Forum - View topicREVIEW: My Pancreas Broke, But My Life Got Better Manga Review
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encrypted12345
Posts: 728 |
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The first one in this series (My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness) I could have some fun with. The instant that got a sequel though, I noped out of even trying it out. At that point, it felt like enabling.
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MrPuzzles
Posts: 152 |
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I'd love to see this reviewer get through twelve seasons of Curb Your Enthusiasm. |
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Doctorkev
 Posts: 87 Location: Scotland |
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I can't even cope with one episode of that... |
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Nev999
Posts: 164 |
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Wow, this is the most angry I've ever been at a review, and it's mostly because of this part:
If the kind of attitude and lack of empathy you have in this review, toward a real person struggling with mental issues, is the same kind of attitude you have toward your patients, you probably treat them very poorly. Like every kind of bad health professional I've ever met, some of which really impacted me and loved ones very badly. This deeply upsets me and I feel terrible for your patients. I hope the attitudes toward you show in this review are toward someone who is seeking help and yet sometimes suffers from relapses, are not what you show with them, but I think it's hard to have these kind of takes about mental health and not have your patients notice them or be impacted by them. I'll have to take some time to gather myself for a full response, but I hope you rethink your approach. |
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Doctorkev
Posts: 87 Location: Scotland |
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Have you read the book that was reviewed, plus all of the previous volumes? If not, please do so before making such judgements. If you have, then by all means I'll be interested to hear what you have to say.
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Nev999
Posts: 164 |
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Yes, I have. Why would you assume I haven't? Anyway, yes,I will give you a full response later, I want to be polite.
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Doctorkev
Posts: 87 Location: Scotland |
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Thanks, sorry, I often assume people have uninformed knee-jerk reactions on the internet.
In that case, please I'd love to hear an informed and measured alternative response to this material, because I don't know anyone else who has read it. As you can see, the book made me feel very frustrated and I had to be honest in my review. I'm very willing to consider another viewpoint, and I'm sorry if you found any of my words to be offensive or judgemental - that certainly wasn't the intention! |
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Arale Kurashiki
Posts: 775 |
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I would also say that "I have experience with this because I'm a parent of neurodivergent people" doesn't fill me with confidence either - I'm not sure how to explain using words the connotation of that kind of thing, but it's something I've seen a lot.
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#Droneku
Posts: 38 |
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This feels like a dad scolding a son. There is no artistic appreciation at all.
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Doctorkev
Posts: 87 Location: Scotland |
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If it at all helps, I previously worked for a year in a community paediatrics clinic assessing children for neurodevelopmental disorders including autism, ADHD, learning disabilities etc, so I’m likely more informed and experienced in this topic than many other medical practitioners. Although I’m more of a generalist now, I’m still involved with many of these patients and their families. I have a young child with mild autism, an older child with ADHD, and another child with some neurodivergent traits but no formal diagnosis at present. I’m not sure how I feel about the suggestion my opinion might be suspect based on the fact I’m a parent of children with these conditions - if anything it gives me more of an insight into the struggles people with such conditions often face in their daily lives. I’m certainly not one of those people advocating we use bleach to cure autism or something like that! I guess there are enough weirdos on the internet who believe terrible things and do terrible things to their kids that I’ll forgive you for your cynicism! |
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Arale Kurashiki
Posts: 775 |
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Not accusing you of anything horrible, but there are a lot of parents who view autistic people as secondary to parents with autistic children when it comes to viewpoints and resources - my own mother still regularly refers to autistic people exclusively in the form of children because that's the only framework she views autism existing in. It's like, a whole subculture of people, is maybe the word I was looking for. The idea of autistic voices being autonomous advocates for their own experiences is almost never on the table, in almost anyone's worldview.
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whiskeyii
 Posts: 2272 |
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I definitely appreciate the clarifying posts! While there wasn’t anything I necessarily disagreed with in the review (the part about fleeing what’s basically an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting is something that would drive me up the wall in a purely fictitious story, let alone for a real person in actual crisis), but I for sure had one eyebrow raised at the mention of your credentials. Not because it’s necessarily a bad thing, but as someone with both ADHD and autism who presents as “high-functioning”, I’ve been told by specialists that I basically wouldn’t qualify for an official diagnosis for autism because I’m “too socially adept” for their litmus test. Add in that I’m also an adult woman with no history of educational difficulties, and you start to brush up against the limits of conventional wisdom about autism in the medical sphere.
Personally though, I’m more reassured since you have a direct, personal connection to neurodivergent folks (heck, the fact that you even *used* the term is a pretty good sign in my book). I just wanted to chime in on why even a genuinely positive approach towards neurodivergency might be approached with some hesitancy from within the community itself, despite your best intentions. |
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Kaylee Smerbeck
Posts: 150 |
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As an autistic adult the reviewers issue is saying as a parent of
Autism parents are not the be all end all |
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Hiroki not Takuya
 Posts: 2683 |
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The organization that teaches parents how to "deal" with the tragedy of having an autistic child may be the source of what you mention and they should be avoided. As someone with ASD, I see so many depictions in anime and Japanese literature of behaviors belying ASD that I wouldn't be surprised if the manga author were on the spectrum, but so it seems are most of the Japanese population in varying degrees. My take on DoctorKev's wording in the review is that he is attempting to stay away from emotionally charged language and being professional rather than callous and being a parent who hopefully is better informed should mean he treats patients better than what you may have experienced or have seen happen. |
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Nev999
Posts: 164 |
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Ok, I’ll go through this slowly. I guess to be clear, I’m coming at this from the perspective of someone who has a lot of the same disorders Kabi has, and who has loved ones with similar issues. I’ve had depression since I was eight and had some very bad episodes where medication stopped working or something happened or just inexplicably it got bad, it hit me hard, and I went backward on my progress I also have severe anxiety (a lot better lately but), I have ADHD (probably, anxiety can often be mistaken for that because there's so much overlap so sometimes I wonder if the diagnosis I got was completely correct). I grew up with an alcoholic parent. i'm in an okay place right now.
I do think it's possible to stop pushing yourself enough to make progress when you're suffering from mental illness. I don't believe it's helpful to not make efforts towards recovery. Kabi, however, is making efforts, she just does not always succeed. I respect health care people, my father is a therapist, I’ve studied psychology, I've been helped by plenty of good health care professionals but I’ve also seen some callous ones and the havoc they wreak, which is what concerns me about your approach toward a person you decided to specifically connected with people in your care (and your children for some reason?), but I’ll keep it from getting personal and simply state my concerns. Let’s start.
You think comitting emotional self-sabotage and having emotional immaturity isn’t explained by her disorders? Also, why are you trying to diagnose someone you literally haven’t met in person? And I’ve met plenty of autistic people who have a lot of emotional maturity and don’t self sabotage, so that’s an odd thing to say. Emotional immaturity and self-sabotage are very common for people dealing with anxiety, depression, eating disorders, alcoholism and ADHD, Poor emotional regulation is literally one of the symptoms of most of these conditions. People with those conditions often have a lot of trouble socializing which yes, leads to arrested development. Poor decisions are a staple of these conditions. Self-sabotage is a huge thing people with addictions do! It does not matter if you’re 30 or not. I’m 32 and that sure doesn’t stop me from feeling my symptoms. It’s utterly bizarre you say this isn’t understandable, and I’m very concerned about someone working with mentally ill people saying this. You seem to think because you work with neurodivegent children you understand neurodivergent adults. Those kids are going to grow up and they will still show the same symptoms, I’m sorry to say.
“Sure it provides her with an income” yeah I mean that’s not a big deal or anything. Why doesn’t she just stop? Who needs money? I hope repeating that makes you realize how bizarre that is to say, especially for someone who really struggles to hold a job where she has to interact with people, which is most of them. Income is kind of important, and being wholly dependent on relatives is terrible for a depressed person's guilty brain (as someone who was briefly). .Also, telling an artist to give up their passion because it hurts shows very little understanding of artistic passion. Kabi has stated several times she wants to try to work on nonfiction little less and work on her fiction manga, and feels bad for not doing so, but she keeps struggling with writing fiction even when that’s her goal. Writing fiction (and writng at all) is really hard when you’re severely depressed and anxious. In my worst stretch of depression- the time when every second I was alive was agony and I had to go to outpatient- I couldn’t write at all, and it killed me because I so desperately wanted to, and wanted to share my writing, yet I'd lost that ability and was sure I'd never get it back. I really feel for Kabi that she’s struggling to do what she wants and feeling constantly guilty about not being able to do it.
“she insists on running away” yeah I sure ripping out her IV painfully, bleeding everywhere and fleeing from the hospital was something she stubbornly insisted on doing, and not something that’s explained by a severe anxiety bought on by incredibly stressful conditions. She just really wanted to do that! When someone relapses or has an episode, it means they learned nothing and aren’t trying at all! Kabi was a patient in the hospital during the beginning of COVID and thus could not even see her family or go outside. Her support system was completely gone, she was trapped in a place full of sick people at the height of a brand new pandemic. I can’t imagine that kind of hell as someone with anxiety. She would hear people shouting about patients dying or getting sick and she could. Not. Leave. She had very little to offer her relief from her brain eating itself alive and she was also starving. I might have ran in this situation too.
What an absolutely awful thing to say about someone with a mental illness or an addiction. If you struggle and relapse, you’re just a coward. If you struggle and relapse, you just don’t have conviction. As if it's that simple. I hope you never say something like this to the people in your care. Having support and knowing what you need to do doesn’t just make you magically get better or mean you can automatically, easily do it. People seem to think if you go to therapy, take some medication, and follow a manual you’re cured. I do all the “right things” and I still have setbacks. And sometimes you find doctors who crush you with statements like this and set you back even worse-- I'm lucky I've never had one, but my friends sure have. Recovery isn’t a straight line, finding the right coping mechanisms isn't a straight line, and the fact you don’t seem to understand this yet work with mentally ill and neurodivergent people concerns me. Lifelong mental illness means you’ll inevitably get worse sometimes and have to claw back up.It is inherently extremely repetitive! It means you’ll do stupid things. You’ll backslide. If my mother—or even a stranger-- had told me “well, you just don’t want help. You just don’t have courage and conviction” while even going to therapy or going outside for a few minutes was so hard for me and taking every ounce of energy, I might not be here today. But she didn’t. And I made slow progress because she showed me empathy and understanding. Staying alive under these conditions takes courage, and Kabi is still alive, and Kabi is still trying to get better. She has a therapist. She’s on medication. She’s staying sober at the end of the book which I imagine is incredibly hard considering Japan’s drinking culture. She's constantly trying treatments, even if she gets overwhelmed and can't got through with them all. All of that takes courage and conviction. But apparently if she gets overwhelmed the first time she goes to a support group meeting and leaves, that doesn’t matter. Could she be doing more? Sure, maybe, but it’s not a straightforward process, and trust me, when she fails and flees she’s more frustrated with herself than you can ever be with her. The fact she sometimes fails doesn’t negate that she tries. Kabi is also openly discussing her mental illness in a country that often stigmatizes it even more than the US does. That's incredibly courageous. Her work has helped many people feel less alone, including me. The fact that she explores how recovery isn’t a straight line is actually invaluable, because so many people, you included, seem to not get that. The fact she is honest about the ugly, raw, repetitive parts is helpful, because a lot of people don't want to talk about that. And a lot of the reason her mental health got worse was COVID, which did lead to a huge mental health crisis in SO many people. She is not alone there, as she points out in her book! Being isolated like that led to the worst mental health crisis of my life, so man do I get it. Thinking about how Kabi might feel if she came across this review (or even someone in a similar place to Kabi) really breaks my heart, especially considering the guilt she often expresses and her low opinion of herself. Especially since you say she’s probably going to kill herself which is just terribly insensitive. You’re not criticizing her art, you’re criticizing her as a person and offering armchair psychoanalysis, (while hyping up how your professional position as if it gives you some insight into her). That’s not something a reviewer should do. It's fine to say the recap is repetitive, I agree. It's fine to say it's frustrating to read, or that it's repetitive or painful to read, to engage with it as art, ask what Kabi is trying to express-- but instead you scold and diminish Kabi's struggles, insult her and engage in frankly offensive rhetoric about mental health..
The fact you assume everyone is neurotypical like you by saying the “the rest of us” see how silly and obvious Kabi’s problems really shows how narrow your viewpoint is. That statement is also weirdly condescending. I’m hope you rethink things. I said my piece, and I'll leave it at that. |
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