The Scar: A Personal History of Depression and Recovery

How does one come to terms with the past? For Cregan (English, Barnard Coll.), that meant writing about it, starting with a depressive episode she experienced after the death of her two-day-old daughter. The author continues by documenting her time in a mental hospital, where she receives electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) and attempts suicide; wanting to be helped but believing she could not be helped. Research into her Irish Catholic background leads to a discovery of a family history of depression, along with stoicism and silence around mental illness; "We didn't talk about how we were feeling; we simply made space for the moods and irritability of others." Turning to history and religion for advice, Cregan finds that neither can answer how to respond to the traumatic event of losing a child you didn't know. She details the emotional toll of mental illness, and how her first marriage never recovered from the aftermath of her daughter's death. Later chapters sensitively trace the difficulties of subsequent miscarriages, and ultimately motherhood, with her second husband.