"Lizzie Simon's ingenious inquiry into the nature and treatment of manic depression-her own as well as others-is a spellbinding revelation....It is bold, suspenseful, and completely fascinating."
-John Berendt, author of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
 by Lizzie Simon Buy the Book |
Why did I write DETOUR? I wanted to collect testimonies from
young bipolar people who had been treated successfully and were in the
process of building careers and families and healthy lives. I felt that
our stories weren't being told anywhere. There were books about bipolar
people, but they were written by much older people who had much different
issues than I had had. I knew there was a generation of us who were young
enough when we were diagnosed to not be truly and permanently disabled
by the disorder....I knew it from my gut even though I had never actually
met any of them, or seen their lives portrayed in Hollywood or on TV.
I talk about it explicitly in DETOUR, that going crazy at seventeen was the most traumatic experience I have ever had, and that at that time I felt without role models, without resources, without road maps. That was my first vision of DETOUR, a collection of stories that bipolar kids and their families could read. A light at the end of the tunnel thing. Company, also, that was a big thing I wanted to provide. Company, because going crazy is so incredibly alienating and isolating. I wanted to create the exact book I would have needed when I was diagnosed. -Lizzie |
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The National Mental Health Association
The Federation of Families for Children's Mental Health The National Alliance of the Mentally Ill The National Depressive and Manic Depressive Association The Child And Adolescent Bipolar Foundation The Angel of Reconciliation:
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My Family (from left to right): "Kelly was a good dog"; my brother's wedding; Garrett!; angelic Ben; graduation day with my mom and grandmoms
Praise for DETOUR:
"DETOUR, Lizzie Simon's memoir of her bipolar
disorder, is a wry, poignant chronicle of coming to terms with what cannot
be resolved. Having been diagnosed at 17 and helped by lithium, Simon felt
marked and alone. Hoping to find a "herd" of like-minded compatriots--young,
ambitious bipolar achievers--she drives cross country, interviewing people
like herself. She finds them and doesn't. They are out there, with stories
like hers, but the project can't solve the problem of aloneness and her
unique interior life, because aloneness is the incurable condition all
humans share.
Simon's candor and charm leap off the page and grab you by
the lapels. She's wise, at the mercy, searching, and she's given herself
the admirable goal of laughing about the imperfect, partial reality of
everything."
--Laurie Stone, author of Starting with Serge, Close to the Bone, and
Laughing in the Dark.
"DETOUR is a harrowing, exciting, and intimate account of a young woman's
quest for identity, love, and that most elusive thing of all -- peace of
mind. Part road-story, part confession, part case-history, it all adds
up to a remarkable and beautifully written memoir."
-- Jonathan Ames, author of The Extra Man and My Less Than Secret Life
"Lizzie Simon writes with a dynamic, confident voice, which brings to
life her memoir, DETOUR. Part love story, adventure story, success story,
the reader will cheer Lizzie on as she makes her way across America in
search of her "herd" on a mission to debunk the negative stereotypes of
mental illness. Lizzie Simon's DETOUR is an inspiring, bold and original
book."
-- Galaxy Craze, author of By the Shore
"Lizzie Simon has written the best description I have ever read of living
with Manic Depressive disease. She describes not only the acute episodes
but the day to day instability of a mood disorder, the strain on relationships,
and one woman's struggle to make herself whole. This book will be helpful
to patients, family, and even physicians, but beyond that is brilliant
literature."
--Alexander Glassman, MD, Chief of Psychopharmacology, College of Physicians
and Surgeons, Columbia University
"DETOUR does for bipolar disorder what Prozac Nation did for depression
- scopes it out from the viewpoint of soomeone who is young, hip, and vulnerable."
--Peter D Kramer, author of Listening to Prozac
"A cross country roadtrip -- mostly lucid, sometimes scary: the bipolar Simon interviews other bipolar people who have been treated successfully treated and now lead highly functional lives, while she regularly gets pounded by her own disorder.
She opens with a guided tour into her mental illness, telling how in highschool she became jittery, then confused, layering anxieties upon anxieties, finding it increasingly difficult to speak or stop the tears, moving toward a paranoia that convinced her that the CIA was out to kidnap her cat. The tour is impressive -- with its darting sentences, stops and starts, gasped breaths -- for the way it conveys the smother, agitated brain fever Simon was feeling. She gets help, is given medication to bring the chemistry into a semblance of balance, and it isn't long before she formulates the idea of a road trip to find her herd of people: bipolars who have laid seige to their disorder. She swings low out of New York and west across the southern tier, talking to others about the circumstances of their disorder, what went right for them, what things they did that gave them a leg up. This is no easy road; Simon knows, as do her interviews, that one's mercurial nature can leak through the medication, and she knows the fear that comes with hearing the biochemical abd psychological cues that that's happening. Each time, she does what's needed to reestablish her sense of self: sob, or soak in the sun and read a magazine, or flee. She learns to gave herself a break, to cast a wary eye on guilt, shame, and stigma: "I made my top priority to be OK in my body and in my mind..." It sounds simple. But it wasn't.
It's no easy thing to provide a glimpse into the churning melancholia of bipolar lows, but Simon manages it -- with considerable effect indeed."
--Kirkus Review, April 15, 2002
"Simon's fast-paced, engrossing memoir begins with an account of the episode that led to her diagnosis of bipolar disorder at 17. armed with lithium and determination, Simon graduated from Columbia University and became a creative producer at a theater in New York. Despite her many successes, Simon was restless and ultimately decided to leave the theater and go cross-country seeking other, young, successful people with bipolar disorder.
Her first interviewee was Nicholas, a wealthy, seemingly prosperous man who handled his disorder with drugs and alcohol (and sans medication).
Nonetheless, Simon fell in love with him. On the road, Simon called mental health centers and attended support groups, meeting a wide variety of thriving young bipolar people, from a radio DJ to a college student who had to leave ROTC after her diagnosis. Simon connected with each person, but most important she found a connection with herself.
Inspiring and enjoyable, DETOUR will change misconceptions of bipolar disorder and is a must read for anyone who is or who knows someone coping with a mental illness."
--Booklist, May 15, 2002
"The 23-year-old Simon's DETOUR: My Bipolar Roadtrip In 4-D is an utterly unselfconscious, funny, harrowing description of her highs and lows, from her psychotic episode as 'the CIA's most wanted cat" in Paris to falling in love with a multimillionaire who is also bipolar."
--The Village Voice, June 25, 2002
"HEAD 'TRIP'
Brooklyn author is the pretty new face of manic-depresion
By Barbara Hoffman
Up until she started seeing blood on the walls and microphones in the ceiling, 17-year-old Lizzie Simon was living a charming life.
Well-loved, bubbly and creative, she was spending her senior year in high school in Paris - when she started hallucinating. Friends flew her home to Rhode Island, where she was diagnosed, treated and return to school albeit to a private one near her home. Months later, it was as if nothing had happened - except she knew she had bipolar disorder (a.k.a. manic depression), the mental illness that had plagued her grandfather.
Six years later - a Columbia University grad and Obie-winning producer at the Flea Theater downtown - she left her job, borrowed her parents' SUV and went in search of others like herself. The result: "DETOUR: My Bipolar Roadtrip In
4-D." Out tomorrow, it's part travelogue, part memoir and part self-help book.
And while she produced an MTV documentary - "TRUE LIFE: I am Bipolar" - set to air next month, Simon's adamant that she not become the poster girl for mental illness, the Elizabeth Wurtzel of manicdepression.
"It's not me," Simon says flatly. "It's not my trip. "My parents always said, 'You're so much more than your illnesss.' I wrote about it because what had happened was so extraordinary and there weren't any role models for it. "There was no book you could hand me and say, 'Here's someone who really understands you, Lizzie.' I was just so tired of 'Girl, Interrupted' and those other stupid movies."
"Girl, Driven" is more Simon's speed. At home in Brooklyn the other day, the pale, animated 26-year-old talked about her travels seeking "sparkling little treasures of personality who harbor terrors in their bodies..." She set out to find young, succesful people with bipolar disorder and meet their "boyfriends and wives and know that somebody loved them, somebody wasn't scared", she writes.
"When I read it I thought, 'This is the kind of book I got into publishing to publish,' because I thought it could make a difference," says Greer Hendricks, Simon's editor at Atria Books. "We all fell in love with Lizzie's voice. I think she's going to write books for us that will have nothing to do with this subject."
Just how many people suffer from bipolar disorder isn't clear - reports vary from 1 to 7 percent of the population - but other stats are startling: Sixty percent of those with chronic mood disorder abuse drugs or alcohol. Twenty percent kill themselves. "That's a high morbidity rate," Simon says. "If it was any other illness, we'd be doing a lot more about getting treatment for it."
Her own treatment is lithium, which she's been taking ever since she was diagnosed. Other than some acne and slight hand tremors, there have been few side effects - though when she's stressed, she shakes more. "When I spoke with the people at MTV, I practically had to sit on my hands," she laughs.
What would she be if she weren't bipolar? She pauses, her dark eyes focused far away. "Maybe I wouldn't have had the drive to do all I've done," she says. "But I think I would have had a healthier dating career!""
--The New York Post, June 24, 2002
