Topics | Mental Health | The Sun Magazine #3

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Mental Health

Quotations

Sunbeams

Wounding and healing are not opposites. They’re part of the same thing. It is our wounds that enable us to be compassionate with the wounds of others. It is our limitations that make us kind to the limitations of other people. . . . I think I have served people perfectly with parts of myself I used to be ashamed of.

Rachel Naomi Remen

October 2021
Poetry

Intensive Outpatient

On our way back from a Mother’s Day celebration in Newport Beach / my sister turned to me & said, Have you ever thought about treatment for your / eating disorder? For years the only eating disorder in the house was hers.

By Jeremy Radin September 2021
Tribute

A Tribute To Chris Bursk

The selection that follows — just a small sample of the fifty-plus poems of his that have appeared in The Sun — display the heart and honesty that first drew us to Chris’s work in 1977. A self-described “compulsive writer,” Chris once said, “I do not wait for inspiration. . . . Some days I watch the page until a few words come — and then I find myself inside the world they invite me into.” That world will be missed.

By The Sun August 2021
The Sun Interview

Sent Away

Kenneth R. Rosen On The Troubled-Teen Industry

Some of these children do need help, but is this the right type of help? Over the years counselors have been charged with sexual abuse, physical abuse, and predatory behavior.

By Finn Cohen July 2021
Essays, Memoirs, & True Stories

My Brother’s Dinner With The President Of Sears

After this friend left, I excused myself to go to the bathroom, where I shut the door and fell to my knees, shaking and crying. I wished that my brother had been different. And I wished that I had been more forgiving and compassionate. I wished that everything between us had been different. I was on that floor for a while.

By Marc Inman July 2021
Readers Write

The Woods

As a refuge, as a threat, as a place to live

By Our Readers June 2021
Essays, Memoirs, & True Stories

The Lovely Harry, Philip Larkin, And Me

At the end of our weekly sessions, as I’m about to walk out the door, I hand The Lovely Harry a manila envelope of poems I’ve written that week. Some weeks it’s a thin envelope; other weeks the pages inside push against the seams with their folded energy.

By Paula Harris April 2021
Essays, Memoirs, & True Stories

Bowl, Large Cloth, Pair Of Chopsticks

The air is still. The governor is on the radio: “This could be the greatest loss of human lives and property due to wildfire in our state’s history.” I start vacuuming. It’s not until Amy gets home an hour later that we begin to outline what needs to be done: We need cat carriers to transport the cats. We need provisions for the animals. We need our medications. I am demonstrating how much we need our medications.

By Jacob Aiello April 2021
Essays, Memoirs, & True Stories

Mild Case

When did the distance from the bed to here become twenty-six miles? That pair of pants I stepped over, you see that? Goddamn Everest that was.

By Josh Swiller March 2021
Essays, Memoirs, & True Stories

Precarious

“Imagine if we’d known,” I said. “If you’d had a diagnosis, you could have been given lithium or something to help you.” Joan lifted her hands to her face and sobbed.

By S.B. Rowe February 2021