Summary of Meghan O'Rourke's The Invisible Kingdom

By IRB Media

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.

Book Preview: #1 I got sick the way Hemingway says you go broke: gradually and then suddenly. I had been intermittently unwell since I graduated from college in 1997, and now I was getting steadily worse. I was met by turns with cutting skepticism but also genuine concern from clinicians, friends, and colleagues.

#2 There is a silent epidemic of chronic illnesses that are often marginalized, contested, or even unrecognized. These illnesses are characterized by dysregulation of the immune system and/or the nervous system, which are powerfully intertwined in our bodies.

#3 Many people are still suffering in silence with poorly understood illnesses, and many doctors continue to dismiss patients like me, who have symptoms that appear to be normal test results.

#4 I wrote this book to explain the experience of being ill to myself and to help others who are confronted with the obstinate reality of a hard-to-identify chronic illness. The book actively resists the tidyness of most illness narratives.

• Language: English
• Publisher: IRB Media
• Release date: Mar 9, 2022
• ISBN: 9781669357384

IRB Media

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Insights on Meghan O'Rourke's The Invisible Kingdom

Contents

Insights from Chapter 1

Insights from Chapter 2

Insights from Chapter 3

Insights from Chapter 1

#1

I got sick the way Hemingway says you go broke: gradually and then suddenly. I had been intermittently unwell since I graduated from college in 1997, and now I was getting steadily worse. I was met by turns with cutting skepticism but also genuine concern from clinicians, friends, and colleagues.

#2

There is a silent epidemic of chronic illnesses that are often marginalized, contested, or even unrecognized. These illnesses are characterized by dysregulation of the immune system and/or the nervous system, which are powerfully intertwined in our bodies.

#3

Many people are still suffering in silence with poorly understood illnesses, and many doctors continue to dismiss patients like me, who have symptoms that appear to be normal test results.

#4

I wrote this book to explain the experience of being ill to myself and to help others who are confronted with the obstinate reality of a hard-to-identify chronic illness. The book actively resists the tidyness of most illness narratives.

#5

I want to share my experience with coronavirus with the hope that it can help others, as it did me, understand the disease better and how to live with it. I am not telling this story because I think my illness experience is extraordinary; rather, it is the ordinariness of my story that makes it important to share.

#6

I experienced electric shocks, night sweats, joint pain, and other strange symptoms in my twenties. I associated these symptoms with eating poorly, because it was easy for me to believe that a lack of dietary discipline was responsible for my exhaustion.

#7

I grew up in a family that was largely indifferent to matters of health. My parents took me to the doctor regularly, and handed out Tylenol for fevers, but if the problem was vague or seemingly minor, they tended to ignore it.

#8

I had developed a low fever in February 2012. I was teaching at New York University, and my life was starting