Nov 3, 2006

An Unquiet Mind

A week or so ago grandma -- asked me to order her 10 books. All of them have something to do with politics or history, except this one that just came in the mail today. (This book was meant to be. Why would grandma order this one and why is it crossing my path) It's called An Unquiet Mind by Kay Redfield Jamison. It's about her struggle to overcome manic-depression all the while getting her PhD/ doctorate or whatever from UCLA and becoming a very successful doctor. As I'm reading she goes through terrible struggles with depression and suicidal thoughts. During this time she takes lithium, but because she's so stubborn and thinks she can conquer this on her own, she takes herself off of it. This is when she loses her first husband and finally 'loses her mind'. She's hospitalized for awhile and it's kept on the hush. She gets back on lithium and receives her tenure. It's during this time she meets David (again). Someone she had known a long while back, yet she was married. He always liked her and they'd always kept in touch off and on. Now he knows she's single again and he comes to visit her. She writes of long walks, her new found enjoyment of life, the beauty of the time they were spending together. "Long nights and early mornings of incredible passion made me again believe in, or remember, how important a sense of life is to love, and love to life." At this point I had to put the book down and cry. The love they were feeling described us. It hurts to read of something so close yet so far. We had that and now it's gone. I feel a great sense of loss when I read of something so beautiful....cuz we had it. While she was visiting him in London (she lived in Cali) she dropped her pill bottle losing all her lithium, so she had to tell him she was manic-depressive so he could get her a new prescription of lithium. Without the lithium she would relapse and have another episode. So that night she told him. After a bit of silence he simply said, "rotten luck". "David could not have been kinder or more accepting, he asked me question after question about what I had been through, what had been most terrible, what had frightened me the most, and what he could do to help me when I was ill." She felt for the first time somebody finally understood, that she was not alone in dealing with all of her pain and uncertainty. He started to take care of her. "After knowing David, I never again saw life in its worst possible spirit". Eventually she had to leave London and go back to Cali, but they met up and spent time together in different places throughout the rest of the year. "We wrote and spoke often, missed one another". "I enjoyed life in ways that I hadn't for years". She spent more time with David that spring in London. Before she left for home they had made plans to once again spend time together in just a few short weeks. Shortly after arriving home there was a knock on her door. It was a courier with a letter informing her of Davids death, he had a heart attack. I have set the book down now. It's so hard to read this, I know the love she finally felt. How life felt so right. Suddenly it's gone. She needed him, like I needed you, like you needed me. I can't believe this would happen to her. So I'm going to keep reading and I'll write more as I come across something that touches me.....
"bit by bit, began to understand that the future I had assumed, and the love and support I had come to depend upon, were gone"
"there were so many dreams lost: all of our plans for a house full of children were lost; all of seemingly everything was lost"
"the shock of Davids death gradually disappeared over time. Missing him never has."
Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,
And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane;
But last year's bitter loving must remain
Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide.
There are a hundred places where I fear
To go, ---- so with his memory they brim.
And entering with relief some quiet place
Where never fell his foot or shone his face
I say, "There is no memory of him here!"
And so stand stricken, so remembering him."
"the accumulated pain and uncertainty from David's death for several years very much lowered and narrowed my expectations of life. I drew into myself and, for all intents and purposes, shuttered my heart from unnecessary exposure to the world."
"thank you for the lovely weekend.
they tell me it rained." - there were weekends with you i felt like that, we were so into each other, we had no clue what was going on in the outside world.
Well, she eventually gets over Davids death, meets someone else and marries him. I can't relate to that right now, so I don't like it. I feel like if someone really was your one and only true love, there isn't anyone else out there for you. So now I think that David was not 'the one', if he was she wouldn't have gotten over him so quick and found someone else. I was thinking she was really going to spiral downward with her condition and with his death. I look at me and think your death is a great burden to my well being. If I was already weakened by something like what she's been describing (manic-depression) than I swear I would've went off the deep end, just because you mean soooo much to me. I love you honey more than anything ever in this world, you are the best, i can't wait 'til the day we can be together again. 'god will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead and his kingdom will have no end' i love you always forever and ever, your baby girl oxoxxox

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