Book of the Month April 2022 - Many Different Kinds of Love

Many Different Kinds of Love: A Story of Life Death and the NHS by Michael Rosen

‘They’ve been worried about my low blood pressure but they’ve brought me the Daily Mail so it’ll be fine in just a moment.’
 
Stock up on hankies, because Michael Rosen’s account of his near-death experience with COVID will have you crying with laughter and sadness in equal measure. Lines such as ‘I feel like I’m losing home’ are so honest and raw that you can’t help but follow him on this visceral journey. The imagery throughout is remarkable; at one point, his bed calls to him in a sort of siren song, imploring him to give up his ‘crazy idea of wanting to walk’. Fortunately for us, he succeeds in his ‘de-bedding’. The half page recollection of finding his son dead in bed is so stark, so matter of fact, that it deals a sledgehammer blow. Other passages, reflecting on the significance of physical contact between caregiver and patient, are more gentle:

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‘Your hands speak
Touch is a language’.

The book demonstrates the impact that illness can have on mental health as well as physical. ‘I am not sure I am me’, writes Rosen, encapsulating the disorientation, the frustration, the fear of surviving, but being altered. He compares himself to his father, who ‘shrank down to a list of ailments’ in his final years. His reflections and insights are thought provoking and moving. So too are the written contributions from staff involved in his care, who - in a humbling display of generosity of time - wrote in a notebook at his bedside. With their words, we get a glimpse of the humanity in what seems, at times, a dehumanising environment. We hear indirectly of their struggles; those working extra shifts, or in specialties that are not their own, so that patient care is not compromised.
 
This book might be an emotionally difficult read for anyone with COVID-related trauma; on the other hand, it might be therapeutic as it is ultimately a story of survival. Certainly, Rosen has used his experience to campaign for improvements in the NHS, to advocate for physio and OT services and to give hope to those affected by life-changing health issues. I would certainly recommend it - but do remember those tissues.
 
Jocelyn Skanning