An Unquiet Mind: Chapter 7 Summary & Analysis

Jamison writes that once, when she was younger, she believed there was “only a certain amount of pain one had to go through in life.” Her illness had brought so much suffering to bear upon her, she thought, that her life would be “kinder” to her in other arenas. Jamison points out that she knows now that this belief was foolish—just months earlier, she’d imagined she could reach the rings of Saturn.

Early in 1975—six months after her psychotic episode and suicide attempt—Jamison’s nerves were still frayed and her “mind was skating on thin ice.” One morning, when she arrived at the inpatient ward of the UCLA psychiatric hospital for a morning meeting, she was introduced to David Laurie—a psychiatrist on leave from the Royal Army Medical Corps in England. The two liked one another immediately and bonded over lunch that afternoon at the hospital cafeteria. Their shared interests in music, poetry, and psychiatry bonded them together—but Jamison, who was still living with her first husband, did not pursue a romance with David, even though she found herself drawn to him. After a few months, David returned to London, and, in spite of her best efforts, Jamison found her marriage falling apart beyond repair at last.

Over a year later, after having exchanged letters with David intermittently, Jamison returned to her office at UCLA one afternoon to find him waiting there for her. He invited her out to dinner, and she at last accepted. The two spent several days together, and when David had to return to England, Jamison accompanied him. The passion she shared with David during this time, she writes, made her remember how important and healing love can be in the scope of one’s life. As close as Kay and David were, Jamison still hadn’t told her new lover that she was struggling with manic-depressive illness.

One afternoon, Kay went to Canterbury alone to visit the cathedral there. While kneeling to pray, Kay realized she’d forgotten to take her lithium the night before. When she reached into her purse for the bottle, she dropped the pills all over the filthy cathedral floor. She left without gathering them, knowing she’d need to ask David to write her a new prescription—and that that would mean telling him about her illness. That night, Kay told David the truth, dreading his reaction—but instead of reacting with fear or cruelty, he embraced her and said, “Rotten luck.” The two shared a laugh, and Kay felt that someone at last understood her. Kay answered all of David’s questions about her illness. When she told him that lithium interfered with her attention span and prevented her from reading, he pulled out a favorite book and began reading to her.

Kay returned to the United States for work, and, later in the fall, David visited her. Again, their weeks together were filled with passion, companionship, and beauty. Kay felt more herself than she had in years. The following May, Kay went to visit David in London again, and they enjoyed a spring vacation across England. One Sunday morning, climbing a hill, Kay noticed that David was markedly out of breath. He assured her that he was fine, and they didn’t discuss it again. 

Kay returned home to California, planning to visit David during one of his posts at the British Army Hospital in Hong Kong in a few months. One night, though, Kay was working at her apartment when there was a knock at the door. When she answered it, she found a diplomatic courier with a letter from one of David’s commanding officers—David was dead, at just forty-four years old, of a massive heart attack. Kay recalls feeling numb and disoriented as the days went by and plans for David’s funeral got underway. She spoke to David’s parents and commanding officers, booked a flight to London, and traveled across the sea in a state of total shock. In London, she tried to read through some of David’s old love letters, but found she couldn’t—to this day, Jamison writes, she’s never looked at them again.

During her visit to London for David’s funeral, Kay was met with kindness and compassion from David’s colleagues in the British army. His commanding officer met with her for lunch and gave her details from the autopsy report—both to shock her into accepting the reality of David’s death, and to point out that the heart attack was so massive and so unexpected that nothing could have been done to save him. At the funeral itself, David’s friends, family members, and fellow officers stayed near to Kay and comforted her.

After David’s funeral, Kay stayed in England a while to visit with friends. She mourned not just the loss of David, but of the potential future they could have had together. Still, David’s death did not plunge Kay over the edge into “unendurable darkness.” Though just a few short years ago she’d been deeply suicidal, taking her own life never once crossed her mind. She owes this fact to the support of her friends and loved ones—but also to the bolstering force of the love and acceptance David showed Kay during their time together. Recovering from the loss of David took a long time, Kay writes—but there did come a day when she at last felt relief from the pain.