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How many times have you heard someone laugh off his eccentricities with a flippant, "Oh, that's just my OCD coming out?" How many times have you chuckled knowingly, remembering your own neuroses - the way you have to make your bed just so, or how you can't stand it if the toilet paper is on the holder in the improper position, or the way that you can't stop yourself from sweeping up every crumb that hits the floor as soon it lands? I dare you to laugh about OCD after reading the first four pages of Saving Sammy: Curing the Boy Who Caught OCD by Beth Alison Maloney. You won't. I guarantee it.
Maloney's story begins the summer her middle son, Sammy, turns 12. A smart, happy child, he enjoyed competing in mathathons, playing Dungeons & Dragons with his friends, and hunting for treasures along the shoreline near his home in Kennebunkport, Maine. Then, Maloney buys a new home, moving herself and her three boys away from the beachfront rental home they'd come to love. His parents' recent divorce, plus the stress of moving, seems to traumatize Sammy. Beth watches as he takes up strange behaviors - walking around with his eyes shut, navigating only with his hands; refusing to sleep in his new bedroom; avoiding physical contact; spinning, hopping and jerking at odd times. What begins as puzzling soon becomes alarming. Sammy's compulsions start to take over his life - he can't leave the house without performing a complicated routine; he won't shower, brush his teeth, or change his clothes; he can't stand having windows open or the sight of bare feet or the sound of loud breathing. He apologizes constantly for inconveniencing his family, but he can't seem to control his need for things to be a certain way.

Terrified, Beth searches for a doctor willing to see Sammy, finally landing in the New Hampshire office of psychiatrist Dr. Drill. His diagnosis? Obsessive compulsive disorder. The answer makes sense, but Beth's still troubled. With its sudden onset and no family history of OCD, she can't fathom how her son ended up with the condition. Still, she follows the doctor's advice. As Sammy's symptoms get worse and worse, Beth knows there's more to it than OCD. Second diagnosis? Tourette's. Despite the usual medications used to treat the disease, Sammy's still no better. His obsessions keep him confined to the house, where the family has to walk on eggshells so as not to disturb his fragile psyche. Exhausted, depressed and terrified, Beth vows to help her son. No matter what it takes. When her research leads to a controversial study linking OCD to strep throat, she thinks she's finally found her answer. The only problem lies in convincing Sammy's doctors. With stubborn determination, she braces herself for war, battling doctors, researchers and anyone who stands in the way of her son and the cure she knows is out there. Long after others would have given up, she fights. She won't stop until she has her Sammy back. And she doesn't.

Saving Sammy is an incredible, absorbing story that is as troubling as it is inspiring. My heart ached for the boy whose compulsions made his life a living hell; for his brothers, who dreaded being at home; and especially for Beth, whose agony is palpable. Her story is a rebuke of the doctors who stubbornly refused to look beyond their beloved studies, letting patients suffer before allowing themselves to move past their foregone conclusions. It's a call-to-action, urging parents everywhere to stand up for their sick children. Mostly, it's a testimony to the strength and perserverance of a mother who refused to back down. And to the boy she brought back from the very brink of insanity. It's a story you're not going to believe, and one you won't soon forget.

Grade: A

If this were a movie, it would be rated: PG for mature themes

To the FTC, with love: I received Saving Sammy from TLC Book Tours. The fact that I received the book free of charge has nothing to do with the way I graded it - I gave it an A because that's exactly what it deserves.

"I thought I knew what crazy was. Then I came to Bellevue."

- Julie Holland, M.D.

Every day, New York City's sickest, most pathetic residents troop through the doors of Bellevue Hospital's psychiatric ER. It's a desperate parade of sociopathic inmates, abandoned street folk, suicidal everymen and psychopaths of every stripe. Some want a listening ear, others a safe place to sleep; some enter souped up on drugs, others have been off their meds for months; some want real treatment, others desire only the free painkillers. Each shift brings fresh neuroses, new problems, unique challenges. In short, Bellevue's the perfect workplace for a hotshot young psychiatrist like Julie Holland. An adrenaline junkie who loves nothing more than playing with fire, she gets a sometimes frightening, ofttimes enlightening, always fascinating up-close look at how the brain functions - and malfunctions.

Weekends at Bellevue (which will be published in October) details all the crazy Holland encountered in the 9 years she spent treating patients in the ER, as well as the path that led a would-be rock star to become an honored psychiatrist, professor and author. She describes her growth from a nervous "third-year" who "spent most of my time feeling like I was in either a gory movie or a well-written medical drama" (31-32) to a more confident resident and finally, to an experienced psychiatrist and expert psychopharmocologist. Along the path, she encounters her share of dangerous patients, harmless whack jobs, successes and failures. Her experiences oscillate from outrageous to hilarious to heartbreaking. What makes the book most profound, however, are the truths Holland discovers about humanity and about herself. By the time burnout forces her out of the chaos of emergency medicine into the relative calm of private practice, Holland has come to a startling conclusion:

The reality is this: All of us, to some degree, are mentally ill. We get paranoid, anxious, depressed, and insomniac. We alternate between delusions of grandeur and crippling self-doubt, we suffer from paralyzing fears and embarrassing neuroses. We have compulsions to do things we know we shouldn't, and there are millions of us with addictions, whether to gambling, drinking, dieting, or playing Second Life. Every one of us has psychiatric symptoms, many of them serious enough to warrant attention, even if they are not incapacitating. But few of us are willing to let on that we are suffering. This secrecy and shame compounds our avoidance of those who have been officially diagnosed as mentally ill (293).

When my 7-year-old daughter spied the title of this book - In the Land of Invisible Women - she wrinkled her little face in confusion. "Mom," she asked, "How can a woman be invisible?" I know she was not asking a deep, philosophical question, but was stumped by pure logic - People are solid, therefore they cannot be invisible. Before I had a chance to explain, she flitted outside to build a fairy house, but it made me wonder if she, a daughter of 21st Century America, could even fathom a world where women live under such oppression that they cannot drive, own property in their own names, or drift outdoors without cloaking themselves in thick robes. To a child who's been taught she can do and be anything - a doctor, an astronaut, even president - such a world would be as foreign to her as Mars.

The land in question is Saudi Arabia, pre 9/11. Author Qanta Ahmed admits some things (like women being allowed to drive) have changed since she dwelt in the Kingdom, but In the Land of Invisible Women focuses on what was happening during the years she lived and worked in Saudi. Dr. Ahmed, a British Muslim of Pakistani descent, studied and trained in both England and New York City. After several years in the U.S., her American visa ran out, so she made a spur-of-the-moment decision to relocate to Saudi Arabia, where her medical skills were needed at King Fahad National Guard Hospital in Riyadh. The prospect of a high salary and free rent drew her to the Kingdom. Although friends expressed concern over her decision, she felt little apprehension - after all, she was a Muslim woman "well-acquainted with the ways of an Islamic Kingdom" (8). It didn't take her long to realize just how different life in this foreign land could be.

Dr. Ahmed became especially fascinated with the lives of Saudi women, who functioned under laws dictated by extremist leaders. By Western standards, their lives were oppressive nightmares, their every movement guarded by men. At the time of Dr. Ahmed's residency in the Kingdom, females were required by law to veil themselves when in public. In addition, they were not allowed to drive, own property in their own names, or appear outside their homes alone. Powerful Muttawas (or religious policemen) patrolled restaurants, malls and other public arenas to ensure the rules were followed. Foreigners received no leniency, so Dr. Ahmed followed the same rules as her Saudi counterparts. By studying these women - feminists, extremists, cowards, advocates, vocal and silent - she learned to appreciate their plights. Through Dr. Ahmed's many stories, the reader also comes to admire them in all their variations.

Dr. Ahmed also discusses the many contradictions in the Kingdom, from Pepsi-slugging, Cadillac-driving Saudis who despise the U.S.; to American-trained doctors' "unmistakable fetor of relish in the face of [9/11's] destruction" (397); to brilliant female doctors unable to express second opinions for fear of offending their male colleagues; to women veiled to escape men's glances conducting affairs with "Bluetooth boyfriends." In the end, she remains puzzled by a place where

I still count the dichotomies: angry divorcees who dream of becoming second wives; conflicted Saudi men who cannot forsake the expectations of powerful matriarchs; womanhood that is both oppressed and liberated by veilings; Saudi men who are feminists and Saudi grandmothers who propogate female suppression ... (435-436).

As fascinating as all these discussions are, the most poignant sections of the book come as Dr. Ahmed deals with "the fleeting Muslim within me" (112-113). Disappointed with Saudi Muslims who display flagrant sexism, anti-semitism and other kinds of racism, she becomes disillusioned with the Saudi brand of the peace-affirming religion she has always known. Still, a trip to Mecca offers spiritual rebirth, which finally allows her to feel a sense of belonging in the Kingdom.

In the Land of Invisible Women is not light reading. It's a riveting hard-hitter that offers a unique and intimate look under the veils of a culture steeped in complexity and contradiction. Throughout, Dr. Ahmed provides an honest, sometimes scathing, sometimes sensitive look at the fascinating nuances of Saudi culture. It also provides a moving potrayal of one woman's search for her own self, her own soul. Unique and intensely moving, In the Land of Invisible Women is not to be missed.

Grade: B