She died young, after which publication by her mother of a book containing some of her poems, diary entries and other writings covering treatment she had received for her psychotic illness brought her to the attention of a wide audience.
At the end of her third stay in the clinic she was released in December 1970 and moved into her own apartment, but experienced loneliness and an acute sense of inadequacy.
[1] The date has added significance because 8 March was celebrated in East Germany (and elsewhere) as International Women's Day.
Sonja Gerstner's sad trajectory through psychosis treatment provided a basis for what may have been the first, and was certainly the most popular critical book on psychiatric provision in the German Democratic Republic.
[10][11] "Flucht in die Wolken", her mother's compilation of Sonja's work, quickly became popular in East Germany, and in the end was translated into eight languages.
[4] The book's success can be attributed to the critical light it shone on therapeutic practice, the sensitive presentation of psychotic illness and the headlong assault on the taboo in place across the medical profession against applying the theories of Sigmund Freud and Carl Gustav Jung to diagnoses of mental illnesses.