Polly Atkin

Polly Atkin, a patient who has suffered greatly with Ehlers Danlos Syndrome and hemochromatosis, documents her long struggle to be taken seriously by the medical profession, obtain diagnoses, and manage her condition. Some of Us Just Fall offers insight into what it is like to be a person living with chronic diseases that set her apart from those with normally functioning bodies. Atkin packs a lot of other “stuff” into her book as well: commentaries and reflections on the writing of others who live with disabilities; considerable nature writing (focused mostly on Grasmere in the Lake District); academic musings on Thomas de Quincey and the Wordsworths; mini essays on hydrotherapy, cyanobacteria and figures in Scottish history; and excerpts from her journals (some of them recounting nighttime dreams).

I would have much preferred a shorter, more linear narrative. Part of Atkin’s point is that chronological time doesn’t really exist for the chronically ill patient. Life does not progress, move forward, for her in the way that it does for more able-bodied humans. Instead, time is layered, a palimpsest. To a certain degree, the patient is stuck. The same things happen over and over again, though there are variations in the bones broken, the joints dislocated, and the organs that require imaging. To emphasize this deviation from time as most experience it, Atkin’s telling appears to be intentionally fragmented and disorienting. It’s 1997 in one paragraph and almost twenty years later in the next.

Since my own preference is for a clean, economical writing style, I did not get on well with this long and sometimes wordy book. I also grew impatient with the nature writing, the stories about class trips in childhood, and the retelling of dreams. I was most engaged when Atkin wrote plainly about her condition. I didn’t have the mental wherewithal to grapple with her metaphorical musings about liminal realms—the caves under Nottingham or the kingdom of faery. The author was evidently drawing parallels between these places and the illness experience. Unfortunately, I cannot say I always grasped her points.

I was greatly saddened to read of Atkin’s suffering, and while there were aspects of her book that I appreciated and learned from, it often felt too cerebral and highbrow for me.

Many thanks to the publisher and Net Galley for providing me with a digital copy for review purposes.… (altro)