Category: Non Fiction (Page 11 of 11)

The ADHD Effect On Marriage by Melissa Orlov

September 15, 2014 / Kyle Wendy Skultety / 0 Comments

Subtitled “Understand and rebuild your relationship in six steps”, this book is mainly geared towards those who are experiencing trouble with their ADD/ADHD mate. Both people in the relationship will see themselves portrayed authentically, with explanations of WHY they are feeling those emotions. The first few chapters explain ADHD–what it is, how the brain is affected, how it is diagnosed, and the insidious ways it can creep into your relationship/marriage and cause trouble. Orlov quotes from, and suggests reading, The Dance of Anger by Harriet G Lerner as a supplement to this book. She also sprinkles the pages with lots of stories and examples from real life men and women working to save their relationship. It’s easy to sense the frustration these people have with ADHD serving as the third wheel in their marriage, and some of the stories are quite depressing.

The second part of the book is the rebuilding part, as Orlov outlines her six steps for fixing what has gone awry. She goes out of her way to explain that it’s not the ADHD causing the person to be “broken”, but a lack of understanding how it affects the brain and how ADHD’ers see the world differently.

The six steps are: cultivating empathy, addressing obstacle emotions, getting treatment for BOTH parties (as the non ADHD’er may experience depression, anger or frustration and become resentful and/or ill), improving communication, setting boundaries, and finally, reigniting romance and having fun. As someone who truly believed that ADHD was just a convenient diagnosis for little boys with ants in their pants, I can say I was literally blown away by this book. My whole way of thinking (these people just needed to focus more, be more organized, stop daydreaming, get discipline) could not have been more wrong. ADHD’ers have heard since they were young that they were “not good enough”, they were “underachieving”, they could be “so much more if you just focused better”, and they feel unloved, abandoned, and frustrated.

I am a very organized person by nature, and dealing with a man with ADHD would be a challenge, for sure. The first step is understanding that MY way is not always the RIGHT way, and ADHD’ers need to do what works best for them. Medication is a great help, but so is communication and coping strategies. Knowing your enemy is the first step to defeating him.

Included with the book are worksheets, tools and resources that can be further utilized. Both people will come away knowing their spouse better, and themselves a little better as well.

This was the first book I read about adult ADD/ADHD, and I learned a great deal. On Goodreads, this book got mixed reviews, and most reviewers suggested reading Is It You, Me, or Adult ADD? by Gina Pera as a better source of information and assistance. I’ll be reviewing that in a future post, as I’m currently working through that now. The ADD Effect On Marriage is a good, if simple, book to read to gain understanding of adult ADHD. The advice is pretty sound, and if nothing else, you will see yourself in the anecdotes of those who have experienced a rocky road in their relationship. You will know that you are not alone in this.

[easyazon_link asin=”1886941971″ locale=”US” new_window=”default” nofollow=”default” tag=”gimmethatbook-20″ add_to_cart=”default” cloaking=”default” localization=”yes” popups=”yes”]Know someone with adult ADD? Interested in learning more, even if there is no ADD in your life? Click here to get a copy.[/easyazon_link]

The Fantastic Laboratory of Dr Weigl by Arthur Allen

August 26, 2014 / Kyle Wendy Skultety / 0 Comments

The subtitle of this book is “How two brave scientists battled typhus and sabotaged the Nazis”. Those scientists are Polish zoologist Rudolf Weigl, an unsung and mostly forgotten hero of WW2, and Ludwig Fleck, a Jewish immunologist. Both men were condemned to Buchenwald and commanded by the Nazis to concoct a vaccine against typhus, a disease equated with Jews and feared more than almost anything else.

Typhus is spread by lice, and to create this vaccine it had to be obtained from live lice, that were nourished by inmates of the concentration camp. Originally there were lice that didn’t carry typhus, and so they were given the disease, allowed to feed on human blood, and then they were sacrificed and their intestines removed and made into a kind of slurry. That’s the basic way, I suppose. However, it’s not that easy to do; but these brave men in the lab convinced the Nazis that they DID make a vaccine. And they did! Thousands of doses were sent up to Germans at the front. Those vaccines didn’t prevent anything. The small batches of protective vaccines were secretly distributed at the camps to prisoners. Gutsy!

This book has everything: stories of how Jews were abused, scientific theory, intrigue (will the lying scientists get caught?) and morality (some medical personnel felt that creating a fake vaccine went against their “do no harm” tenet and wanted to truly protect the Nazis against typhus).

Sprinkled throughout the book are tidbits of Nazi behavior, such as “The camp commander, Fritz Gebauer, was generally mild-mannered but occasionally needed to strangle a woman, an action that produced a state of red-faced passion.” That is a sentence that is hard to top. Any Holocaust deniers out there: read this book. There is NO WAY that all this was made up. Realize this now.

While I read this book, I kept thinking that the Nazis weren’t really all that gullible, were they? Apparently so. They were more interested in abusing the prisoners than checking on the scientific methods being used. The political intrigue and back stabbing gets convoluted as former enemies become friends, and vice versa.

I did learn a lot about typhus, which is always a plus for me. Give me plague and pestilence and I’m a happy camper. I also marveled at the resilience and strength of the prisoners and displaced Polish Jews of the story. Time after time I shook my head in amazement after finishing a gory paragraph or three.

This book explains an important and mostly unknown back story of WW2, and I feel better for having read it. The resilience of the human spirit is truly wonderful.

You can get a copy of your own here!

Confessions of a Sociopath by M.E. Thomas

August 17, 2014 / Kyle Wendy Skultety / 1 Comment

Sociopaths are hot topics now, apparently, as this is the second book I’ve read recently with this subject matter. What makes this one different is that it’s written by an actual, authentic, self proclaimed and later-diagnosed, sociopath. She describes her life from childhood, as she grows up, interacts with others, and ponders (ad nauseum) her every move and why she is wonderful.

Goodreads has so many scathing reviews on this book, I laughed out loud. Unfortunately, here is another one to throw on the pile. I realize that she is a sociopath, and that she is expected to be a megalomaniac and self promoting. However, her stories seem full of detail, all contradictory. She will say she had an awful childhood and was beaten, then later on she will wax nostalgic about how her parents loved her and did nothing but the best for her. Most of her tales describe how she has no emotion, for a crying friend, for animals that need help, for no one and nothing. I found this to be tiresome after the first third of the book. By page 166 I loathed her, not for her alleged sociopathy, but for her boring writing style and major self absorption. I think this person, if she really does exist, has Borderline Personality Disorder. Her exploits at using and “ruining” (her words) people just made me roll my eyes and want to smack her. Actually, leaving her alone and not basking in the glow of her wonderfulness would probably hurt her more.

Oh, but that’s right–she has no emotion. Other than that, she is perfect in every way, and is making the world better by her cunning ways and ability to cut through to what is needed most.

I can’t even write this review without rolling my eyes and sneering. Sorry. And as a final note, one I’ve not seen mentioned in any other reviews, is that her use of a certain italic font, is disturbing and disconcerting. I’m not sure of the typeface, but it’s very hard to read, due to the unusual way the “s” is printed. This, most of all, made me want to throw this book across the room.

Don’t waste your time or money reading this. It was awful. If you do not heed my warning and wish to slog through it anyway; here is the Random House page on the book.

I received this book from Blogging for Books in exchange for this honest review.

If, for whatever reason, you decide that you want to own this tripe for yourself, you can get it here.

The Soul of All Living Creatures by Vint Varga, DVM

August 5, 2014 / Kyle Wendy Skultety / 2 Comments

Dr Vint Varga knows animals. He has practiced veterinary medicine for decades, first as an emergency room vet, then a specialist in veterinary behavior medicine.

Early on in his career, he realized that a strong connection could be made between humans and animals, enough to cause healing on both sides. The Soul of All Living Creatures is a quick read filled with real stories and real patients Dr Varga has seen during his career. Each chapter is titled with the name of a human emotional trait, and he goes on to explain how animals embody these traits as well. If we can learn to understand our pets better, we will learn something about ourselves in the process.

The introduction to the book has tear-jerking potential. Varga tells us about a dog that is hit by a car, and how the dog failed to thrive despite his excellent medical care. I’m not giving anything away here…but you will nod your head when you how things turn out.

Bloodhounds, mice, clouded leopards….all non-human creatures are the same to the good doctor, as he illustrates the chapter’s subject (sensitivity, integrity, forgiveness, etc.) with short tales about patients that he has seen and tried to fix/cure, with thorough analysis of the animal’s behavior and listening to those who know the creatures best.

Varga believes that “in the presence of animals, we find true acceptance” and so we can be ourselves in front of our dog or cat. He says that he remembers each case not only for what illness the patient had but recalls the bond that was shared between the pet and the owner.

Interspersed throughout the book are short fables and folk tales that also illustrate Varga’s point, as well as little snippets of his own wisdom, such as “When one behavior is not expressed, another behavior will take its place” and “When we limit our experience to what we perceive, we let our senses define our existence”. Despite all this home-grown sentiment, the book is not overly touchy-feely. What is obvious is Varga’s love and compassion for those who cannot tell their own story, and how he does his best to help every single one he can, even to the point of rescuing a tiny field mouse that was helpless on a busy road during a torrential rainstorm.

My only complaint with the book was that we never got to hear how most of the patients did after the treatment. It was as if they dropped off the face of the earth with no follow up. I was curious to see if his instinct and healing methods worked. That being said, this book would make a terrific addition to an animal lover’s library.

If you would like to enjoy this book as I did, click here to get a copy of your own!

Interested in what the New York Times said about this book? Click here.

Thanks to the publisher, Broadway Books for providing me with this review copy. I received this book from Blogging for Books in exchange for this honest review.

Vaccine: The Controversial Story of Medicine’s Greatest Lifesaver by Arthur Allen

July 29, 2014 / Kyle Wendy Skultety / 3 Comments

Spanning over 400 pages and telling the story from 1721 to the present day, Vaccine is a work of great scope. It starts out with the smallpox epidemic in Boston, Cotton Mather, and newfangled “variolation”, then proceeds to the 1940’s and 50’s issues with polio and measles, and rounds out the tale with the controversial DTP vaccine, a discussion of the alleged link between vaccines and autism, and an entire chapter devoted to anti vaccinators, those who would see their children suffer and die a horrible death from whooping cough and other childhood sicknesses.

Blending science, mystery, drama, and politics, this book has something for everyone. Fun fact: the beloved Raggedy Ann & Andy dolls were created by a well known illustrator, Johnny Gruelle, after his daughter Marcella was supposedly sickened by a vaccine given at school without his permission. The book tells that “The doll, with its limp limbs, became a symbol of vaccine-damaged children, and Marcella was the heroine of the Raggedy Ann stories that Gruelle went on to illustrate.”

Another fun fact: During the frantic search for the flu vaccine in 2004, there was also a pertussis (Whooping Cough) epidemic quietly making the rounds, with more than 19,000 cases that year. There were only 11,647 in 2003.

Anti vaccinators would storm the Internet looking for like minded souls and then get together to protest the government’s forced vaccination requirements for school children. In a ludicrous-sounding passage, a mother tells the author that it is good when her children get ill, because then everyone can take the time to slow down and spend time together. The book then goes on to tell how one child spent 6 months coughing, for most of the day and night, with spells of alternating vomiting and coughing from his illness. Another child broke a rib coughing; and a woman had to be hospitalized because she was in danger of losing her unborn child (her cervix was being nearly ruptured from the hacking.

The descriptions of the illnesses are detailed but not gory, and as you read you will find yourself thinking a lot more about the simple “shots” we all got as a kid.

At times a bit long winded, and necessarily full of politics, Vaccine was interesting but not enthralling. I didn’t feel it was a waste of my time, because I learned a great deal, and in the end I was glad my parents took me to the doctor and protected me. Whether you are for or against vaccines, you should read this book.