12 — December 2023 — Cranford Life
Author leaves Manhattan to move to Cranford By David Jablonski Managing Editor Bruce Goldstein took the big plunge last year, when he finally moved out of New York City and into Cranford with his family. For Goldstein, this was a big step. “We moved in July of last year. It’s gone pretty quickly and we’re still adapting to New Jersey,” said Goldstein in an interview with LocalSource on Friday, Oct. 20. “I was born in Brooklyn and lived in several parts of New York City before living in Manhattan for 35 years.” Making the jump from New York to New Jersey is not exactly unique, but Goldstein had a factor that a lot of transplants from the city don’t have to deal with: he’s bipolar. In fact, it was getting so bad that, as a twenty-something in the Big Apple some 30 years ago, he came dangerously close to losing his mind. “My doctors said it was a miracle that I wasn’t committed,” he admitted. His friends and his mother tried to help him, but it was getting increasingly difficult for him to manage. Until he got a dog. Now, for most people, a dog is a companion, someone to keep you company when you’re lonely, perhaps to teach your children responsibility. But for Goldstein, it was a game-changer, and it saved his life, literally. “When you’re depressed, medication can only get you so far,” he said. “It doesn’t give you a reason to live. A dog is saving you.” “People get depressed,” he continued, “because of different things they are going through in their life. I went the medication route. Medication can only get you a certain place, get you better. But a dog can take you out of your shell, out of your apartment. I had to take care of him. Basically, by taking care of him, I was taking care of myself.” That dog’s name was Ozzy, and the journey, from deciding to get a dog and finding him to Goldstein’s gradual improvement to the point where he knew he wouldn’t hear the knives in the kitchen
Photos Courtesy of Bruce Goldstein
call him anymore became the best-selling memoir, “Puppy Chow is Better Than Prozac.” For Goldstein, that book took nine years to write and was a journey in and of itself. Goldstein’s memoir was published in 2008 and became a best-seller. “It was a bestseller on Amazon. Right now, it’s a bestseller in Italy.” According to the National Institute of Mental Health, an estimated 2.8% of U.S. adults had bipolar disorder in the past
year. Goldstein was just one of many, although he did have Ozzy to help him through the tough times. “I haven’t had any kind of relapse,” Goldstein said. “Was I really crazy or bipolar, manic depressive? It was serious, but since my kids were born, I haven’t had anything. I still work in advertising, but I haven’t had anything like that. “I talk to people and tell them, you’ve got to be strong, and they can read my story. Two years ago, I got an email from a parole officer who said a woman in prison
did a book report and chose my book and wanted to thank me. She gave me a card.” As his family grew, Ozzy did, too, but dogs age a lot faster than humans. “Toward the end, when Ozzy was 12 and a half, I was pushing my daughter in a stroller and dragging Ozzy behind me,” Goldstein recalled wistfully. “It was a bumpy time in my life. Ozzy passed away when he was 13. The book has lived on; it’s timeless. I was thinking it’s timeless because people will get See BEST-SELLING, Page 13
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