Chapter 3 "Flights of the Mind" Summary and Analysis

In July 1974, Jamison joins the UCLA faculty. Here she supervises psychiatric residents and clinical psychology interns, serves as faculty liaison between the departments of psychiatry and anesthesiology, and completes her work on drug studies begun in graduate school. Buoyed by high spirits, she finds her mind racing ever faster. She seems to need less and less sleep, and works intensely. Only in retrospect does she realize that this is the onset of a seriously psychotic episode of mania; but strangely, one that has depression at its black core.

In a vividly descriptive passage, Jamison outlines the two extremes of her mood disorder. At the manic extreme, she is filled with feelings of self-confidence and well-being. Life is exciting, and even dull people seem interesting. Euphoria and seductiveness color relations with other...