Jolt - by Ted Scheinman (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

In the tradition of Susannah Cahalan's Brain on Fire and William Styron's Darkness Visible, Jolt is a candid and deeply personal mental health memoir that chronicles one man's descent into clinical depression, his last-resort decision to undergo electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), and his search for identity and memory in its aftermath-- by the celebrated Smithsonian editor, memoirist, and essayist.

Sitting in a circle on the seventh floor at Sibley Memorial Hospital in Washington, DC, thirty-five-year-old Ted Scheinman remembered why he was there. A lifelong struggle with major depression--beginning at age eight--had come roaring back, more punishing than ever. After years of SSRIs, SNRIs, group therapy, and even months of ketamine treatment, Ted checked himself into the psychiatric ward for an intensive course of ECT--commonly known as shock therapy. It was a radical, last-resort depression treatment. Miraculously, it worked.

But not without cost. Ted's memory fractured--sometimes erasing entire days. He couldn't remember the names of the other patients he now played cards with, the phone call to his mother the night before, or even what he'd eaten for breakfast.

In Jolt, Scheinman reflects on the emotional complexity of recovery, the ambiguity of healing, and the elusive nature of well-being. This is a vulnerable, psychologically rich narrative about resilience, self-care, and how we piece ourselves together after trauma.

Written with lyrical precision and raw emotional candor, Jolt blends scientific inquiry with moving self-reflection in a groundbreaking memoir that asks: What do we owe ourselves to stay alive? And what are we willing to forget in order to move forward?

About the Author

Ted Scheinman is a senior editor at Smithsonian magazine and contributing editor at the Los Angeles Review of Books. His 2018 debut, Camp Austen: My Life as an Accidental Jane Austen Superfan, garnered enthusiastic praise on both sides of the Atlantic and beyond. Scheinman has interviewed politicians and celebrities from Tilda Swinton to Debbie Harry, his projects have received funding from such institutions as the Pulitzer Center and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and his essays and reporting have appeared in such publications as The Atlantic, The Chronicle of Higher Education, GQ, The New Republic, The New York Times, The Paris Review, and Slate.