When Down Is Up: Life with a Down Syndrome Son Book

Let me throw this out there: I think this is a hugely important topic. There's very little literature out there on men with eating disorders, and even less by men with eating disorders.

The starkness of this book, of the author's prose, will probably appeal to many, but I couldn't get behind it. The writing is very calm, unfeeling, and it's hard to sympathize with the author. Based on his writing, I don't think his underlying problems were ever addressed (wrong kind of therapy, perhaps a lack of therapy), but neither does he seem to think that a) he has a problem in the first place (not that this is unusual, but it makes it harder to get into the book) or b) that his actions are causing pain to anyone else.

There's a lot of repetition of events and facts and a lack of insight into the author's own actions and thoughts, and I wish that the author had collaborated with somebody else on this book - as I said, it's an extremely important topic and could have been a very interesting story.

At several points in the book the author mentions being "happy" and "healthy" with a given weight and not being able to understand why those around him won't let him stay there - and then he drops weight and says the same thing about a lower weight (he also mentions the many health problems that accompanied his anorexia... and he died of it around the time of the book's publication). I don't think he understood himself or his eating disorder well enough at the time of writing to provide a useful portrait.