Mother’s Little Helper: A Memoir in Vignettes

Mental illness debilitates the afflicted and impacts friends and family members. The collage of scenes in this memoir reveal the ways family members developed survival strategies and coping mechanisms to manic depression. Over a 30-year period, Betty Jane Cooksey had more than 40 recorded suicides attempts and 20 stays in intensive care. After shooting and killing her husband, Dub, in 1992, she was diagnosed with bipolar and borderline personality disorder by a court ordered psychiatric evaluation and spent four years in state hospitals. Betty battled mood disorders derived from painful childhood memories, and grappled with therapists, medication, and social stigma. Dub worked to stay ahead of medical bills and keep his wife out of the state hospital, a struggle that lost him his life. Rhonda and Susie, raised by a mother who could not control her emotions, experienced feelings of shame, failure, and loss of control. The vignette form is ideal for capturing the volatile moods of manic depression and the impact of mental illness on the nuclear and extended family. Through the good times and the bad, we loved and supported each other. It is a story of survival.

Name thesis:degree_name

M.F.A. (Master of Fine Arts)

Level thesis:degree_level

Masters

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Creative Writing and Media Arts (UMKC)

Grantor dc:publisher

University of Missouri -- Kansas City

Year dc:date.issued

2018

Author dc:creator

• Cooksey, Rhonda Lynn

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Hodgen, Christie, 1974-

Language dc:language.iso

en_US

Handle dc:identifier.uri

https://hdl.handle.net/10355/67993

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:mospace.umsystem.edu:10355/67993