Not the Thing I Was: Thirteen Years at Bruno Bettelheim's Orthogenic School ebook

by Stephen Eliot

Not the Thing I Was book. Sent at age eight to Bruno Bettelheim's Orthogenic School among autistics and schizophrenics, Eliot found himself in a world without drugs or locks on the doors.

Not the Thing I Was book. He was called crazy . Instead, fine china was on the table. The staff believed to help a child, you had to understand how he saw the world and persuade him that there might b He was called crazy. As a child, he probably was. The staff believed to help a child, you had to understand how he saw the world and persuade him that there might be more He was called crazy.

It is more than ten years since Bruno Bettelheim ended his life in a plastic bag and unleashed a torrent of extremist opinion about the nature of the man. The author of sixteen books, Bettelheim in the midnineties was the subject of two full-length biographies in English that described him i. . The author of sixteen books, Bettelheim in the midnineties was the subject of two full-length biographies in English that described him in diametrically opposite terms

Sent at age eight to Bruno Bettelheim's Orthogenic School among autistics and schizophrenics.

Eliot, Stephen, Bettelheim, Bruno, Sonia Shankman Orthogenic School, Mentally ill children, Child psychotherapy, Psychoses in children, Child analysis, Child psychiatry. New York : St. Martin's Press. ENCRYPTED DAISY download. For print-disabled users. Books for People with Print Disabilities. Internet Archive Books. Uploaded by AltheaB on September 30, 2010.

Published by St. Martin's Press, New York, 2002. From Bauer Rare Books (San Diego, CA, . List this Seller's Books. Payment Methods accepted by seller.

Not the thing I was. Thirteen Years at Bruno Bettelheim’s . However, he is eloquent in describing the Orthogenic School’s routines and in weaving his progress through them, from the battling child.

Not the thing I was. Thirteen Years at Bruno Bettelheim’s Orthogenic School. Here, recounting his 13 years at Bruno Bettelheim's Orthogenic School in Chicago, he tries to crawl back into the skin of the boy who never felt comfortable in that skin. However, he is eloquent in describing the Orthogenic School’s routines and in weaving his progress through them, from the battling child who established a relationship with another person for the first time, to the golden middle years when he started to catch glimpses of his behavior in a context other than his own, to the desire to be free of observation and. others’ control.

x, 288 pages : illustrations. More creator details: Stephen Eliot.

Child analysis-Case studies. Child psychiatry-Case studies. Child ntial treatment-Case studies. Mentally ill icago-Biography. Psychoses in ase studies. x, 288 pages : illustrations. Copies and Availability.

He was called crazy. As a child, he probably was.Sent at age eight to Bruno Bettelheim's Orthogenic School among autistics and schizophrenics, Eliot found himself in a world without drugs or locks on the doors. Instead, fine china was on the table. The staff believed to help a child, you had to understand how he saw the world and persuade him that there might be more successful ways to interpret it. Bettelheim had been in the concentration camps. He figured if the Nazis could build an environment to destroy personality, he could build one to create it. A fascinating coming of age story that's a cross between One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and The Ciderhouse Rules. L'Express hailed the author for his "lucidity and devastating humor." Marianne writes, "The child who thought of himself as merely a pulsing brain invites us on a voyage back from the frontier of insanity and we return transformed." A must read for parents, teachers, therapists and troubled adolescents themselves--so that all can see there is light at the end of the tunnel.

Exellent

Certain to be a classic among coming of age tales, "NOT the Thing I Was" is a painfully honest account of a troubled child who through the help of Bruno Bettelheim's Orthogenic School for autistic youths developed into a high-functioning adult, unlike most autistic children who remain locked all their lives in a parallel universe which often makes it impossible for them to communicate or care for themselves.

My only disappointment is that Eliot doesn't examine documented allegations that Bettelheim was a sexual predator who molested the child patients in his care at the Orthogenic School. The omission my be due to the apparent fact that Bettelheim only molested little girls at the school, so Eliot may not have witnessed any of the sexual abuse that undoubtedly contributed to Bettelheim's suicide in his 80s, a long time to carry the burden of guilt around.

I would love to read a follow-up volume or a magazine article written by Eliot about his life after leaving the Orthogenic School, graduating from an Ivy League college and becoming an investment banker in London.

Stephen, this fan is waiting...

Good luck and congratulations on your exemplary life!

Frank Sanello

Karg

Library book in a very goog state.

Sagda

I read this book while living at the orthogenic school. To tell you the truth, I found it intriguing but I didn't really enjoy the style of writing.

For people who the the Orthogenic School was abusive- most place at the time would lock disturbed children in rooms and tie them to beds for weeks on end. Race theory was prevalent, as was insulin shock therapy. Autistic children were likely to be institutionalized for their lives in dark, cruel places. In this respect, the Orthogenic School was revolutionary- it attempted to do neither of these things and tried to treat children like human beings. Were there a lot of therories that are majorly messed up? Yes. Was Bettelhiem abusive? Probably. But I have trouble believing that the school wasn't better than the other alternatives of the time.

Eng.Men

I think this book is an interesting and sad account of a child who, during his long stay at the Orthogenic School, is brainwashed into accepting that abuse is an acceptable and even a laudable form of treatment. Eliot accepts this belief because he is repeatedly abused and shamed by the person he loves so deeply, Bruno Bettelheim. Eliot seems convinced that because Bettelheim is so brilliant and gifted with children that he can somehow abuse children in an effective, therapeutic way. This way of thinking strikes me as a rationalization of the worst kind. Perhaps this rationalization is understandable in Eliot who was raised by Bettelheim for most of his early life. In fact, Eliot so deeply internalizes that hitting an emotionally troubled child is the best way to address the child's chaotic behavior that he feels justified in hitting children himself late in his stay at the Orthogenic School.

As I read the book, I wondered where were instances of Bettelheim showing remorse for hitting a child or of Bettelheim trying to search for a gentler approach. I found no such instances. I find only repeated instances of a man using his power to inflict abuse on children and generally in situations where a person with some common sense could think of another way.

I suppose, with Eliot, I see the brilliance of Bettelheim. After all, Bettelheim chose the perfect situation to act out his sadistic tendencies on a population who would be the least able to defend themselves...troubled children taken from their homes, usually at a fairly early age, and kept at the O. School for several years. Also, Bettelheim seems to have had the power to surround himself with whatever staff he pleased. And, from Eliot's account, he usually chose impressionable, young people who I guess out of loyalty never ratted on him or who accepted that his claims were rational. I guess the staff had reason to accept Bettelheim's ideas since he was supported by the University of Chicago for so many years. Indirectly, the book is an indictment against the U of C for allowing Bettelheim to inflict his sadistic approach to curing troubled children for 30 years.

I think it is extremely simplistic to think that Bettelheim who is deeply loved by the children in his care can help them by beat and shaming them. And Eliot makes it clear, Bettelheim's cruelty was not an infrequent aberration but an integral and consistant part of this "therapeutic milieu". It's just another indication of the cult mentality displayed at the O. School to suggest that this institution was superior to all others at this time in history.

Eliot questions how else to help a chaotic child except by hitting him. Even Jacqui Sanders, Bettelheim's successor, finally stopped hitting children at some point in her directorship, so I guess she was finally able to find other ways. It seems a horrid twist of logic to suggest that beating children who love you is superior to using restraints and drugs. Besides being psychologically harmful, from the research I have done on this subject, it was never legal in the U.S. for caretakers to beat their mental patients.

By the way, here's a suggestion for helping troubled children...find him or her a compassionate therapist. Not a person who is trained to tell children that getting beaten is okay, but a person who can actually help the child understand their behavior and feelings.

But, then again, this book is about the power of a child's love for his guardian (and in this case guard, not guardian angel). And if Bettelheim abuses Eliot, then the abuse becomes intricately connected to love. And this is the legacy of Bettelheim's Orthogenic School: it was a place where over and over again children were forced to accept abuse as an accepted part of love. I personally think that's sick.

In an aside, I do think another reviewer goes a little easy on Jacqui Sanders. 1)Jacqui, as well as many others, witnessed Bettelheim's repeated brutality against children and never reported it, and 2)Jacqui herself hit and beat children for many years before coming to her senses. She allowed others at the School to do the same. Jacqui documents this in her own book published by the U of C.