The Stranger In The Mirror - Softcover

Steinberg M.D., Marlene; Schnall, Maxine

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0060954876 ISBN 13: 9780060954871

Publisher: Harper Perennial, 2001

Synopsis

Discover groundbreaking findings on a hidden epidemic - and why it so often is misdiagnosed.

You peer into the mirror and have trouble recognizing yourself. You feel as if you're going through the motions of life or you're watching a movie of yourself.

These are all symptoms of dissociation - a debilitating psychological condition involving feelings of disconnection that affects 30 million people in North America and often goes untreated. The Stranger in the Mirror offers unique guidelines for identifying and recovering from dissociative symptoms based on Dr. Marlene Steinberg's breakthrough diagnostic test. Filled with fascinating case histories of people with multiple personalities, this book provides enlightening insights into how all of us respond to trauma and overcome it. Her innovative method of treatment will benefit anyone in search of a healthier sense of self and a heightened capacity for joy.

About this title

About the Author:

Marlene Steinberg, M.D., is a practicing psychiatrist and world renowned researcher in dissociation. Dr. Steinberg conducted her pioneering research at Yale University School of Medicine. She practices in Connecticut and western Massachusetts.

Maxine Schnall a Pulitzer Prize nominee, is a former contributing editor to Woman's Day and the author of five books.

From Publishers Weekly:

What do the Columbine killings, "getting lost in a good book" and your midlife crisis have in common? According to psychiatrist Steinberg, they are all events that can be placed on a broad continuum of behaviors related to dissociative identity disorder, popularly known as multiple personality. Steinberg, whose research was supported with grants from the National Institute of Mental Health, argues with conviction that mild dissociative behaviorAtemporary episodes of disconnection or memory lossAcan be a useful mechanism for coping with such mundane but stressful events as giving public presentations as well as major traumas like an operation or an assault. In more extreme forms, it is a debilitating disorderAsimilar, she argues, to attention deficit disorderAthat is in need of psychiatric recognition and intervention. Arguing that DID often results from early childhood abuse, Steinberg passionately calls for removing the stigma from its related behaviors, noting that the popular conception of the disorder is gleaned from overblown films such as Sybil and The Three Faces of Eve. Readers can gauge their own dissociative tendencies with the book's abridged version of the Steinberg clinical interview for DSM-IV dissociative disorders. Readers interested in clinical depression and ADD will gravitate to this book, although Steinberg's throwaway comments that suggest that seeing "alternative" lifestyles depicted on TV can cause psychic confusion and that stepparents have a greater tendency to violate the incest prohibition may cost her some otherwise sympathetic readers. While DID doesn't have as much cultural currency as ADD, Steinberg's research has much to add to the contentious debates surrounding childhood trauma, diagnostic categories and the changing relationship between incurable disease and manageable disorder. Agent, Mary Tahan. (Oct.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Harper Perennial
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0060954876
• ISBN 13: 9780060954871
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 344