Katie Reviews You Don't Have to Be Mad to Work Here : A Psychiatrist’s Life by Benji Waterhouse

After reading an excerpt of this book before its release I knew it was a book I was going to find fascinating but also enjoy. The excerpt was from a chapter later in the book where a patient has been sectioned as he believes he's a werewolf and he presents a risk to himself and others as he had taken a bite out of a nurse who was trying to help him when they wouldn't let him drink the blood that had been taken during a blood test. Yes, this is an eye raising situation, but Dr Waterhouse presents it clinically with compassion for the patient all the while taking the patients beliefs seriously.

This book greatly reminds me of Adam Kay's book This is Going to Hurt, which told the story of Kay's experience as junior doctor. Dr Waterhouse does the same thing but in psychiatric medicine. One thing that was very clear from the beginning of the book was that it was going to highlight the struggles faced by NHS staff and the demands it faces.

One of my favourite parts of this book is on page 38 where Dr Waterhouse is discussing mania and one of its symptoms manic spending and in the footnotes at the bottom of the page he advices the reader that if “you’re reading this book with forty nine other copies sitting next to you following a manic spending spree, please go to A&E immediately. But maybe leave an online review on Amazon or Goodreads first”. Dr Waterhouse continuously mixes fact and humour throughout this book, and it has a wonderful effect of making the harder hitting reality of psychiatric medicine easier to read by providing light relief that in some chapters is really needed.

The book is split into three parts these are: Part 1 : prodrome, Part 2: illness and finally Part 3: recovery. Each part is set in different placement locations, thus exposing the reader to the reality of working on wards, clinics and the PICU (Psychiatric Intensive Care Unit) all under the same hospital trust and the variety of patients and the severity of their conditions. Other than Dr Waterhouse's experience, the only continuous individual that the reader meets throughout each part of the book is the patient called Tariq (all names in the book have been changed to provide anonymity for patients and staff) who we initially meet in clinic with a diagnosis of schizophrenia, living rough with his dog, he then reappears in part 2 in A&E after a suicide attempt following the death of his dog and then finally we meet him in Part 3 where he's turned his life around and has re-homed a puppy. This was a beautiful, rare example of how psychiatric medicine can make a difference and to see their treatment come full circle.

This book doesn't just focus on the mental health of patients but also Dr Waterhouse has been truly honest in his struggles with his mental health. Throughout the book we meet Joe, Dr Waterhouse's psychotherapist, who he was recommended to visit at the beginning of his psychiatric training to help him come to terms with what he experiences as a doctor. This insight into therapy for a doctor shows a healthy approach to talking but Dr Waterhouse also expresses his fears of being judged for his mental health from those around him.

This is a brilliant memoir focused on the experiences of medicine from the point of view of a doctor, which not only explains different conditions and experiences of patients but is fantastically funny. Which makes it feel honest.

To purchase this book please click here.