Lay My Burden Down: Suicide and the Mental Health Crisis Among African-Americans (Paperback)

by Alvin F. Poussaint Doctor (Author)
Key Phrases: black suicide rates, health care gap, black mental health, Lay My Burden Down, United States, Alvin Poussaint (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Product Description
"A remarkable achievement." —Harriet A. Washington, The New England Journal of Medicine

Through stories (including their own), interviews, and analysis of the most recent data available, Dr. Alvin Poussaint and journalist Amy Alexander offer a groundbreaking look at "posttraumatic slavery syndrome," the unique physical and emotional perils for black people that are the legacy of slavery and persistent racism. They examine the historical, cultural, and social factors that make many blacks reluctant to seek health care, and cite ways that everyone from the layperson to the health care provider can help.

"As a black woman thrashing with the new class divide and an intermittent but chronic depression that feels as old as rivers, I found [Lay My Burden Down] a relief, an assured voice in a wilderness [that] I felt I was essentially wandering alone." —Erin Aubry Kaplan, Salon

"A persuasive moral indictment of the mental-health establishment for not working harder to rid itself of prejudicial images of African-Americans within its own practices, and to address them in earnest in the larger society." —Matthew V. Johnson, The Christian Century

"A stunner of a book. . . . The positive message here is that these scourges can be prevented." —Leon Eisenberg, M.D., coauthor of Children in a Changing Health System

About the Author

A former consultant for The Cosby Show, Alvin F. Poussaint, M.D., is professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School and the Judge Baker Children's Center in Boston. He lives in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. Amy Alexander is a columnist for Africana.com and editor of The Farrakhan Factor. She lives in Hyde Park, Massachusetts.

Product Details

• Paperback: 288 pages
• Publisher: Beacon Press; Revised edition (October 12, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0807009598
• ISBN-13: 978-0807009598
• Product Dimensions: 7.8 x 5.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #695,123 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A must read for all African-Americans, September 29, 2005

By	Dotun "Stephen Akinduro" (Columbus, GA) - See all my reviews

My mother died by suicide when I was 9 years old. What I find most amazing till this day is how my family (we are African-American) refused to talk about her mental illness and the circumstances that lead to her death. For years, I would rather lie about her death and her illness, than admit that she was mentally ill.

This book takes the blinders off an issue that we don't like to talk about in the black community. How many times have we heard comedians joke about mental health issues being a "white man's disease". But the truth is that mental illness affects people of all classes, ethnic backgrounds and religion. It can especially hit the poor very hard due to insufficient access to health care. With necessary information, statistics and a very objective approach, the authors of this great book show how mental illness is more of a problem than we would like to think, and yet "age old stigmas" (especially the one that associates mental illness with being crazy) make it hard for us to seek the treatment that we need. Of course, there are other issues that are addressed, such as the insensitivity of the health care community towards the health care needs of African-Americans.

This book is a must read for anyone sinmcerly concerned about the overall health of the African-American community and our society as a whole

9 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars a classic example of bad research unchallenged or edited by an adult, March 30, 2006

By	J. Adams "History buff" (Washington, DC USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is a classic example of how inconvenient facts can be ignored in order to support a thesis which promotes a political agenda instead of actually examining the data available to reach a proper conclusion. Is there a suicide and mental health crisis among African-Americans? If you read this book, it is beyond repute. Is it caused by the racism that the authors find under every rock? Absolutely, according to them. Do the authors look at historical facts that refute their premise? Absolutely not.
Was racism in the US more prevalent in the Jim Crow era than today? Well, ask the Tuskegee airmen, or any other totally segregated (but supposedly equal) segment of society who had to drink from a "colored" water fountain or attend inferior schools. What were the differences in mental health statistics between racial groups in that era when it came to looking at white vs. black groups of similar economic circumstances? Whites were disproportionately represented then. Will you find that information in this book? Absolutely not.
So what has changed? Publishers are willing to put books like this into the marketplace without anyone challenging the total lack of foundation for their conclusions and demanding real research instead of selective and highly slanted statistics that do not hold up in the light of day.
Of course the fact that this book is in the near 400,000 level of sales vs. serious academic research such as The Bell Curve at 6500 says a lot. But this book is essentially a politically correct and academically fraudulent exercise. If you are into victimhood and excusing the failure of the leaders of today's civil rights movement to rise above the shoe leather of giants like Martin Luther King Jr., you will like this book. If you are looking for serious examination of the many crises facing the black community today and how to deal with them, you won't find it here.

2 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very healing, July 6, 2005

By	M. Breeze (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I work with people with mental illness and substance abuse. I have shared this book with many of my African American clients and everytime I do I get such positive reinforcement that the authors of this book have given them their dignity back. It has answered ages old questions about the the black experience that everyone should know. This book should be a must read for all our children.