Silence You - Paperback

by Jessie Close (Author), Calen T. Pick (Author)

"I read Jessie and Calen's book with my heart in my throat, at times, my eyes burning with tears. It is a gripping, heartbreaking, and ultimately, life affirming, step-by-step account of how mental illness can shatter a family, but also how that family, through love and resilience, can not only survive, but triumph."--Glenn Close

"Writing the book was like putting it back together, my fall into psychosis and how I began to recover."--Calen T. Pick, featured in People

For eighteen years, everyone looked up to Oliver. He was smart, funny, good-looking, and a talented artist. Everyone wanted to be his friend. But after his eighteenth birthday, he became morose and moody. He watched familiar faces melt into unknown strangers. Oliver fights to silence the sinister voice that tells him scary things as he tries to exist in a world that no longer makes sense to him. Oliver's parents and siblings grapple with how to help him find treatment while his delusions, anxiety, and hallucinations intensify. However, finding treatment proves to be even more difficult since Oliver's mother is bipolar and his father holds onto the denial he has regarding Oliver's increasingly dangerous behaviors.

Based on the authors' own experiences, Silence You follows a family coping with crisis. Oliver, the eldest son, is suffering from schizophrenia. As he goes through treatment, his parents and siblings deal with the repercussions. In particular, Oliver's mother, Elizabeth, must come to terms with her own mental illness and the role it may have played in Oliver's illness.

Author Biography

Jessie Close, the younger sister of actress Glenn Close, is an internationally recognized speaker, author, poet, and advocate for mental health reform, whose own battle with bipolar disorder illustrates the critical need for early diagnosis and treatment. She authored The Warping of Al, and she writes a blog for Bring Change 2 Mind. Jessie has received awards from the National Alliance on Mental Illness and Mental Health America, as well as the Jed Foundation Award and The McLean Award. She speaks with great passion and humor on a subject with which she is intimately familiar.

Calen T. Pick is a self-taught artist living in Bozeman, Montana. He was diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder at age nineteen. His interest in art is largely based on the therapeutic benefit of being creative. He is the son of Jessie Close.