Recommend this read for anyone struggling with how to deal with mental health issues. Hands down, the best true experience with a mental health issue I have ever read! LaPera crafts her personal and family experiences in such a way that even someone with strong opposition to the struggles of mental health issues could relate. The heart felt journey of this family is both a pleasure to read and informative for the best of clinicians. -Former behavior specialist

Losing Dad is a fascinating and harrowing look into one family’s excruciating story of mental illness. Amanda La Pera’s gripping first-person narrative is deeply personal yet completely relatable as she describes her father’s struggle with paranoid schizophrenia and the impossible decisions it forces upon the people who love him most. La Pera brings these issues to life with a unique voice and crisp, buoyant writing, filled with the pain of trauma, yet often humorous and always accessible. Losing Dad accomplishes what great books do: It gives readers a sense that they are not alone.

Mental Illness touches us at unexpected times, in surprising and often unrelenting ways. Losing Dad is a touching memoir that dispels the myth that we are alone in dealing with it, and when we do, we must struggle quietly. Amanda, the author, allows you to be intimately brought inside her father’s ordeal with late onset Paranoid Schizophenia. A well thought out book with a unique voice, full of resources to help the reader through similar situations, you very much feel you are there, inside this family’s particular situation, without ever feeling like it’s being sensationalized just for entertainment. I recommend this read highly, you will feel supported in your own mental health journey and truly know you are never alone, there is help to be had, and to never give up on yourself or your family.

Oof. So many feelings for this poor family and what they’ve been through. Amanda does an amazing job in pulling you into the story, writing a narrative that flows and takes you on the harrowing roller coaster ride that was her family’s life with her dad. It’s a captivating read, and an in depth look into how untreated mental illness affects everyone, not just the afflicted. I really appreciated the afterword and resources, and applaud Amanda for helping to educate others and hopefully preventing others from experiencing the same pain her family has felt through all of this. Looking forward to reading the second book!