A fascinating read that’s well written and truly is beautiful. I enjoyed this book so much,
Many thanks to both the publisher and NetGalley for gifting me this book

DID is a disorder I have a lot of experience with so I was a little hesitant to read this memoir. Barrett tells her story as a married mother and teacher who is diagnosed with DID (then called Multiple Personality Disorder) in the early 90's when she was in her 40's. It focuses quite a lot on her career, higher education and religious journey, slightly less so on her mothering of her children, her time in therapy and in mental hospitals, and her crumbling marriage and divorce.

I do find her a bit of an unreliable narrator, not because of her DID but because I can't help but think she's leaving things out when it comes to her ex-husband who comes across as 100% villain and there is just zero resolution about what could have happened to her in her childhood and by whom. There are bizarre flashes that don't make sense and she tells of reasons to hate her controlling, sexist father like he beat her with a hairbrush once and he was definitely a terrible jerk but nothing to suggest the kind of trauma that causes this level of dissociation. Then towards the end of the book she seems to suggest that her father or someone else took her to sell her to multiple people for abuse when she was a toddler but then she sort of suggests that those flashes don't necessarily represent real memories but symbolism? So much doesn't make sense, it's like reading a mystery where it just ends with "we guess we'll never know but that's fine." She also writes from the perspective that integration is the goal and that now she is "fixed" because she's integrated. Not all who have DID would agree with that. It feels very much like the thinking back in the 90's about DID, and like one person's experience. This is not necessarily *the* experience of what it's like to live with DID, but it is a good memoir of an older woman's life at a very difficult couple of decades in it.

Note that her definition of integrated is not that all alters become one and share memories, but rather that she as host got to basically take over and the rest mostly went away. She said in an interview elsewhere, "I didn’t do anything special to integrate my alters. As my other symptoms of abuse began to heal, I talked with my alters about the possibility of integrating but, frankly, I didn’t really know what that meant. One day while on vacation, I realized I was one. They had done it on their own without talking to me about it. Integration doesn’t mean my alters aren’t still there. According to the theory of structural dissociation, they will always be there because that’s the way my brain developed as a very young child in response to chronic abuse. In fact, one or the other still comes out and lets me know their opinion or feelings every now and again, but mostly, they trust me to handle life. They decided that life as one would be more effective and pleasurable than life as many." Again, this is one person's perception of the definitions of integration and healing.

All in all, it's a well written memoir though it leaves the reader with more questions than answers. Life is like that, too, most of the time.

I read a digital ARC of this book for review.

Inspirational read. A happy wife and mother who loved nothing more than taking care of her brood, Lyn Barrett was knocked off course by a family crisis that triggered her inner world to crumble.

Her diagnosis of multiple personality disorder, now known as dissociative identity disorder, threatened her life as she knew it, her family, and her future.

With the knowledge that DID is a coping strategy young children use to protect themselves from chronic trauma, Lyn embarked on a journey to discover her true self.

Barrett's memoir reflecting on her process of discovering that she has Dissociative Identify Disorder and beginning therapy to address it is written in a way that puts you right in her mind with her. Her ability to do this allows readers to somewhat experience the uncomfortable nature of not feeling in control of one's self. Barrett included various aspects of her life, from parenting to working, with her mental illness and I really appreciated that she demonstrated that, even with severe mental illness, individuals can still be successful in areas of their lives, even when they feel everything else is a failure. I also appreciated that Barrett covered her entire process, from first feeling like she was "losing her sanity" to finding success through therapy in addressing her mental illness. Finally, for those looking to read this book who suffer with a history of trauma, Barrett doesn't specifically recall her trauma in clear memories. There are a couple scenes that break through for her that give a vague glimpse into the type of trauma she may have experienced, but she never fully describes her trauma history. I know this may be important for those who have specific triggers to be aware of ahead of time.

Thank you to NetGalley for this digital ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Wow. This was incredibly fascinating on every level.

Lyn Barrett begins her memoir in her early, normal adulthood: girl meets boy, they fall in love, they have children. But, when she realizes that her husband was cheating on her, Lyn’s mental health begins to unravel. A shell of the person and mother she once was, Lyn discovers through years of therapy and support that she suffers from dissociative identity disorder, or what was known at the time as multiple personality disorder, a symptom of severe trauma. Lyn takes us through her experiences of ultimate self realization and trauma healing in a memoir that is both very personal and educational.

I truly appreciated everything about this. It was gripping from the very start, particularly when she went into detail about how she went about each of her alters.

Obviously, I recommend assessing your own nervous system going in. As someone who has a lot more capacity these days, I still found quite a bit triggering. However, she still does not remember big details from her trauma, which is common.

I definitely recommend this one for anyone interested in mental health and my fellow trauma nerds.

I couldn't finish reading this book. What I did read I found to be too slow-paced to hold my interest and somewhat confusing, especially when describing her thoughts. I'm incredibly interested in learning about different mental health conditions, like DID, but this memoir couldn't hold my attention unfortunately.

2 stars

This book could be great but it starts out slow and kind of confusing. Didn’t make it half way. May pick back up later.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing this book in exchange for an honest review.
Dissociative Identify Disorder is a fascinating psychological disorder. This author's experience with meeting and learning about her multiples is an eye opening read. The therapist she meets with to unravel the tangled web of who she really is, did an amazing job helping her understand her multiples.

"Crazy" by Lyn Barrett is a first-person account on living with DID, an often misunderstood phenomena. The author takes us on a journey through realising she has multiple alters, getting to know them, understanding them, and - what seems to be of a great value to her - trying to find out what events caused her mind to create them.

It is an interesting self-case study that covers quite a long period of time, filled with therapeutic intervention, facing several hardships and finally coming to peace with one's history. It is very maturely written and definitely an engaging read.

However, for me, in some points "Crazy" lacked certain sensitivity. For example insisting on calling a suicide attempt not resulting in death "unsuccessful", or not reflecting on the poor parenting (from both parents) that resulted in a lot of alarming behaviours of children.