Product Description

Are you living under a shadow?

Do you or someone you love suffer from:

Chronic sadness
Obsessiveness
Outbursts of anger
The inability to finish tasks
Acute anxiety
Disabling discomfort in social situations

These are the "shadow syndromes" of major mental disorders that limit the lives, productivity, and happiness of millions of people.

Drawing on cutting-edge research, Drs. Ratey and Johnson challenge the most basic beliefs of our mental health professionals by uncovering the biological factors that often determine our personalities.  They use real-life case studies to illustrate how shadow syndromes affect our everyday lives and how they can be treated--often dramatically--with diet, exercise, psychotherapy, and medication.

Shadow Syndromes is the revolutionary theory that sheds light on our life-limiting behaviors and offers the essential tools for changing them.  This book will liberate you and those you love.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #90999 in Books
• Published on: 1998-06-01
• Released on: 1998-06-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 400 pages

Amazon.com Review
Freud once said that nobody is "normal," and after reading Shadow Syndromes, you may well be convinced of that. While more than 50 million Americans suffer from full-fledged mental illnesses such as depression and obsessive-compulsive disorder, millions more suffer from milder forms--yet they likely don't realize it. From chronic sadness to low self-esteem to shopping addiction to intermittent rage disorder, compassionate authors John J. Ratey, M.D. and Catherine Johnson, Ph.D. chronicle the often-undiagnosed (yet definitely insidious) "shadow" disorders. One of the most eye-opening points the authors make is that men who "can't commit" to a relationship may in fact be suffering from an unrecognized adult form of attention deficit disorder.

Shadow Syndromes is thorough, but at the same time it simplifies the technical aspects of mental illnesses--no stacks of footnotes or complicated neurotransmitter charts here. The authors use plenty of anecdotes to illustrate how everyday people have recognized and overcome shadow syndromes. They also prevent the book from becoming one big bundle of bad news by stressing that these disorders are treatable with medications such as Prozac, which Johnson took to handle her mild depression. Specific lifestyle changes are also advised, including more sleep, changes in diet, and more exercise. The "Care and Feeding of the Brain" chapter compiles other empowering, healing approaches. This book will be valuable not only for those who believe they're suffering from a shadow syndrome, but for doctors and therapists as well. --Erica Jorgensen

Review
Identify the hidden timebombs in your personality...featuring proven treatments and strategies that can change your life. -- Review

Review
Identify the hidden timebombs in your personality...featuring proven treatments and strategies that can change your life.

Customer Reviews

Not a big help
The book don't share the objetive information that I waited.It don't help you to diagnose or perceive the "shadow syndromes".A lot of real cases but little epidemiologic, neuropsychiatric, and treatment information.And it don't do the most important in my opinion: to diferenciate from a shadow syndrome to the other.

an important book
This is an important book that should be read by everyone who has an interest in mental health, and that includes just about all of us. In many ways, this book is an extension of the ideas of Peter Kramer's Listening to Prozac and Michael Norden's Beyond Prozac, especially the former book. It's filled with useful information and plenty of detailed case studies, where I think case studies are a very useful and entertaining way to learn about the effects of psychiatric drugs. Is there really a large fraction of the population that exhibits symptoms bordering on overt mental illness? I think so and they probably could benefit from the right psychiatric drugs at the right doses, as long as those drugs don't have serious side effects for the given person. This is a highly enjoyable and enlightening read. Author of Adjust Your Brain: A Practical Theory for Maximizing Mental Health.

Hidden Syndromes
An interesting book to read and understand all syndromes and how they appear. Although too much on the side of using Prozac which now is not used as much as many patients become hooked on such medicines . If you take that away,or do not pay much attention to this part, it is very informative and you can understand those who are near you who have these syndromes.