AMY MY DAUGHTER
Mitch Winehouse C 2012 (Amy's father)
itbooks - an imprint of HarperCollins is the publisher
There are words Mitch Winehouse does not use about his daughter, the singer Amy Winehouse who died a couple years back at the age of 27.
Let me use some of them. Amy Winehouse was a mess - long before she was famous - and she was mentally ill - she cut herself. She was into this seriously mentally ill behavior before she became addicted to... of all substances, her man - husband and ex-husband - Blake.Amy, who's artistry I admire, is on the cover of the book in a photograph that reveals a huge tattoo going down her arm that reads "Daddy's Girl." Maybe that's why, though Mitch was married to Amy's mother, and then her stepmother, the involvement of these women in Amy's life is not part of the big story - his story of being the protective but anxious father of a superstar.
I did want to know how her upbringing effected what seems to be Amy's long standing lack of self-discipline, but as it reads Mitch in his capacity as father, and as a man somehow involved in her management of finances and career, was the one she kept making the promises to - to quit - and the one who was there for her, offering love and advice as best he could even when she couldn't or wouldn't.
To hear Mitch tell it, Amy was brought down by Blake and could have been saved by marrying and having children with her next serious boyfriend.
The ups and downs of her medical history and her on and off again attempts to beat drugs and then alcohol might be typical of any addict. What wasn't typical was Amy's talent. Mitch never says that talent was a burden to her, or that she kept medicating herself with these substances because being famous and keeping a career going like that are damn difficult.
Amy was in very poor health and she had pretty much done herself in with substances. I came to feel that bad boy Blake was another symptom.
Those of you who know me know that I think, have long thought, the whole Psychiatry/Psychology profession is way too powerful. I believe this self propagating profession is hand in hand with pharmaceutical companies and that it is now true that everyone is diagnosable and therefore medicateble. I'll never be a Scientologist but on this they have it right.
I couldn't help but wonder though if Amy Winehouse would still be with us here and now if, earlier in her life, someone had recognized her cutting of herself as serious mental illness. Would psychotropics have killed the creativity and spirit in her? Or would be the best substitute for all those street drugs, all that booze? Mitch doesn't say it. I do.
Towards the end, Mitch mentions that there's a possibility that he got spiritual signs that he thinks were about Amy - butterflies - and a bird and a butterfly flying together. He has used these symbols for AMY'S FOUNDATION, which will address the problems of addiction, ill health, and homelessness among youth.
