The Deacon's Bench
Photo by Jeff Belmonte from Cuiabá, Brazil via Wikipedia
A friend posted this on FB yesterday. It should be required reading for everyone in love, everyone who’s engaged, everyone who plans to embark on a lifetime commitment to another. If you want to know what “for better and for worse” means, here it is. It’s holding the hand of another, wherever the road takes you, and never letting go.
Mark Lukach has written movingly about his young wife’s journey into mental illness, and the challenges he has faced as her husband. He’s written a book about their struggles called “Where the Road Meets the Sun” and given lectures about his experience.
In Pacific Standard, he writes about his wife’s multiple hospitalizations:
THERE’S NO HANDBOOK ON how to survive your young wife’s psychiatric crisis. The person you love is no longer there, replaced by a stranger who’s shocking and exotic. Every day I tasted the bittersweet saliva that signals you’re about to puke. To keep myself sane I hurled myself at being an excellent psychotic-person’s spouse. I kept notes on what made things better and what made things worse. I made Giulia take her medicine as prescribed. Sometime this meant watching her swallow, then checking her mouth to confirm that she hadn’t hidden the pills under her tongue. This dynamic led us to become less than equals, which was unsettling. As I did with my students at school, I claimed an authority over Giulia. I told myself that I knew what was better for her than she did. I thought she should bend to my control and act as my well-behaved ward. This didn’t happen, of course. Psychotic people seldom behave. So when I said Take your pills or Go to sleep, she responded badly, often with Shut up or Go away. The conflict between us extended to the doctor’s office. I thought of myself as Giulia’s advocate, but often, with her physicians, I didn’t side with her. I wanted her to follow medical advice that she herself did not want to follow. I’d do anything to assist her doctors with their treatment plan. I was there to help.
Once discharged, Giulia’s psychosis lasted another month. It was then followed by an eight-month-long haze of depression, suicidality, lethargy, and disengagement. I took a few months off of work to be with Giulia during the day and keep her safe, even get her out of bed. Throughout, her doctors kept tweaking her meds, trying to find the best combination. I took it upon myself to make Giulia take her pills as prescribed.
Then, finally, almost abruptly, Giulia was back. Her psychiatrists told us that her long episode was probably a one-and-done thing: major depression with psychotic features—a dressed-up term for a nervous breakdown. We needed to be proactive and careful about Giulia maintaining balanced and stable habits. That meant her staying on the pills, going to bed early, eating well, minimizing alcohol and caffeine, exercising regularly. But once Giulia returned to health we greedily inhaled our normal lives—windy walks on Ocean Beach, actual intimacy, even the luxury of stupid, meaningless fights. Soon enough she was interviewing for jobs, and landed a position even better than the one she had left when she was hospitalized. We never considered the possibility of a relapse. Why would we? Giulia had been sick; now she was better.
He concludes poignantly:
Giulia and I fell in love effortlessly, in our carefree teens. We’ve now loved each other desperately, through psychosis. At our wedding we promised this to each other: to love each other and stick together in good times and in bad. In hindsight, we also should have promised to love each other when life is normal. It’s those normal days, now transformed by crisis, that have strained our marriage most. I realize no mad map is going to keep Giulia out of the hospital, nor prevent us from fighting over her care. But the faith required to try to plan a life together feels good and grounding. I’m still willing to do almost anything to make Giulia smile.
The trailer for his book is below.
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