The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey Through Madness (40 page)

"That makes me very sad," he said, and took me in his arms.

As we'd pledged from the beginning, we'd taken our time getting to
know each other well enough to relax into closeness, which then led to
something deeper and more complex than any relationship I'd ever
known. We decided to live together; he moved into my high-rise
apartment, where we tried together to decipher the symbols on the
fancy European stove that I'd never once tried to use.

And Will was a different kind of man than I'd ever known, too. Far
from being "not much," the furniture he built was beautiful, each piece
one of a kind, carefully and lovingly crafted by his own hands;
museum pieces,
I thought. He'd made a garden lantern of hammered
copper, with inset cut glass that reflected a blue green light much as
the ocean did. He had a gigantic collection of music, all kinds, and a
gigantic sound system as well. Gardening was a creative act; so was
baking a chocolate cake, or a meringue or a torte. He had, in short, the
curious, insatiable soul of an artist, and something in that soul had
made a decision to care for me.

Kaplan had told me that often women feel like they don't have a
choice in sex, and in our time together he helped me to understand
that I did have choices—about when, and with whom, and under what
circumstances. I knew all too well that my illness complicated
things—it made certain risks much bigger than they might have been
for someone else. Taking off your clothes can feel like taking off
armor; revealing vulnerability feels dangerous. And even the sanest
person has to admit that the physical experience of orgasm is
disorienting, even somewhat hallucinogenic—for me, that letting-go,
falling-through-space feeling hadn't always been good. When space
looks suspiciously like an abyss, and "losing yourself' can equal
psychosis, ceding control can be terrifying.

I'd been disappointed in sex enough over the years to know that
the next time I took the risk of a physical relationship, I needed it to be
about love. And while like every couple, Will and I had had our ups
and downs, he knew intuitively how important this was to me, and
when the time came it happened in the most tender and loving way.
What happened between us there was everything I'd hoped it would
be. I felt safe in his arms, and loved, and fulfilled. (And when I walked
into the bathroom the next morning, there was a big toothpaste heart
on the mirror, which sealed the deal.)

But still, there was one last truth for me to tell, and many months
into our relationship, I still hadn't summoned up the courage to do it.
How would he react? Would he be horrified, or disgusted? Would he
physically recoil? Would he leave me? Over and over, I rehearsed the
scene in my mind: "Will, you know I see an analyst, but actually, my
mental health situation is a bit more complicated. I have a pretty
serious mental illness..." And then, by happenstance, the man got a
little ahead of me.

One day, he handed me a magazine article. "There's something I
want you to read," he said. The article was about Asperger's syndrome,
a high-functioning form of autism. Will had underlined parts of it.
"Some of this sounds like you, don't you think?"

"It does sound something like me," I said. "And that's because it is,
sort of. Will, there's something I've wanted to tell you for a long time,
but I've been afraid. Afraid of your reaction, afraid that you might
leave me. I actually do have a serious mental illness, I've had it for
years, and it's not ever going to go away." I carefully watched his face
as I delivered the news. So far, I didn't see anything that alarmed me.

"Really?" he asked. "I sort of suspected that it was something like
that, but I didn't want to ask. I figured you might get around to telling
me at some point. What illness do you have, actually?"

"Schizophrenia," I said. "Do you know what that is? It's not split
personality."

"I think I do," he said slowly. "It's when people get out of touch
with reality. That's a bit scary to me. But it doesn't change how I feel

about you. How often does it happen? Is there medication for it?"

"I still sometimes have episodes," I said. "And yes, there's
medication, fairly effective medication. But I have transient symptoms
sometimes. Different things can set me off. Stress, stuff like that."

"Will you tell me when it's happening to you?" he asked. "I want to
know."

Interestingly, most people I've revealed my mental illness to—and
this includes mental health professionals—have been surprised to
learn the truth, or perhaps the extent of it. The fact that Will wasn't
surprised, and said he'd suspected something all along, was very
telling. Either he'd come to know me more intimately than anyone
else, or he was more willing to be frank about what he suspected, or
he'd read more into my quirkiness. "How did you know?" I asked him.

"Well, you've always been a bit more than minimally eccentric," he
said gently. I could tell he was mulling over his words. "And you've got
a lot of blank spaces. Culturally, I mean. Almost anything from about
1965 to 1980, if I make a reference to it, you give me a blank look.
Almost like you'd been somewhere else during that time. A lot of baby
boomer stuff just goes right by you, you know?"

Yes, I did know. He'd paid attention, he'd intuited something, and
he was right. It's hard to explain now, but something in the way that
he was completely present in the room that night—something in his
body language, in his eyes, in his voice—told me that we'd stay
together. He didn't flinch, he didn't laugh, and he didn't leave. Of
course, he hadn't seen me be "floridly psychotic" yet, but I had a
feeling that when that happened, he would stand his ground.

One night, I came home after having had dinner with someone who
had presented a paper at our workshop series. "I'm really envious of
her," I told Will.

"Why?" he asked.

"Well, she's got a great position at a great law school, is very
bright, and has a happy marriage. What more could anyone ask?"

He went out of the room for about ten minutes, then came back in.
"So, wait a minute," he said. "You mean being married is something
good in your eyes? Something you would want?"

"Yes, absolutely." I thought my heart was going to flip itself right

out onto the living room floor.

"So, then—do you want the two of us to get married?"

I didn't have to think about that for one more second. "Yes!"

And then the circus began, the one which is so familiar to engaged
couples everywhere: The Arrangements. Months and months of The
Arrangements. For a while, I dismissed it—it felt entangling,
complicated; it gave me anxiety attacks, it gave me headaches. Where
to have the ceremony, what kind of ceremony to have, when to have it,
what to eat, what to drink, whom to invite—very quickly, it all seemed
overwhelming. And then the air simply cleared. Yes, yes, I wanted
all
of it—the ceremony, the party, the celebration, the family members,
the friends and colleagues, the public acknowledgment of our
commitment to each other. I wanted the whole damn thing.

I called and told my parents what was going on, and when I asked
my mother if she wanted to come west and help out with the
preparations, she hesitated for a moment and then haltingly replied
that it might be best if I took care of that end of things. I was stung for
about a minute, then quickly decided that it was probably better that
way. Will and I took over the job of wedding planners—and Will had
claimed one job as his. "I'm going to make the cake," he declared.

A funny thing happened when we went to meet Rabbi Julie, who
had agreed to perform the wedding ceremony. After driving about an
hour deep into the San Fernando Valley, we finally arrived at her
house. Ushering us into the foyer, her husband asked if we'd be so
kind as to remove our shoes, so as not to dirty the white rug. We then
spent about an hour with Rabbi Julie, retrieved our shoes, and drove
the hour back home. As we were walking through the lobby of our
apartment building, I looked down at my white Reeboks and asked
Will, "Didn't I wear black Reeboks to the rabbi's?" I had actually
managed to wear our rabbi's husband's shoes home!

Shortly after Will and I became engaged, we received some difficult
news: My dear friend Alicia had been diagnosed with breast cancer.

The minute she'd heard about our engagement, Alicia had offered
to have the wedding at her house, in her shady, flower-strewn
backyard. Now everything had turned upside down. How could I
make all these happy plans while Alicia was in the fight of her life?
We'd find another place to get married. Or no, wait, maybe we
wouldn't get married right now at all.

"Out of the question," she said. "This will be wonderful, to put
together such a beautiful party. Come on, it's going to be fine, and it'll
give me something happy to look forward to!"

I looked at my calendar and realized it was time for me to get my
own mammogram. And there, events took another nasty detour. The
technician took slide after slide, and in between there seemed to be
some discussion going on in the other room. When Dr. Giuliano
finally came in to tell me there were "anomalies" that were cause for
concern, I completely fell apart. All my defenses were swept away, and
the room flooded with psychosis.

"Fleeces and geeses and astronomical proportions with the people
growing tumors. It's a growth industry."

"What do you mean, Elyn?" Dr. Giuliano and nurse Becky Crane
said almost in unison.

"The tides have changed. There'll be nothing for it. There's the
drowners and the downers. One will never survive."

"Your friend Alicia is in the other office," said Giuliano. "Would it
help if you talked to her?"

Alicia knew I had a mental illness, but didn't know the details and
had certainly never seen me ill. When I went into the examination
room she was sitting in, I started babbling in a scared and anguished
way. Alicia responded with enormous kindness and comfort. "Oh,
sweetie, what's wrong?" she asked. "Now, now, everything's going to
be OK. No, your head isn't going to explode." She wrapped her arms
around me and held me tight. And I held on to her as well.

I had the biopsy the next day. The day after that, Will, Alicia, and I
went to get the results: I had breast cancer, too. There were some large
in situ regions (so-called DCIS—ductal carcinoma in situ) and a small
microinvasive part. That meant that only a small part of the cancer
had breached the boundaries of the ducts; the rest of the cancer had
been contained. When Guiliano and Becky gave me the news, I lost my
grip and started muttering again. Will had never seen me like this;
months later, he finally confessed how freaked he'd been by what he'd
seen.

Although the cancer was in a fairly early stage, I needed to have
surgery, followed by weeks of radiation. The stress of it all
overwhelmed me—once again, my little airplane had been swallowed
by a gale. I'd learned to expect disaster around every corner—I guess I
thought it was my fate—but Will is basically an optimist, and he
calmly continued to behave as one.

Kaplan was out of town at the time, and I had been seeing his
backup. The backup's daughter, I knew, had died in early adulthood
from cancer. When I told him my diagnosis, tears came to his eyes,
which touched me. When Kaplan returned, he saw me immediately,
and let me know he'd be available whenever I needed him.

The initial intensity of fear and anguish gradually lessened, but for
several days after the diagnosis, I could do little other than sit at home
and listen to music while I tried to keep a grip on what was real. Will
instinctively knew that I couldn't tolerate any other intimacy than
being hugged. Later, he also, somehow, knew when I was ready again
to be loved.

My parents came as soon as they could. Friends and colleagues
rallied around as well. And many people sent flowers. When Steve
arrived, he looked over my shoulder past our embrace, to my dining
room table, and remarked on the many bouquets of flowers sitting
there. When you have cancer, people send flowers; when you lose your
mind, they don't.

There's nothing like a cancer diagnosis to focus the mind, even a
frayed one. While I was undergoing radiation—five days a week for
eight weeks—it was hard to think of anything other than where I was,
what I was doing there, and why. I worried that my friends were
unnerved to be around me; maybe I reminded them of their own
mortality. There wasn't a pill for this—it was all a roll of the dice, and I
prayed every day that the luck would swing my way.

I live on top of one of the world's largest earthquake epicenters,
but I'm not afraid of earthquakes. I'm not afraid of automobile
accidents, and I'm not afraid of being attacked or robbed when I'm on
the way from my office back to my car in the dark of evening. But my
health, my inconsistent body, scared me to death. How many times, I
wondered, would I have to deal with the betrayal of this mass of
nerves and blood vessels and muscle and skin? It made me wild with
anxiety, even anger.

My dear friend Janet (from LAPSI) had once worked at a Los
Angeles chapter of the Wellness Community, a support group for the
benefit of cancer survivors that was founded in the mid-eighties (and
became notable due to the visibility and participation of one of its
earliest members, Gilda Radner). At Janet's strong recommendation, I
decided to check it out. I couldn't have said what I needed when I first
went there, but whatever it was, I found it.

The empathy between people who are fighting cancer is a powerful
thing; there's strength in it, and solidarity, and an innate
understanding that "well" people don't have, in spite of their best
efforts. I made some very close, very dear friends in the Wellness
Community. Inevitably, given the nature of what brought us all
together, I also lost friends. Sometimes, I was asked if it wasn't more
stressful to spend time with a roomful of people with cancer than it
might have been to skip a meeting once in a while. But I needed to see
them. There were people there far sicker than I, and people who'd
been sicker longer, and they were living their daily lives with
equanimity, dignity, and even humor. How could I deny myself the
comfort and the teaching they so freely offered? And, as time passed
and "new" people came in behind me, how could I not then turn
around and share what I'd learned with them?