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In 2015, Mark Lukach published a powerful and poignant article about the difficult journey he and his wife experienced through her mental illness. It was called ‘My Lovely Wife in the Psych Ward” and carried this sub-heading: “We met at 18. We wed at 24. At 27, I checked my wife into a psych ward—for the first time. How mental illness re-shapes a marriage.” It was heart-rending and deeply moving. Reading it felt like a punch to the gut because it conveyed, so beautifully, how difficult it is to journey through mental health issues with a loved one.
While I have since read brave personal accounts of those who have lived with mental health issues and champion that cause here at The Good Men Project through our Mental Health Social Interest Group and our #NotWeakJustHumanProject, this was the first telling that I had read from the perspective of a loved one helping someone through that struggle.
I was thrilled to hear from Mark recently, with the news that he had written a memoir that explores the journey of caregiving for his wife, Giulia and their son Jonas, through her three hospitalizations with psychosis and depression. It is an incredible book and I could not recommend it more highly.
I am thrilled to present this Good Men Project interview with the author, Mark Lukach.
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The Good Men Project:
Why did you want to write a book about this topic?
Mark Lukach:
When my wife Giulia was hospitalized in the psych ward for the first time, I felt many of the feelings you’d probably expect: fear, grief, guilt. But the one I wasn’t anticipating was loneliness. I could only visit her during visiting hours, and I spent much of the rest of the day on my computer, trying to learn about what she was going through. The internet has a ton of resources to help people better understand mental illness, and I relied on them heavily.
But I was surprised to not find anything that spoke to my side of the experience. I was looking for some sort of account that chronicled what it was like to be a caregiver, to have to face the hard choices around medication, career, family support, finances–and I came up empty in my search. There’s that Simon and Garfunkel song, “The only living boy in New York.” I felt like I was the only guy who had his wife suffer a mental health crisis, since no one was talking about it.
After we got through the crisis, and my wife’s health stabilized, I began to consider writing about our experience, since it feels to me like there is such an obvious need for these types of narratives.
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The Good Men Project:
How does your wife feel about having her illness publicized?
Lukach:
I really admire Giulia’s courage for her willingness to be so open about her health. While there are personal details about both of us in the book, there’s definitely a difference with her being the one with a diagnosis, especially a diagnosis that many people don’t understand and might mischaracterize.
I think the reason she’s become comfortable with being open about her health is because she believes in the potential of our book to help people who might be in her shoes, or in mine. As I said before, I was really searching for some sort of outlet to help me process what I was going through, and Giulia certainly felt the same way.
The people she connected with the most during her recovery were people who had experienced something similar to her, and had survived it. They were her biggest role models, and Giulia could only be helped by them because they had opened up and shared their experiences.
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The Good Men Project:
How has going through this changed you as a person?
Lukach:
I grew a lot through the caregiving experience. First and foremost, I gained a whole wider understanding of what mental health is. Unfortunately, I started all of this with some pretty judgmental feelings…for example, that taking medication was a sign of weakness. I’ve realized now that I couldn’t be more wrong. People are out there doing the best they can to find their way to health, stability, and happiness. Who am I to judge how they get there?
But beyond this, I’ve also learned a lot about what it really means to listen. I’ve always been a do-er, and a problem solver, and so when people have told me things that are hard to hear, I tend to jump into action. But listening doesn’t necessarily involve action. It’s more simple than that, although difficult in its simplicity. You have to honor the pain that a person is expressing, not talk over it or try and fix it on the spot.
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The Good Men Project:
Did the writing on the book impact your relationship?
Lukach:
Writing this book was an emotionally draining catharsis for the two of us. I had to go back and revisit some of the most traumatizing moments of my life, not just one time, but over and over again as I wrote and rewrote sections of the book. Giulia read pretty much every draft, so she went through it all again as well.
We certainly had our disagreements about what should be included, or how a specific story should be told, and at times it was a difficult process. But there’s no question about it that working on this book turned out to be really helpful for our relationship. It forced us to have conversations we had been avoiding. It made us more aware of how we treat each other, and more importantly, how we want to treat each other. It was kind of like a long drawn out version of couple’s therapy that we were holding between ourselves, with the book as the moderator of the conversation. Just like couple’s therapy is hard but totally worth it, this book was hard but totally worth it.
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The Good Men Project:
Has this experience changed the way you look at the issue of “mental health.”
Lukach:
Beyond a much more accepting view of it, I’ve also learned that mental health really is a shared experience. None of us are islands, and so how I’m doing–emotionally, physically, spiritually–shapes how those around me are doing. We don’t really treat mental health that way. One person gets a diagnosis, and so they may see a therapist, or take medication, or whatever, but the approach is rarely inclusive of the whole family, which I think is so crucial.
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The Good Men Project:
How has your relationship with your wife changed from going through this process together?
Lukach:
I’m not even sure where to start.
We were tested to what felt like breaking points. We’ve rekindled a tremendous sense of romance and affection for each other. We continually grow in our understanding of each other.
I guess the best summation is that we have experienced our highest high and lowest low since she was first hospitalized.
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The Good Men Project:
Do you ever fear a relapse or that you will have to navigate through that again? How do you deal with those feelings?
Lukach:
Oh yes, definitely.
For us it’s seasonal, so we do have stretches where we aren’t as worried. All of Giulia’s hospitalizations have happened during the fall, and so when it’s the fall, we are the most on edge about this. The rest of the year, we breathe a bit more easily. In the Fall, we are very delicate about it: we’re both worried, no question about it, but even giving voice to the worry can make things more tense, and more fragile. So we have to be especially patient and sweet with each other.
As far as dealing with those feelings, for me it takes a lot of exercise and deep breathes to keep those types of feelings in check.
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The Good Men Project:
I want to ask about resilience. What do you think separates those who lose relationships due to the extreme strain of going through something like this from those who form even stronger bonds?
Lukach:
Great question, although I’m not sure I have a great answer.
I think that for me and Giulia, we had already been together for so long (9 years) by the time this crisis first hit, that we couldn’t even really conceive of not staying together through it. That was a huge strike in our favor to make it through.
But I think that beyond this, we both went through the difficult process of listening to each other. That feels like one of the most obvious yet complicated parts of any relationship. you’d think that we both felt the same about something, or at least similar, since we were both there, but Giulia’s experience was so different than mine, and we had to put the time in to listen to what it was like for the other so that we could help support the other.
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Mark’s book is available for purchase on Amazon.
Photo Credits: Pixabay; Mark Lukach
It’s nice to know some men actually stand by their wives when they go through this. My exhusband didn’t. He abandoned me. And we had been together 8 years before I had any issues. I can’t say I don’t have lingering resentment and anger about it. Especially since he didn’t do fairly by me, in the divorce settlement, and he’s moved on and had a THIRD wife, and borne a child with her. And now many years later, I haven’t had any relapses and manage to keep my life together.
What a great post to read.
Thank you!
I couldn’t agree more.