What's Normal Anyway? Celebrities' Own Stories of Mental Illness (32 page)

Tel: 0161 705 4304
Web:
www.babcp.com
An interest group for those involved in the area of behavioural and cognitive psychotherapy, providing information about CBT for the public and a register of all officially accredited CBT therapists.

Royal College of Psychiatrists

Tel: 020 7235 2351
Web:
www.rcpsych.ac.uk
The professional body that is responsible for education, training, and raising standards in psychiatry. RCPsych also provides information about mental health conditions for the public.

Carers UK

Helpline: 0808 808 7777
Web:
www.carersuk.org
A charity that provides help, advice, and support for anyone caring for an older, disabled, or seriously ill family member or friend.

Our thanks must go, first and foremost, to the people whose stories are featured in the preceding chapters; there would be no book without you. We have been touched and humbled by your willingness to share your most personal experiences with us and the public and by your enthusiasm for this project.

We are also immensely grateful to Andreas Campomar, and everyone else at Constable & Robinson, who saw the potential in, commissioned, and worked on, this book, as well as to those who helped put us in touch with some of the people whose stories are featured here.

So too are we indebted to Dr Richard Bowskill, both for writing the Afterword and for his sensible and thoughtful professional treatment over the past few years, and to Marilyn Finch for her therapeutic help, wisdom, patience, and behavioural experiments(!).

Many thanks also go to Rick Gekoski and Belinda Kitchin, who read, edited, and gave helpful opinions on the entire manuscript, as well as to those who read drafts of individual chapters, including Barbara Gekoski, Cathy Broome, Polly Mosley, Kate Hartshorn, Tom Heywood, Charlie Heywood, Mark Owen, and Gem Catlin. Particular thanks here go to Alison Dunn, who took the time to read the whole book and give thoughtful and constructive comments just one week before she gave birth to her beautiful daughter Caitlin.

We would also like to give a special mention to Anna's brother Bertie (Aaron), who not only read drafts of chapters but also came up with the title of the book and took the author photographs.

Lastly, we would like to say a huge ‘thank you' to our family and friends – you know who you are – who have supported and helped us through some very difficult times. We love you all. And finally to Mavis, our dog, for his (yes,
his
) boundless perky energy that has cheered us up when we've needed it the most.