My “Most Valuable Part” from Girl Interrupted is “Bare Bones”. The book Girl Interrupted is a memoir by American author, Susanna Kaysen. She was relating her experiences as a young woman in a psychiatric hospital. The beginning of the story talks about a girl who has 18 years old with the name of Susanna Kaysen. She is admitted to McLean Hospital after attempting suicide by overdosing on pills. Also, she self-harms to feel better. After, Susanna denied having tried to commit suicide with pills. That day, Susanna's psychiatrist convinces her to spend a few weeks in McLean, a psychiatric hospital where they could help her.
After being admitted in the hospital, Susanna is diagnosed with borderline personality disorder. That means that the hospital staff can forcibly extend her stay in the hospital. During the hospital stay, Susanna meets other patients in that place like Polly, Lisa Cody, Georgina, and Daisy. A few hours later, Susanna meets one of the worst patients at McLean and that is Lisa Rowe. She is a charismatic sociopath who loves to break hospital rules. Lisa is admired by all the girls there, for she escapes frequently away without being discovered. Also, Susanna meets Valerie the head nurse at the hospital. Although there are many mental illness people in that hospital, Susanna tried to adapt in that place with those girls.
One day I read "Bare Bones" which told how crazy or maniacal Susanna was in that chapter. I thought that Susanna was the most normal person in the hospital, since she did not act as strange as the other patients there. However, in this chapter I realized that she was not a normal person, Susanna really was out of control in her mind. When I read this chapter, I felt a little impatient about what Susanna was making to herself. One day, Susanna was sitting in the living room inspecting her hand a lot. She was doing that because she was worried that she did not have bones in her hand. Susanna was really out of her mind because she felt the tendons in her hand and that moment, Susanna said, "Where are my bones?" she asked herself. Then Susanna started biting her hand looking for bones, making her nerves, tendons and blood vessels move away from her. At that moment, she was trying to peel her skin, so she scratched the back of her hand. Susanna being in there in the living room, but nobody stopped her madness and suddenly, Susanna said, “Success!” a bubble of blood came out of his last knuckle. Then, Georgina and Polly asked Susanna, "What the hell are you doing?" Susanna told Georgina and Polly that she wanted to make sure that she had a normal human hand like everyone else, for she did not feel bones. In that moment, Valerie the head nurse of the hospital arrives with a cup of medicines for Susanna. When Susanna took the pills, she felt dizzy and she fell to the floor, Georgina and Valerie lifted her up and Susanna told them that everything would be fine. What Susanna meant by that was that she was safe, she was really crazy, and that no one could get her out of that place.
I think that this chapter was one of the best because Susanna finally realizes that she was out of her mind. Also, I think Susanna realized that she had to stay at the McLean hospital to be evaluated, since her behavior was not that of a normal person. Finally, after everything that happened, she began to recognize that she was sick and started to get ahead and accept herself for how she really is. I mean, she agreed to be a person with a mental illness.
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