Rating: 
Summary: Excellent! Someone speaks up!
Review: 'The camera my mother gave me' is a fabulous read about Kaysen's experience with Vestibulitis - a condition that of the vulva that is rarely spoken or written about due to its intimate nature - despite the thousands, perhaps millions of women who suffer from the disease - mostly in silence.This book is wonderfully written in a sarcastic, witty manner that will appeal not only to people with Vulvar Pain conditions - I'd recommend it to anyone. As a fellow Vestibulitis sufferer, I related to all her experiences, especially her frustrating attempts to find the answers from various health proffesionals who lack the knowledge to treat this terrible condition - mostly due to the lack of research and the wide variety of causes and symptoms. I must warn all Vesitbulitis/Vulvodynia sufferers NOT to seek the answers from this book!! I made that mistake. I was devasted to find that the book ends with Kaysen calling off her search for the solution and resolving to live with her condition. Although that was a perfectly suitable ending to the book, it is not the answer I was looking for. I refuse to live with this condition and will not give up until I find the cure. So, laugh and cry along with Kaysen, celebrate her courage in writing this book, be encouraged in your efforts to speak up about your condition, but turn instead to support groups for companionship along your journey. I hope more and more women will speak up and demand a better understanding of vulvar pain disorders among the medical community and the public. We need answers! Thank you Susanna Kaysen!! I hope you are rid of this awful condition!
Rating: 
Summary: Kaysen invites the world to be her gynecologist
Review: A very odd book, this is a memoir of Kaysen's experiences with an, um, inimate health problem. I now know a lot about her sexual problems and confusion, but little about her as a person - not even how finds the money to support herself. Does she jump out of bed and start writing every day? Does she teach a class? Does she simply live of the profits of her earlier, enormously successful memoir, "Girl, Interrupted"? While the author is clearly very bright, in dealing with her illness she's made a lot of stupid decisions and come to some stupid conclusions. Why, if she wasn't satisifed with the surgeon she consulted, didn't she press him for answers or even get a second opinion? Why did she persist in going to doctors and then rejecting the treatments they proposed? Why *wouldn't* she discuss her medical problems with her boyfriend? Why *wouldn't* she allow him to speak to her doctors? And why, when after a year of enduring her rejection, he finally - in an act of frustration and desperation - becomes more aggressive, does she panic, flee, and describe his actions to all of her friends as "attempted rape"? The book is startling in its frankness about sexual matters, but provides little insight into any other area of the author's life. While I now know a great deal about her inner parts, she never revealed her inner life. At the end, I couldn't say that I ever understood or even liked the author. I guess the best way to summarize it is to say that in this book, Kaysen invites the world to be her gynecologist - not her friend.
Rating:
Summary: Scary, but true -- I know because it happened to me
Review: After 12 years, too many doctors to count, a lot of creams and injections, and two surgeries -- I understand Susanna Kaysen's story first hand. Vulvar/vaginal pain is a secret not talked about and the medical community is still mystified. This book does an excellent job of capturing the all too often insensitive and incompetent response of medical professionals. It does an excellent job of describing the mental anguish when your sexuality becomes painful and slowly dies. She deals openly and directly with the destruction that occurs in our relationships when our sexual self is no longer participating. I laughed out loud. And, I was silenced. It's been 11 years since I pondered the 45% effectiveness rate of the surgery. I'm lucky -- I placed my bet with a good surgeon and have regained my health and sexual self. However, no woman is ever the same. Thank you Susanna -- I've waited a long time to see our story in print.
Rating:
Summary: Incredible - a dark laugh out look at women and medicine
Review: Any woman who has suffered at the hands of modern medicine will appreciate this book. Kaysen gives the reader a candid look into her life the trips to gynecologist, surgeons and new age clinics as she tries to figure out what is wrong with her . In the process, trying to keep her home life afloat and her sprits up. A quick read, the novel becomes hard to put down. The book is not for the faint of heart or the easily offended. Kaysen uses language freely, so if sex ed made you uncomfortable in high school you may want to pass this one up.
Rating:
Summary: Vulva, Interrupted - realistic portrayal
Review: As in "Girl, Interrupted," Susanna Kaysen focuses her sharp camera-eye on a reality not often talked about. In "Girl, Interrupted" these realities largely centered around mental illness and definitions of such for women. In "The Camera My Mother Gave Me," the realities are vulvar disorders - causes, treatments, explanations, talking with others about it - and figuring out its meaning. I liked this book largely because it was a very true story not just about Kaysen's life, but about many women who struggle with a vulvar disorder - be in vestibulitis (as Kaysen has), vulvodynia, lichen sclerosus - even vulvar cancer. Women with vulvar disorders often wonder if they are alone, why hasn't there been more research in years or in decades (Kaysen and her research and medical colleagues make this point, too) - is this a reflection on mental state? or is there really a physical cause? is it a connection between the two that may exacerbate the terrible lows of the disorder? These are questions that women diagnosed with vulvar disorders grapple with. It was also fascinating to read this book years after having read "Girl, Interrupted" - and to really empathize with her reaction when she is faced with the prospect of having to take tricyclic antidepressants or an SSRI such as Prozac. Having this thread of her autobiographies gave "The Camera My Mother Gave Me" much added weight.
Rating: 
Summary: Funny and thought provoking!
Review: Having read Girl, Interrupted, Susanna Kaysen's gripping and comic memoir, I didn't hesitate to pick up this book. The Camera My Mother Gave Me is a thought-provoking and witty memoir about Kaysen's encounters with various doctors -- gynecologists, vulvologists, internists, alternative health physicians -- in a quest to find out what is wrong with her vagina. Her vagina suffers from a mysterious illness that doctors have not been able to identify -- thus, said illness interferes with her relationship with her boyfriend. Should she insist on getting to the bottom of things, or should she learn to live with her unidentified condition? Funny, intelligent and compelling, The Camera My Mother Gave Me is a short memoir that ought to be read from cover to cover. I recommend it most highly.
Rating:
Summary: Female Problems
Review: I hesitated picking up this short memoir, thinking a book that focused on such topics as female problems beneath my modern feminist dignity, but ended up finding the frank discussion of the female body and its midlife crises rather refreshing. It's easy to dismiss Kaysen (who of course wrote GIRL INTERRUPTED) as a whiner and a chronic malcontent, but anyone who contends with a medical problem that contemporary medicine can't solve knows how frustrating life can be. She honestly and humorously chronicles the horrors of aging -- parts that don't work right (in this case her own vulva), doctors who don't seem to be able to find the right cure, men one might fancy who prefer women their own age (much younger), and the importance of a good sex life to one's general well-being. It was laugh-out-loud funny and poignant at the same time.
Rating:
Summary: Humor, Reality, Discovery - All in 176 Pages
Review: I read this short book in one sitting, well, except for jicking, of course - a new word! See the first chapter on biofeedback for this definition. I loved Susanna Kaysen's honesty and frankness and that she was and is able to laugh at herself and her situation at a time of great confusion and personal pain. I do not share this problem with Kaysen or several of the reviewers here and had only picked up this book because Girl, Interrupted had been very interesting. This was moreso. Kaysen entertains you with her style and open discussions with a large variety of people and gives us all a peek at how it feels to occasionally allow ourselves to see the reality of our own emotions hiding within what appears to be a physical problem. Kaysen, like many of us, does not appear to have all the answers and yet she shares some rather profound glimpses of herself that she has begun to discover along the way. In writing this book, it seems that Kaysen has found her voice about her real issues and by speaking up about them, has helped herself begin to truly heal. This is a great book for people on a healing journey - not to hand out solutions to a very personal problem, but to shine a light on the value of delving into self rather than finding a pill or procedure to cut out the pain. I give it 4 stars because it is a very good read and well presented. 5 stars would be merited if the end were a bit stronger, but it does end with a thought provoking paragraph about your body and your mind.
Rating: 
Summary: Sex, Interrupted
Review: I'm grateful to Kaysen for writing this book, and I found it a fascinating read. Yet, there is something about it that rings *disservice* to so many women with the same medical problem. Although the term 'vulvodynia' is never actually mentioned (a technicality), what really bothers me is that the book is almost entirely devoid of the one thing I kept expecting to find at one point or another: HOPE. The tone is quite dark and--while I can understand the author's desire for consistency--as someone with the very condition she writes about, I kept wondering when she was ever going to get around to landing upon something that actually helped her. No such luck. It also fails to truly convey the frustration of having to forage through the medical thicket with a condition so poorly understood. Her sarcasm rings through, but she appears to have unusually effective relationships with her doctors (perhaps this was worked over in the drafts?). While that might be an inspiration to women who need to garner a little more assertiveness while on the examination table (something difficult to do when you're half-naked in stirrups!), it comes across as SHE being the difficult one, in her resistance to a real commitment to getting better. Meanwhile, her rocky love relationship is documented with poignance and heartfelt confusion. This is a book meant to be read for entertainment, period. There are a few scant explanations of certain theories and treatments, so thumbs up for that, at least. However, the fact that one of the central themes is a painful condition is second to the use of imagery and brevity of dialogue in creating a story that centers more around a woman's psyche in relation to her sexual self. Nothing wrong with that, and it certainly makes an insightful case. The last third of the book engaged me more than the rest, but even throughout all this thought-provoking work, I got a little irked. These are just my own personal observations: 1. She doesn't seem to give the treatments half a chance to work. And, she misspells oxalate as oxylate. 2. Pessimism reigns supreme, which probably explains #1. I question some of the other critics' assessments of the lack of any real self-pity, too. It's just more insipid and veiled through a constant filter of the ongoing meter of her sexual desire and functionality. Sure, most of us want to have sex quite often and enjoyably. But she never seems to glean any real emotional lessons whatsoever from all her trials & tribulations, and that is a disappointment. 3. The 'Why I Am Opposed to Antidepressants' chapter. While I don't disagree 100% (I've never taken them myself), her attitude strikes me as using it for secondary gains--to avoid life's other difficulties. And she even admits this avoidance to wanting to feel better, but the assumption is that it's widespread and therefore 'normal.' While it may be fashionable in this day & age to whine with semi-masochistic angst about the Disease du Jour, anyone with any degree of experience with said Problematic Vagina will probably see through the literary tactics and question the helpfulness of publishing a book that follows the herd in that aspect of medical mentality. 4. The shift in focus to the 'inequality' of older women vs. older men seemed a little out of place. The association of that to her chronic pain only one year later (while stating she's not going through menopause) reads as a dire prediction for anyone over the age of 40, and suggests that a woman's entire attractiveness is dependent upon the health of her vagina. 5. There are no dates given, so the reader has no way of knowing the author's age and whether this was early on in the treatment & research (10-20 years ago), or just recently! In the end, Kaysen closes with a note on the mind-body connection, stating, "disease is one of our languages. Doctors understand what disease has to say about itself. It's up to the person with the disease to understand what the disease has to say to her. My vagina keeps trying to get my attention. It has something important to say to me. I'm listening. I'm still listening."
I couldn't help but wonder that if she wasn't listening so much to her vagina, maybe her mind would let her take the treatments more seriously! But maybe hoping for a thoroughly happy ending is a bit unrealistic. If you're still listening, Ms. Kaysen, my question to you is: Are you better yet?
Rating:
Summary: Quick, painless read, but not very rewarding
Review: I'm not a big fan of the previous book I read by this author, "Girl, Interrupted." This book is better, or at least more engaging, but I still find Kaysen prefers a passive, almost victimized role, which makes her narrative less appealing. I don't identify with her at all. It's an interesting read, and I appreciate her descriptions of navigating health care and using the resources she has to learn what she can on her own. It's very short; I read it in about two hours. It's certainly not the best book I've read. She seems unlikeable and whiny, and in the end, I wasn't all that interested in how things turned out for her.
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