BURN RATE: Launching a Startup and Losing My Mind

Sharing my secret after 22 years

It is with long-sought relief that I can share news of next week’s publication of BURN RATE: Launching a Startup and Losing My Mind.

It's about my previously undisclosed 22-year journey with bipolar disorder.

“Arrestingly candid… the most powerful book I’ve read on manic depression since An Unquiet Mind.” — Adam Grant, #1 NYT bestselling author

The book begins with a manic episode I had in college after which I was diagnosed; details a decade and a half spent in denial, with scores of depressive episodes; and culminates in a second hospitalization for mania in 2016, from which I was discharged into handcuffs and arrested for assault.

In short: the kind of sh-t you hide from the world.

Instead, I decided to share the unvarnished story, in service of my own catharsis and to normalize discussions of mental health in the workplace.

Today, Fast Company broke open the conversation, a small part of which was publishing an exclusive excerpt from the book detailing a manic episode I had in Las Vegas. It is challenging material, and a brave selection by the editors.

One doesn’t get to this part of the story, the telling of it, without the loved ones who lived it, and still do. Though not much of a spoiler, the book’s dedication reads:

For Usha, Monica, and Charley. Without you, I have no past.
For Manuela. Without you, I have no present.
For Isaiah, and for Bella. Without you, I have no future. 

I feel so lucky.

Yours,
Andy

twitter: @dunn
linkedin: @andyrdunn