The Wendell Cocktail: Depression Addiction and Beauty

Description: The Wendell Cocktail describes a major social problem exemplified by the journals of a person with coexisting conditions--mental illness and addiction. Although there are resources for people with each of these conditions--psychiatry for mental illness and twelve-step programs for addiction--there are few effective resources for people with both. Since about half of the mentally ill medicate with an addiction an increasingly large percentage of the American population is left without adequate care. Wendells journals illuminate the complexity of a tormented mind that is nevertheless capable of exquisite enjoyment of music natural beauty and delight in the observation of birds and animals. The books conclusion suggests approaches to understanding and better providing for persons with addiction and mental illness. Endorsements: Margaret R. Miles is one of the most insightful religious thinkers of our time. The breadth of her historical understanding of Western thought and art and her sensitive observations about the changing roles of women over time have been clearly established in her other books. In this book she advances our understanding of mental illness and drug addiction. --Malcolm Young Rector of Christ Episcopal Church in Los Altos California Margaret R. Miles has crafted a narrative marked by honesty and wisdom. A sisters promise and devotion added to a brothers pain and courage are key ingredients for The Wendell Cocktail. The suffering and anger voiced in her brothers journal entries are palpable. They bear convincing witness to the struggles of those living with mental illness and addiction in a culture that does not deal well with either. --Flora Keshgegian Associate Professor of Pastoral Theology Graduate Theological Union This unusually personal volume is by turns painful insightful and disturbing even occasionally beautiful and humorous illuminating the dark corners of addiction and mental illness by skillfully interweaving the journals of an acute sufferer with the commentary of a compassionate observer--an observer who is also a distinguished historian and thinker. Deliberately avoiding neat lessons and pat answers Margaret R. Miles nevertheless ensures that through sharing her brothers story his intense pain is not wasted. --Robert MacSwain Assistant Professor of Theology and Christian Ethics The University of the South The Wendell Cocktail considers the fierce landscape of mental illness and addiction. By opening her own journal alongside those of her brother Miles speaks not about but from the experience. . . . If youve ever wanted to get inside the head of someone with this condition this book points the path. And if youve ever needed language to express your own experience Wendells journals graciously edited and shared give an account from a fellow-traveler. --Martha E. Stortz Professor for Religion and Vocation Augsburg College About the Contributor(s): Margaret R. Miles is Emerita Professor of Historical Theology The Graduate Theological Union Berkeley. Her most recent books are Augustine and the Fundamentalists Daughter (2011) and Getting Here from There: Conversations on Life and Work (with Hiroko Sakomura 2011).