You can enter the contest anonymously (i.e. leave a screen name or otherwise fake name in the “Name” section), but you must put a valid email address in the “Mail” space (it doesn’t show up for the public to see); otherwise, I can’t contact you if you’re the winner!
• Do it all before midnight (Eastern Time) Thursday, September 4, 2008!

I will select the winner using the List Randomizer tool at Random.org, and announce the winner on the morning of Friday, September 5, 2008.

Good luck!

Image: Dr. David Clarke/Sentient Publications

Post from: Blisstree

Contest: Win A Copy Of Dr. David Clarke’s They Can’t Find Anything Wrong!

Today’s Mental Health Notes post is a treat indeed, as I was able to interview Dr. David Clarke, author of They Can’t Find Anything Wrong!: 7 Keys to Understanding, Treating, and Healing Stress Illness.

Dr. Clarke defines “stress illness” as an illness that is caused by various kinds of life stresses, both past and present.

Read on as Dr. Clarke explains how we can spot, diagnosis, and treat stress illness; provides suggestions on how to deal with doctors who may not appropriately handle stress illness; and offers eight little words that can change the way you look at your health.

Mental Health Notes: In a brief nutshell, They Can’t Find Anything Wrong! is a book about stress illness. Can you tell us exactly what stress illness is, and what prompted you to tackle this subject?

Dr. David Clarke: As the name implies, stress illness is illness caused by any of several types of past or present life stresses. The physical symptoms are just as real and can be just as severe as those caused by any other disease.

My interest in this condition began 25 years ago when I encountered patients whose diagnostic tests were all normal. I didn’t know these patients had stress illness because medical training pays little attention to this condition, even though over half of all medical patients fall into this category. Fortunately, I learned how to solve these medical mysteries from a psychiatrist who was also trained in diagnostic medicine. She taught me that by asking the right questions I could find the cause of the symptoms and then treat them successfully.

MHN: Did you write the book with a particular audience in mind, or can everyone benefit?

DC: The book will benefit three groups of people: medical patients whose illness is not explained by diagnostic tests, their doctors and anyone who is struggling with stress in their life whether they are physically ill or not.

The heart of the book is four dozen stories about people who overcame a variety of life stresses. They achieved this even though initially they often did not fully comprehend what they were coping with. The stories enable readers to gain insight into their own lives, which is the essential first step toward positive change.

MHN: If a person has a stress illness, are there any clues they can detect on their own? Do these clues have anything to do with the “five types of hidden stress” you cover in your book?

DC: The five types of stress are prolonged effects of stress from childhood, stress in your life at the moment and three mental health conditions: depression, anxiety disorders and post-traumatic stress. The presence of any of these may be largely or completely hidden. The most important clue that a hidden stress may be responsible for an illness is that diagnostic tests fail to reveal a cause for the physical symptoms. Some other clues that you might have a hidden stress are that you:

1. Would never want an innocent child to grow up experiencing what you did as a child.
2. Always seem to find yourself in relationships where you are treated disrespectfully.
3. Have lost interest or pleasure in activity you previously enjoyed.
4. Care for everyone else in your world but rarely take time for yourself.
5. Have a low general energy level.
6. Feel depressed, down or sad much of the time.
7. Are unable to control or stop feeling anxious, worried, on edge or nervous.
8. Are bothered by unwanted memories from a traumatic, terrifying or horrifying personal experience.
9. If you had a list of everything in your life that causes stress, tension, worry, anger or fear you would feel sorry if a friend was coping with the same list.
10. Have an addiction or an eating disorder.
11. Cut, burn or otherwise deliberately injure yourself.

MHN: What are the most common physical health problems that stress can cause? Have you stumbled upon any “uncommon” physical health problems caused by stress?

DC: Symptoms can occur anywhere from head to toe and include pain, dizziness, muscle or joint stiffness, difficulty breathing, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, constipation, fatigue, sleeping problems and many others. The symptoms in stress illness are just as real and can be just as severe as the symptoms of any other disease. Some of my patients have been hospitalized and a few have even had surgery that, of course, did not help. Though many stress illness patients have just one symptom, the more symptoms a patient has the more likely it is that stress illness is responsible.

Sometimes stress illness causes unusual symptoms. One of my patients had itching of patches of his skin in a different bodily location each day. For example, one day his hands would itch, the next day the itching was between the shoulder blades, the day after that his upper left chest would itch and so on. Another patient had pain on the left side of her body from the armpit to the upper thigh. Despite their unusual nature, the symptoms in both of these patients were relieved after one and eighteen months respectively.

MHN: Of the “7 Keys to Understanding, Treating, and Healing Stress Illness,” is there any one more important than the other? Is there one that you would encourage readers to remember, even if they didn’t understand anything else in the book?

DC: The 7 Keys work together like the segments of an arch to build a foundation for positive life changes. So it is difficult to single one out. But if I had to select one concept that may stand out a little, it is that the childhood environment for about half of my adult patients left them with an inaccurate, negative self-image. This can have a subtle but significant adverse impact on their lives that my patients usually do not fully recognize. The book will give readers insights in this area that can change how they live every day.

MHN: Do you think some doctors are unwilling to delve into stress-related illnesses? And if so, why? Are the steps to diagnosis too complicated, or are the doctors too narrow minded?

DC: Few doctors have had any formal training about stress illness. Consequently, many are frustrated by their inability to diagnose it or they conclude that the condition is not part of their job. This is unacceptable for an illness that is responsible for over half of all medical office visits. Fortunately, most health care professionals who read my book can learn to correctly diagnose and treat most patients with stress illness.

MHN: What advice would you offer someone who is clearly ill, but can’t find a doctor who’s willing to look beyond the lack of physical explanations?

DC: This is a tragically common situation. Many people experience relief of symptoms from reading my book and following its treatment advice. Those who remain ill should communicate the personal insights they acquire from the book to their health care provider and ask for additional advice. These patients may benefit from referral to a mental health professional, from prescription medication or from additional counseling by their primary clinician. They may also benefit from the information on the website www.stressillness.com.

MHN: Are people who suffer from undiagnosed stress illness more prone to self-medicate?

DC: When significant life stresses are hidden it is difficult or impossible to change them significantly. The resulting emotional pain may be severe with no obvious source of relief. Some people in this situation will find no better solution than to relieve the suffering with drugs, alcohol or tobacco. Some patients develop other addictions such as to work, exercise, shopping, food, gambling or sex and some develop eating disorders or engage in self-mutilation. A tragic few commit suicide.

MHN: In your experience, have you ever met a patient who suffered from a stress illness and had trouble getting his or her insurance carrier to cover the cost of care?

DC: No. Insurance carriers see little difference between a patient with, say, abdominal pain from an ulcer and a patient with abdominal pain from stress illness. Unfortunately, most health insurance companies have not yet recognized how much unnecessary diagnostic testing occurs when clinicians fail to diagnose stress illness correctly. I am optimistic that in the future they will all insist on a routine stress evaluation.

MHN: They Can’t Find Anything Wrong! has received rave reviews from people in various health professions and patients alike. If, in 20 years, no one can remember a thing from it, is there one bit of information you hope they will retain?

DC: Just eight words: Stress Causes Real Symptoms, Effective Treatment Is Available.

MHN: I think that definitely sums it up nicely. Thank you for your time, Dr. Clarke!

Dr. David Clarke received his B. A. in psychology from Williams College (Phi Beta Kappa), and his medical degree from the University of Connecticut in 1979. Since then he has successfully cared for thousands of patients with stress illness, often sent to him after other doctors were unable to help them. He has been a visiting professor at several international hospitals, including Oxford. He was also named a Top Doctor in the Portland Monthly magazine physician review in 2005 and 2006.

Dr. Clarke is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine and Senior Scholar at the Center for Ethics in Health care both at Oregon Health and Science University. He is also a Clinical Instructor at Pacific University and a member of the Academy of Psychosomatic Medicine. He is board-certified in Gastroenterology and Internal Medicine, and has practiced in Portland, Oregon since 1984. He was Ethics Director for his medical group from 2005 to 2008.

David Clarke has received numerous awards for excellence in patient care. He developed and presented a monthly seminar on stress illness for patients and local doctors have given their patients tens of thousands of copies of his brochure on this topic. He lives in Happy Valley, Oregon, which is near Portland.

Thanks to Dr. Clarke and Sentient Publications, Mental Health Notes will soon hold a contest to win a free copy of They Can’t Find Anything Wrong!: 7 Keys to Understanding, Treating, and Healing Stress Illness. In the meantime, you can learn more at www.stressillness.com, and even order a copy today from Amazon and Borders.

Images: Dr. David Clarke

Post from: Blisstree

Dr. David Clarke Speaks About Stress Illness And His Book, They Can’t Find Anything Wrong!

I can’t believe I just discovered this.

And, in all honesty, I didn’t discover it. My mother, who’s obsessed with freebies, discovered it.

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) offers tons of mental health publications, brochures, posters, notepads, and cards for you to order – for free.

I know, I was ecstatic, too.

And why I say “tons,” I mean tons. From anti-stigma posters to advocacy magnets to useful notepads to informational brochures, SAMHSA has it covered.

These are excellent items for everyone – mental health consumers and their loved ones, mental health advocates, and mental health professionals – so visit their order page and see if there’s something there for you!

Image: SXC

Post from: Blisstree

Mental Health Freebies Galore!