Trying to make a marriage or relationship work is hard enough. It's even harder if both partners have chronic and debilitating mental illnesses. I have OCD (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder) and my husband, Lou, is bipolar (Manic-Depressive). Manic-Depression has been well known in the psychiatric field since the 1950's and the standard treatment was a medication called Lithium. OCD had no treatment or even a name at that time. Unfortunately, psychiatry is not an exact science and it’s basically trial and error to find the right medication. I was 24 when I first met Lou and he was 32. Lou was lucky to have Lithium work when he was first diagnosed at age 32. From birth, particularly my teenage years, I had no help until I was 37. Lou basically took care of me the first 20 years of our marriage.

In 1974, I met Lou on a blind date at a bar in New Haven. Donna, my best friend, had a date who set it up, and the four of us were going on a motorcycle ride. I was talking to another guy at the time and I didn’t want to leave. Then Donna’s date told me that Lou went all the way back to West Haven, where he lived, to get me a helmet. I couldn’t refuse. Two weeks later, Lou secretly moved in with me in my tiny room in a rooming house in Connecticut.

I was an aspiring singer and I worked full-time as a graphic artist at Design Group. Lou was a cabbie. What attracted me to Lou was that he wasn’t a typical biker or cabbie - he was intelligent and sensitive; I was surprised when he told me about his computer programming work on our first date. Lou was the only one who loved my voice and supported my singing career - unlike my parents. On our second date, I had a feeling that I would marry him someday.

Donna and I originally moved into separate rooms in that rooming house before Lou came into the picture. Donna and I did everything together. Then that blind date changed everything. When Lou moved in with me, Donna got jealous of our new relationship and my not spending as much time with her. Plus she also had a thing for Lou. Out of spite, she ratted to my parents that we were living together. I was angry at her because I didn’t want my family to know about our new relationship until I we knew where we were going with it.

Obviously, our new living arrangements didn’t sit well with my parents and we were at odds. When my family first met Lou, he was “high” or manic - overly confident and cocky. Seeing my parents, on a later occasion, Lou talked about marriage to me in spite of the fact that he was separated from his wife for a year, had two kids and wasn’t even divorced yet. That didn’t go over too well with them, either. The only one who liked Lou was my much younger sister, Debbie.

My family moved to Florida because of my father’s bad heart. I forgave Donna, and I chose to stay in Connecticut with Lou in the rooming house. The three of us hung around together until Lou told me later that Donna tried to unsuccessfully seduce him several times. We moved out into an attic apartment in New Haven. But I had a soft spot for Donna, and I eventfully forgave her again and we remained friends.

Lou and I later talked about marriage and he proposed to me on Valentine’s Day. He was manic but I wasn’t really aware of it or cared. I was thrilled about the proposal but was concerned when he would get his divorce. He didn’t know where his wife was; other than the last he heard from her was that she moved out somewhere with the kids with a gay guy. Lou felt angry and helpless that he didn’t know where his children were.

His wife, Evelyn, wasn’t the best role model for the kids or a good wife to Lou. He had known her only for a few months. Then the Army was going to ship him out to Germany. He was 23 at the time. This was during the Viet Nam War. His choice was to leave Evelyn or take her along and marry her. Even though Evelyn was only 21 and already divorced twice, the two of them left deep south Georgia (where girls married young), and went to Germany and they were married.

When they returned to the States two years later, their marriage disintegrated quickly. Even though Lou was a high paid top notch programmer with a bank, Evelyn wanted him to work at a gas station so he’d be home every night for dinner instead of being on call 24/7. He had quit the bank and got a job at a gas station for her. Then Evelyn told Lou that she didn’t need sex anymore now that they had their two kids, a boy and a girl. He gave her money for a divorce but she ended up using it for something else. After that, Lou started going to clubs frequently to dance away his woes. His illness may have worsened, then, too. Lou was just sexually involved with someone until he had met me. He had found his soul mate, and me, mine.

We didn’t have the money for regular divorce lawyer or a detective to find them. So Lou enrolled with legal aid and was put on a waiting list. Two years later he was told, since he didn’t know where his family was, he could put an ad in a news paper stating his intention of divorcing Evelyn. If she didn’t answer he didn’t have to support the kids, since he had no visitation rights, and he could get divorced quickly. Lou’s divorce papers arrived on his birthday in June.

Somehow, Evelyn found out about Lou’s divorce and dragged the kids with her and drove from Texas to New Haven. The three of them, with no money, stayed over night in Edgewood Park and she wanted to talk to Lou to verify the divorce. Lou was adamant about me not being there. I asked Donna take me to another part of Edgewood Park so I could spy on what my competition and the kids looked like. Evelyn was a dirty blonde, skinny, plain woman, and the kids were so little. I wanted badly to take the kids but I knew I couldn’t handle that responsibility because my symptoms were getting worse. Lou felt the same way so he just let the three of them go back to Texas. I felt bad but relieved.

Later, I called my father and he was also shocked that Lou got the divorce; and that Lou actually repaid every cent of the money I had loaned him two years earlier. My father was certain that I was going to kiss that money goodbye and get burned in that relationship. But he was wrong on two counts, and my father was the kind of guy to admit when he was wrong. Lou and I planned a wedding on the first day of fall, September 23, 1978.

My mother was just recovering from surgery so my parents couldn’t go. Instead they sent my sister up to be with me and $500 for wedding expenses. We had guests bring food instead of gifts. Since purple was my favorite color, another good friend of mine made me a custom, purple wedding cake. We had the wedding at Lou’s sister’s home where he used to live. We almost didn’t get married because a Conservative Jewish wedding needed a non-related Jewish male to the prenuptials as a witness. There was no one there to fit the bill, so the rabbi had to specially send out for a witness. Then were were married under the canopy and Lou crushed the glass. However, as our married life continued, our respective bizarre behaviors and symptoms of our mental illnesses were becoming more obvious and they threatened to tear us apart.

I was born with OCD. I pulled out my hair as a baby which is a unique OCD symptom in itself. As I got a little older, my mother told me that I wanted my toys and things in a certain order. My really bizarre behavior started as a teenager. I would spend hours in the bathroom vigorously squeezing and picking black heads, white heads and whatever heads I could find with my fingers and tweezers trying to make my face look “perfect”. I also scrubbed my face clean with alcohol, and even Ajax once, to prevent anymore breakouts. In reality, I had fairly normal skin, but my eyes saw like a microscope. With all my gouging and squeezing, I accidentally made small open sores that became scabs and scars. I put disinfectants on my face - I didn’t want to get infections and have to see a doctor, and have them learn my terrible “dark secret” of self destruction. One time when I was 23, a year before I met Lou, my face blew up from an infection and I was forced to see a doctor. His nurse saw me without make-up and asked, “Who did this to you?” I sickly answered, “Myself”.

I knew what I was doing was “wrong” or not “normal” but I couldn’t stop. I was afraid if my parents found out what I was doing, they’d put me away. My mother suspected something was wrong - that I spent too much time in the bathroom. I painstakingly applied make-up to cover up the damage. I was so embarrassed and ashamed. I constantly checked myself in mirrors or any reflection I could find, even a spoon, to make sure the make-up didn’t come off and reveal what was underneath. I would also check at different angles of light. Lou was the only one I could trust with my “dark secret” and I only let him see me without any make-up. I also called my “dark secret”, my “face thing” or my “bad habit”. When we did go out, Lou patiently waited for me to cover-up. But Lou didn’t care about my face, he cared about me.

We had moved to a different apartment and I checked my face in the new bathroom mirror. The light was different and with horror I saw the scars I had made. I couldn’t afford dermabrassion nor would my medical insurance cover any cosmetic procedures, so I figured I could do it myself with a nail file or an emery board. My new ritual became filing down my scars. However, I made more scars. And I had to keep them from getting infected. We had moved to another, bigger apartment, and the bathroom had three mirrors. Lou tried taking down the mirrors but I couldn’t stand not checking my face, so I made him put them back up. Again, Lou patiently and impatiently waited for me to cover-up.

Lou’s bizarre behavior was his extreme mood swings and his strange actions. He thought they started early in the service but got more severe before we had met. His mood swings were unbelievably predictable: For a week, Lou was “down” or depressed. He wanted to stay at home and cuddle with me. Plus he slept a lot. Then Lou was “normal” a for a few days. Then, we’d be sitting on the bed just talking and then suddenly, Lou would get up and he was off on a manic “high”. Lou’s manic symptoms consisted of talking incessantly and persuasively, being very sexual (especially when he danced with me), being naked outside, peeking into other people’s windows hoping to catch a sexual act, staying out really late for days, spending lots of money, writing bad checks, and eating out a lot. And Lou didn’t have good judgment even though he thought his thinking was crystal clear, and he felt he was on top of the world!

Lou really tried to promote my singing career - only when he was manic. He wanted to be my manager and was quite the salesman. Lou loved to go out to nightclubs and ask the house bands to let me me sit in with them. I’d sing a couple of songs hoping the band would hire me or someone in the audience would “discover” me. But it never happened. I guess I overly optimistic, like Lou.

One time I met a songwriter who wanted me to sing lead and harmonies on a song he wrote. He painstakingly recorded it, with a large group of musicians, and took the cassette to a radio station and the DJ gave it some air play. The song actually got some requests! The songwriter just wanted to get his song a little air play and then he was done. But Lou was insisting that we take it to the next level but the songwriter got angry, and the DJ thought the song sounded too ’60-ish to “make it”, so that was the end of that.

One time, we went to NY where Lou grew up, and we stayed in a beautiful hotel, like a second honeymoon, in heart of Manhattan. Lou had me sing with a fairly known jazz band in a fine restaurant. The sax player, who had cut an album, wanted to make a recording with me but he was a heroin addict and ultimately ended up in the West Haven VA where he died. The problem was Lou, also trying to manage other bands as well me, was counting on a large commission by booking a Beatles copy band into a exclusive African American jazz club. I knew he was trying to put the wrong band into the wrong club! But I was hoping against hope that the deal would go through so we could pay for our stay. Lou was 99% sure he closed the deal but it fell through and my father had to bail us out.

The nature of OCD is that it waxes and wanes which caused me to also have similar “mood swings” like Lou. Many times it was possible for me to match Lou’s mood swings. When my face looked “good”, I also wanted to go out with him and sing with the club bands. And I loved going dancing. But when my face looked “bad” and I couldn’t cover it up the way I wanted to, I’d get anxious and depressed and wanted to hide. And so did he when he was “down”. The hard part was when Lou was manic and wanted to go out, but when my face looked “bad”, I wanted to stay in. If Lou couldn’t persuade me to go out with him, he’d go out by himself. I worried about him getting into trouble. He often would hang out with pimps and prostitutes. I asked Lou why he did that. He simply answered, "They're the only ones around at that hour I can talk to."

One time when Lou was manic, he wrote several bad checks, and ended up in jail. I was seeing a therapist, Sharon, to work on childhood issues and I only touched upon my “bad habit”. She was more like a friend and helped me conquer a lot my childhood issues, but nothing she suggested could penetrate the “face thing”. I told her about Lou's going to jail for the bad checks. I figured she'd say to dump him, but to my surprise, she told me that she thought Lou was a manic-depressive. She advised me to get him out of jail quickly or he could possibly commit suicide. Sharon got a lawyer friend to bail Lou from jail and I got him into the West Haven VA. Their doctors took a month to diagnose Lou as a mild Manic-Depressive and put him on Lithium. Luckily he did extremely well on it. I used to tease Lou by saying, “He was the only one I knew who took drugs NOT to get “high"! Lou got back into the service as a full time Army National Guard clerk and loved his job. I still worked at Design Group but went part time because of my symptoms. Meanwhile, I had gone to several singing auditions but I was getting nowhere fast so I finally quit at age 34.

At age 35, I got inspired to go back to school to become a computer programmer like Lou. I quit Design Group and I went for a two year Associates Degree Program in Computer Science. Even though I studied my brains out, I still found time to file my face. Unfortunately I had the hardest time understanding programming, which counted more that the other subjects. But I graduated with honors and landed a job at Pratt & Whitney in East Hartford. I couldn’t have done it without Lou’s financial and moral support.

Sharon moved to California and referred me to another female therapist. After I had completed working through my childhood issues with her, I realized my "face thing" was more than just a "bad habit". It was the final wall to break down. Then my therapist retired because her MS worsened. She referred me to a young Yale graduate who I didn’t like. He got me so annoyed when he asked me, "Well, what do you think?" I angrily replied, "If I knew what to think, I wouldn't be here! In the mean time, I'm not going to have a f--king face left!!" I was in the chair opposite him crying my eyes out when he surprisingly referred me to an up-and-coming Yale Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder study at the Mental Health Center in New Haven. Doctor Wayne Goodman, who was in charge, gave "my face thing" a name and I was on my way to getting help. That was in 1986. I first needed to take part in the study and then I would be exclusively treated.

But before I got on the right medicine, I took one that made me ravenous and I gained 20 pounds in one month! My co-workers at Pratt & Whitney started to suspect there was something wrong with me. Also they didn’t think I was a very good programmer. One day all the computers went down. Somebody joked that I, the newbee, caused it. Then I heard another co-worker say, “She’s not that talented!”. Unfortunately she was right. I don’t like to be mediocre in the things I do. After 2 1/2 years and an tedious hour commute, I knew I made the right decision to quit and take a non-programming part-time job at Kendall Rebar which was much closer to home. I operated, did data entry and maintained a small office computer.

Meanwhile I was still in the OCD study group. I was fortunate to get on a medication called Anfranil, that worked well for me. Dr. Goodman referred me to a therapist in the Connecticut Mental Health Center who worked with OCD patients. I also found a dermatologist who heard of OCD and smoothed out my face. He wrote it off as an acne problem, not a cosmetic procedure, so my insurance would pay for it.

Then I was laid off from Kendall Rebar after the owner died. I found another part-time job doing data entry and quality control for The New Haven Register. It was just a job and I missed doing something creative. And I still wanted that shot at fame. At the age of 41, I decided to take up acting. I got the idea from watching the "soaps" when I was unemployed. I took a couple of acting classes in New Haven and NY. My teacher told me, "pretty girls are a dime a dozen but one can always use a good character actress like you." I got a good paying acting job in an acting troupe called Alternative Starz. We worked on a boat in Hadaam, CT, on the Camelot Cruises, where we did Murder/Mysteries for 3 seasons until the boat was sold and our troupe was out of work. Then I commuted on a train to NY and rode the subways to auditions and got one of the lead parts in a paid student film. I continued doing work in student films, extra work in movies, TV and commercials.

Then in 2003, Lou's Lithium stopped working and he became very manic. He tried to bring himself "down" by taking 9 Lithium pills. Lou was acting like he was drunk and I knew something was really wrong. I finally got him to tell me what he had done. I called 911, told the paramedics what he took and then I followed the ambulance to the West Haven VA Hospital. After they pumped his stomach, he went into a coma for a day. I was scared that I would lose him. When he came out of it, he wasn't exactly the same. Like he had some brain damage. He was tried on some different medications that temporarily stabilized him. I felt like we needed a big change in our lives. We had spent 20 years with Lou’s side of the family and I missed my family. It was now just my mother and sister since my father had died when I was 40. We decided to move to Florida.

Unfortunately, my acting career went “south”, too. I was 54 and the industry in Florida wanted mostly young, bikini babes. Not like NY. But I did get some extra work and got a spot online for a commercial that I got well paid for. I have to say, against all odds, I did have a successful 16 year acting career, and I was ready to move on to something new. I no longer had a quest for fame, or fortune (well enough to be debt free and live well), I just wanted to do God’s will - whatever that was to be.

When we had first moved to Florida, we stayed with my mother until we saved up enough to rent a small apartment that allowed dogs in Margate near my mother and sister. She didn’t drive that much anymore since she had a vertigo attack and lost hearing in one ear. So I helped my mother by taking her places she needed to go.

After 4 years, I got tired of renting, so I saved up $1000 to put down on a condo in Boynton Beach that also allowed us to have dogs. I couldn't have afforded to buy a bathroom, let alone a house in Connecticut, because prices there were sky high. Lou wasn’t for ownership it at first, coming from a family of renters, but then he came to like the idea and the condo. It had a club house with things to do and a swimming pool! And more importantly, my neighbors were nice.

We also had to get a new therapist, Lois, to keep on getting our prescriptions. After 6 years with her, my Anafranil wasn’t working as well anymore, so she tried me on Luvox. Thank God, it’s working fantastically for me! I hardly think of my face now; I just wash it, sunscreen it with over-the-counter retinal cream and proudly wear no make-up (unless it’s for special occasions). In fact my face looks better, now, at age 59. But it wasn’t as easy for Lou. Lois tried him on many medications that weren’t as effective or nearly as long lasting as Lithium.

I later got a job as a theatre attendant. After 6 months, they lost an employee and I had them interview Lou, and they hired him. Unfortunately after 2 years, his medications failed and he went manic. Lou accidentally broke a bunch of rules in order to save our boss some work. Lou was fired and I quit. The whole incident was stupid but my boss said I could have my job back. But a couple of the women were petty and one was a week-end supervisor. That supervisor made our lives miserable our last day because she didn’t like Lou for what he’d done, and both women didn’t like me by association. I told my boss this and he’d said he’d speak to the women. He never got back to me so that was that.

In 2008, just over a period of three months, Lou became manic and did a lot of financial damage that we’re still paying for. Then he became depressed, and developed violent tremors in his right hand and arm and difficulty speaking. (He did had minor tremors when he was taking Lithium). Oddly, the tremors disappeared when he went manic. Lois worked with a young neurologist who told us she could use a drug to make him manic in a second so they had to monitor him carefully. Lou wasn’t responding well on any of the medications they tried. The young neurologist referred Lou to an older, more experience neurologist who had Lou take a MRI of his brain to rule out Huntington’s Disease. Even though, he felt Lou’s symptoms were not typical Parkenson’s Disease, he tried Lou on medications for Parkenson’s that didn’t work. He didn't have a clue what Lou had.

I got the idea to look up online the side effects of the two medications Lois had Lou on, and both caused Parkenson’s like symptoms of tremors and trouble with speech. I spoke to the psychiatrist that Lois worked under, and he nonchalantly said that all those types of drugs caused those symptoms. I was angry that Lois wasn’t aware of this and I took him off those medications myself. I decided it was time for a second opinion.

I found a neuropsychiatrist but she wouldn’t treat Lou until his tremors were addressed. She recommended another neurologist who also agreed his symptoms weren’t Parkenson’s. Since she also didn't have a clue either, she recommended we see a movement specialist. Neither one of us heard of a “movement specialist” and we didn’t know what to think.

That’s where it stands now - we are waiting to see this “movement specialist”. Lou’s been depressed for months and lost a lot of weight because he doesn’t want to eat. Plus he stays in bed all day. I correctly guessed that he stayed in bed partly to quell the tremors. The bad part is he just lies there and doesn’t really use his mind other than to ruminate on why he lost his jobs or just lie there, thinking of who knows what. But now he gets ornery and angry when I try to get him to eat, tend to his personal hygiene, change his sheets or help me take the dogs out. All he wants to do is “go lay down”. I’m lucky I can get him occasionally to go out of the house for food shopping. I afraid his epitaph will read, "I'm going to lay down now." if something doesn't change. I'm praying he will get better and one of these doctors will find the right medicine(s) to get him to have a normal life. It's hard and sometimes I want out. But I have to remind myself he took care of me for a good part of our marriage and now it’s my turn; that it's give and take in a relationship and most importantly, love keeps me hanging on.