Nothing Was the Same

by Kay Redfield Jamison

"It has been said that grief is a kind of madness. I disagree. There is a sanity to grief, in its just proportion of emotion to cause, that madness does not have." So writes Kay Redfield Jamison, the clinical psychologist whose widely acclaimed 1995 memoir, "An Unquiet Mind," revealed her lifelong struggle with manic-depressive illness. "Nothing Was the Same" is the story of her marriage to the late Richard Wyatt, a man who overcame severe childhood dyslexia to become a leader in schizophrenia research. With the blend of straightforward frankness and poetic eloquence for which her earlier book drew praise, Jamison describes the almost 20 years of their life together as a love affair that encompassed not only their shared work, colleagues, family and friends, but also her mental illness and the cancer that ultimately claimed his life in 2002. One thing that makes this book especially compelling is its quiet matter-of-factness in the face of personal catastrophe. ..... Every step carries emotion -- shock, dread, hope, joy, despair -- and Jamison portrays each of these with piercing clarity. Still, the overall tone of her recounting is even, spare and thoughtfully analytical, avoiding grimness and offering some leavening lighter touches, like Wyatt's affectionate characterization of Jamison's manic-depressive mind: "a delicate ecosystem, a pond of subtle alkalinities, which was kept alive through a finely honed mix of lithium and love and sleep, or, as he imagined it, 'water grasses and dragonflies, and a snail or two to tidy up.' " (Amazon)

This was a very bittersweet read, to know the inevitable ending, to hear of the hope in the varied diagnoses, to wonder if Jamison would be alright without her husband. It is a well-written memoir and a sad but comforting book.