*This review may contain some mild spoilers* Although, I personally have never been in Mark's shoes and haven't had to deal with a person with a disorder like Giulia is experiencing. With that said, I had mixed feelings about this memoir and possibly because it's one sided, from the caregivers perspective. The mentally affected person's life stops, while everyone else expects to move on with their own. Many medical professionals are less than compassionate and often times family members look at it as a weakness and feeling that it's crippling to their own lives as if the actual person with the disease chooses to be ill. It isn't easy and in my opinion isn't taken seriously enough. In the past I've dealt with my own mental health issues, mainly after developing a thyroid disorder and after having children. In My Lovely Wife, Mark Lukach takes us through these harrowing years with compassion and candour, as he and Giulia renegotiate their relationship, anchored by an abiding devotion to each other and their family.Ī story of the fragility of the mind, and the tenacity of the human spirit, My Lovely Wife is, above all, a love story that raises profound questions: How do we best care for the people we love? What and who do we live for? Breath-taking in its honesty, radiant with compassion, written with dazzling lyricism, this intensely personal odyssey offers much-needed insight into the caregiving side of mental illness, and affirms the power of love. Pushed to the edge of the abyss, everything the couple had once taken for granted was upended. Soon after Jonas was born, Giulia had another breakdown, and then a third a few years after that. Upon release, she sunk into an extended suicidal depression during which Mark, struggling to support Giulia, was torn between the demands of keeping her safe and following doctor's orders, and honouring her independence and making her feel loved.Įventually, Giulia fully recovered, and the couple had a son. Hospitalized for almost a month, she was tormented by delusions and paranoia.

Mark and Giulia fell for each other in their teens, married in their 20's, and didn't realize what their love would demand of them until Giulia suffered a terrifying and unexpected psychotic break at the age of twenty-seven.

My lovely wife book