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Overview
"If anyone can prevent even a single child or teenager from repeating the mistakes described in this book, or help a loved one or family member avoid unnecessary future suffering... then my struggles will not have been in vain."
Imagine being arrested, handcuffed and locked behind the bars of a dark, cold, jail cell. The next day you are forcibly dragged to a downtown high-rise and thrust into a 4'x 8' steel-walled cage. Your freedom has been ripped away, even though you haven't been charged with a single crime. A reporter comes to interview you, so you answer his questions. When returned to your cell, the prison guard tells you, "They are going to lock you up and throw away the key!"
You are driven to an insane asylum where a psychiatrist orders mandatory shock treatments. You are strapped to a gurney, electrodes are stuck to your temples, and a rubber mouthpiece is forced between your teeth. When the first electric voltages pass through your brain, your heart stops. You are revived, then given a series of nine more ECT treatments without anesthesia. Each one feels like a sledge hammer to your head. Your memories fade into a fog, and you feel like a zombie... one of the walking dead. You remain confined indoors and inappropriately medicated for months, because you were misdiagnosed as a drug-induced paranoid schizophrenic. You are a teenage bipolar addict with a mood disorder, OCD, and claustrophobia!
The torture of your confinement, the shock therapy, and being forced to take massive daily doses of the wrong medication leaves you morbidly depressed and obsessed with suicide. While locked away, your father dies and your girlfriend abandons you. Then one day you are released and simply told to "Have a nice life!"
More substance abuse soon changes your obsession with your own death into a compulsion... one that leaves the blood squirting from your wrist as cold as the dirt you're lying in, while just waiting and hoping to die. This is my story. --Kerry L. Barger
The following review was written by Priscilla Estes of Yardley, Pennsylvania. An Independent Writing and Editing Professional and Director of Christian Life Center and Activities, Estes was on the faculty of ETSU (East Texas State University) for 24 years. She has authored and co-authored a number of successful publications, including "New Orleans Swamp Romp" and "Take Me to The River". A Texas "2-stepper" who grew up in a local rural community of Maryland near Washington College, Priscilla previously lived in Antwerp, Belgium for two years:
"Below are my five recommendations to avoid going insane (like I did) and to avoid insuring that you become some kind of worthless, pathetic, immoral, blubbering idiot in the future."
The cover shows an adorable pre-school cowboy clutching matching six-shooters and grinning at the camera. The Roy Rogers image belies the misery on the pages that follow. What started as a private, therapeutic journal steamrolled into an honest account of a life derailed by grief, drugs, and addictive relationships.
Barger does not apologize, make excuses or ask forgiveness for the way he lived his life. He merely tells it, exposing warts, pimples and pus. He chose to take drugs, have affairs and break the law. If this were a novel, he would not be a sympathetic main character. And he'd be the first to agree, describing himself as "moral scum," and his need for love "pathetic."
Even so, Barger's unapologetic denigration of self renders him vulnerable and strangely likeable. After all, he didn't choose his broken, alcoholic family; he didn't choose institutionalization and ten electro-convulsive therapy (shock) treatments at age seventeen; he didn't choose genetic mental illness and a deep, gnawing emptiness inside. But he did choose to devote his life to working with the handicapped in state mental facilities in Texas and to write this book.
Barger's factual style, callous accounts of womanizing and angry outbursts are sometimes uncomfortable to read. A drifting narrative ignores potentially insightful inroads. And the final nine pages, explaining the purpose of the book, should have come first, although we have learned that it is indeed being reorganized for production. The book is a brave chronicle of how not to live and admonishes readers to follow their bliss, go for their dreams, and never give up. --The U.S. Review ( www.theusreview.com/reviews/High-Barger.html )
Imagine being arrested, handcuffed and locked behind the bars of a dark, cold, jail cell. The next day you are forcibly dragged to a downtown high-rise and thrust into a 4'x 8' steel-walled cage. Your freedom has been ripped away, even though you haven't been charged with a single crime. A reporter comes to interview you, so you answer his questions. When returned to your cell, the prison guard tells you, "They are going to lock you up and throw away the key!"
You are driven to an insane asylum where a psychiatrist orders mandatory shock treatments. You are strapped to a gurney, electrodes are stuck to your temples, and a rubber mouthpiece is forced between your teeth. When the first electric voltages pass through your brain, your heart stops. You are revived, then given a series of nine more ECT treatments without anesthesia. Each one feels like a sledge hammer to your head. Your memories fade into a fog, and you feel like a zombie... one of the walking dead. You remain confined indoors and inappropriately medicated for months, because you were misdiagnosed as a drug-induced paranoid schizophrenic. You are a teenage bipolar addict with a mood disorder, OCD, and claustrophobia!
The torture of your confinement, the shock therapy, and being forced to take massive daily doses of the wrong medication leaves you morbidly depressed and obsessed with suicide. While locked away, your father dies and your girlfriend abandons you. Then one day you are released and simply told to "Have a nice life!"
More substance abuse soon changes your obsession with your own death into a compulsion... one that leaves the blood squirting from your wrist as cold as the dirt you're lying in, while just waiting and hoping to die. This is my story. --Kerry L. Barger
The following review was written by Priscilla Estes of Yardley, Pennsylvania. An Independent Writing and Editing Professional and Director of Christian Life Center and Activities, Estes was on the faculty of ETSU (East Texas State University) for 24 years. She has authored and co-authored a number of successful publications, including "New Orleans Swamp Romp" and "Take Me to The River". A Texas "2-stepper" who grew up in a local rural community of Maryland near Washington College, Priscilla previously lived in Antwerp, Belgium for two years:
"Below are my five recommendations to avoid going insane (like I did) and to avoid insuring that you become some kind of worthless, pathetic, immoral, blubbering idiot in the future."
The cover shows an adorable pre-school cowboy clutching matching six-shooters and grinning at the camera. The Roy Rogers image belies the misery on the pages that follow. What started as a private, therapeutic journal steamrolled into an honest account of a life derailed by grief, drugs, and addictive relationships.
Barger does not apologize, make excuses or ask forgiveness for the way he lived his life. He merely tells it, exposing warts, pimples and pus. He chose to take drugs, have affairs and break the law. If this were a novel, he would not be a sympathetic main character. And he'd be the first to agree, describing himself as "moral scum," and his need for love "pathetic."
Even so, Barger's unapologetic denigration of self renders him vulnerable and strangely likeable. After all, he didn't choose his broken, alcoholic family; he didn't choose institutionalization and ten electro-convulsive therapy (shock) treatments at age seventeen; he didn't choose genetic mental illness and a deep, gnawing emptiness inside. But he did choose to devote his life to working with the handicapped in state mental facilities in Texas and to write this book.
Barger's factual style, callous accounts of womanizing and angry outbursts are sometimes uncomfortable to read. A drifting narrative ignores potentially insightful inroads. And the final nine pages, explaining the purpose of the book, should have come first, although we have learned that it is indeed being reorganized for production. The book is a brave chronicle of how not to live and admonishes readers to follow their bliss, go for their dreams, and never give up. --The U.S. Review ( www.theusreview.com/reviews/High-Barger.html )
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781666283020 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Barnes & Noble Press |
| Publication date: | 08/26/2010 |
| Pages: | 202 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.43(d) |
About the Author
Kerry L. Barger is a native Texan currently living in Oklahoma. His family heritage in Texas predates the Civil War. The Wright brothers of Kitty Hawk, President Grover Cleveland, and General Robert E. Lee are all listed on his family tree.
Of all the books he has written, "An American Holocaust: The Story of Lataine's Ring" is by far his most popular work. It details the events of the worst public school tragedy in U.S. history. At the age of 10, his mother's cousin and childhood playmate (Lataine) was killed in the New London, Texas school explosion of 1937.
His "Elohim" trilogy offers an unconventional explanation of mankind's origins and identifies the most likely source of all of the world's major religions.
"The True Story of Noah" explains how Mr. Barger discovered precisely where Noah's ark came to rest, by studying the most ancient documents available that describe the Noachian flood.
"High Times & Rough Rides of a Bipolar Addict" was designed for anyone afflicted with a bipolar illness and for family members struggling with the drug and alcohol addictions that are so common among those affected.
"Coracle: A Planet on the Edge" is a delightful science fiction fantasy set in the distant future at a time when our sun has expanded, and the planet Uranus is being terraformed for human life. A young boy develops a compassionate and friendly relationship with an alien creature known as a wog. Their encounters lead to a series of epic adventures that culminate in the evolution of a long-forgotten, winged beast called a wogon. It surprises any and all with its ability to survive every attempt to destroy it. This book is an allegory, with a message of hope for our own planet's future ecology. Nevertheless, some hard lessons have yet to be learned by those in authority about becoming better stewards of Earth's natural resources.
Mr. Barger's latest book, "A Little Season in the Big Picture", is arguably this author's crowning achievement. It presents the history of mankind in terms of humanity's changing dispensations throughout the ages and what God once expected from his chosen people in the past, compared to His expectations of every individual in our present age. Biblical prophecies of global proportions are clarified and simplified, for anyone who can see the Big Picture and observe firsthand how the next age of man is swiftly approaching. This book is a must-read for all who are grappling with the most difficult problems in today's world.
Of all the books he has written, "An American Holocaust: The Story of Lataine's Ring" is by far his most popular work. It details the events of the worst public school tragedy in U.S. history. At the age of 10, his mother's cousin and childhood playmate (Lataine) was killed in the New London, Texas school explosion of 1937.
His "Elohim" trilogy offers an unconventional explanation of mankind's origins and identifies the most likely source of all of the world's major religions.
"The True Story of Noah" explains how Mr. Barger discovered precisely where Noah's ark came to rest, by studying the most ancient documents available that describe the Noachian flood.
"High Times & Rough Rides of a Bipolar Addict" was designed for anyone afflicted with a bipolar illness and for family members struggling with the drug and alcohol addictions that are so common among those affected.
"Coracle: A Planet on the Edge" is a delightful science fiction fantasy set in the distant future at a time when our sun has expanded, and the planet Uranus is being terraformed for human life. A young boy develops a compassionate and friendly relationship with an alien creature known as a wog. Their encounters lead to a series of epic adventures that culminate in the evolution of a long-forgotten, winged beast called a wogon. It surprises any and all with its ability to survive every attempt to destroy it. This book is an allegory, with a message of hope for our own planet's future ecology. Nevertheless, some hard lessons have yet to be learned by those in authority about becoming better stewards of Earth's natural resources.
Mr. Barger's latest book, "A Little Season in the Big Picture", is arguably this author's crowning achievement. It presents the history of mankind in terms of humanity's changing dispensations throughout the ages and what God once expected from his chosen people in the past, compared to His expectations of every individual in our present age. Biblical prophecies of global proportions are clarified and simplified, for anyone who can see the Big Picture and observe firsthand how the next age of man is swiftly approaching. This book is a must-read for all who are grappling with the most difficult problems in today's world.
From the B&N Reads Blog
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