The den is great. We placed a desk inside Grandma’s closet after taking off the doors and wallpapering the newly created alcove—just one of the handy design tips Mom and I picked up from HGTV. The room also has a new love seat and recliner, along with new carpeting. The mega-Jesus over Grandma’s bed is gone, taken down when Michael and Mom and I painted the walls a soft blue. Mom donated him to St. Stanislaus, a small Polish Catholic church in the next town, the same church we now go to on Sundays.
The room gives me a sense of peace. Because I swear, there have been a few times, when I was alone doing homework or talking on the phone, that the scent of peppermint, Grandma’s favorite candy, softly swirled around me. That’s what made me feel safe reading Perks again in there.
I found the same story radically different this time around. Before, I could only focus on guilting myself for my genetic disorder while exonerating Charlie for being an innocent victim. That’s wrong, I know that now. And before, the absence of Grandma and my friends made the support of Charlie’s family and friends seem fake. But with Michael and Kristal in my life, I’m seeing that people don’t necessarily run from me. They seem to want to be a part of my life. At least for now.
But what really struck me was how skewed my perception was that first Saturday of September, sophomore year. The fucked-up lens of my depression transmitted a version of the story that just wasn’t there. Perks is a story of hope. The message is that yes, we get dealt some horrifically shitty cards, but despite the hand, we still have choices, decisions to make about where to go from here. There is still some control.
I tell Dr. McCallum what I’ve discovered: this distorting effect of depression.
His eyes hold mine. “Remember this, Catherine. Because that is exactly why we have a depression game plan,” he says. “For that very reason.”
The knowledge that Zero will come back doesn’t cripple me anymore. I’m getting used to the idea of cycles. My mind is tidal, and I think I can learn to accept that. I will have to learn to ride out the extreme episodes, even the apocalyptic Zero. And I get that our game plan to deal with it hinges on one thing: staying honest and saying honest. I need to become my greatest advocate. Especially at the first signs of my shit going south.
It’s dark as Mom drives us home from the appointment. The houses fly by, each window flashing the quickest view of lit interiors, glimpses of the lives within. I used to think that only my house was a house of pain, but now I know that every house has its share. Like Bev Walker pacing in her high-end kitchen as the shower in Kristal’s bathroom runs; or Lorraine and Tony Pitoscia staring at Anthony’s DUI court papers spread out on the dining room table; and even Farricelli’s parents, whose dream of a college football scholarship fractured like the vertebra in Louis’s neck. Not to mention all the others whose pain I cannot see.
Not everyone is chronic, but I know no one is immune.
JULY
“Dear God, Catherine! Brake, for Christ’s sake! And move over!” Mom shouts from the passenger seat. “Center! Center! Move! You almost sideswiped those parked cars.”
My driving lessons with Mom are going pretty darn good but for my tendency to hug the right side of the lane. On the mornings she’s at Dunkin’ Donuts, I drive her there, and usually Michael or Olivia picks me up. I’m scheduled to take the test for my license in three weeks, and the Accord and Bonnie Raitt are waiting for me, since Mom just bought herself a two-year-old Subaru.
It was Mom who decided it was time. Between our work schedules and my internship at the New Haven Museum in the visitor services department, Mom was constantly chauffeuring me around. That and the fact that my Lamictal has kept me stable, along with my “stay honest, say honest” mantra, Dr. McCallum, Mom, Aunt D, my sleep journal, Michael and Kristal.
It takes a village.
“Catherine, see those two parking spots ahead. Pull into the first one and keep going to the second,” she says unnecessarily. “This way you don’t have to back out of the spot. A pull-through parking spot is always the way to go.” Mom glances at me before starting to laugh. “Duh, I know. You don’t have to say it.”
Mom and I walk in together. I get an iced decaf with two sugars and wait for Michael to arrive. High Honors student Michael has already started writing his Common App essay. He’s chosen the “what has been your greatest challenge” question and he’s writing about being bullied.
I know I will be using the same prompt for my application. And I know only too well what my answer will be.
We’ve already started the college tours. The first was with Kristal to Wesleyan, where she’s headed in thirty-seven days, four hours and sixteen minutes—she texts me the freshman move-in date countdown every morning. Turned out that she fell more in love with Wesleyan than Vassar. Michael came with Mom and me to UConn for an info session and campus tour. The main campus in Storrs is huge and surprisingly beautiful. Mom, of course, freaked out over the size of the school and has made me agree in advance to a substance-free dorm wherever I wind up.
I have no problem with that. How can I? I never thought I’d be here, walking into student unions, libraries, athletic centers and cafeterias, checking out dorm rooms and bathrooms. Me, Catherine Pulaski, headed to college.
My life resumed.
MARCH, SENIOR YEAR
“Cath!” Mom calls from the front door, her tone carrying both elements of shock and excitement. “Cath! Where are you?”
“I’m in the den!” I yell back. I’m at the desk, finishing up an AP English paper on Beloved.
Mom hurries in. “Cath.” The word is heavy with meaning. Because she’s holding out a light brown envelope. Addressed to Catherine Pulaski. From UConn. It’s about half the size of an eight-by-eleven envelope. This doesn’t look like good news. I’ve heard acceptances come in large envelopes thick with admission info.
I stare at the envelope and then open it with shaky fingers. The papers are folded in half. Slowly, I unfold them. And read.
Dear Catherine,
Congratulations! It is my pleasure to inform you of your admission to the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences as a psychology major at the University of Connecticut Storrs Campus…
Mom pulls me into a bear hug, screaming and crying, “My baby’s going to college! My baby’s going to college. You did it!”
I cry. Hard. Because I can’t believe this is a reality—me, going to college.
I am going to college.
I pull back to look at Mom. “We did it,” I say, my voice cracking on the “we.” I want this to be our moment. I need her to know that I know I couldn’t have done it without her. That she’s my anchor, and that I’m so infinitely grateful. But the words aren’t coming. Instead I repeat, “We did it.”
Mom nods—she understands—and then pulls me close again. She buries her nose in my neck and breathes in, her voice muffled. “You smell like peppermint.”
I inhale the scent that has floated over us. Closing my eyes, I allow myself to see. A future. My future, unspooling before me: college, job, friends, marriage and maybe, maybe even kids. It’s there. It’s been there all the time. Definitely not perfectly rosy and bright. But mine for the taking. All mine.
HISTORY
Private First Class Jane Talmadge is a fictional character, but her experiences are based on the recollections of real women from the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion found in Brenda L. Moore’s wonderful book To Serve My Country, to Serve My Race, as well as in One Woman’s Army, the amazing autobiography of the commanding officer of the 6888th, Lieutenant Colonel Charity Adams Early. Both books, along with Cheryl Mullenbach’s Double Victory: How African American Women Broke Race and Gender Barriers to Help Win World War II, were instrumental to the writing of this story. I was incredibly moved by the courage and perseverance of the 6888th. Kristal’s mom put it best: “You think about what these ladies were facing. It was a double whammy of prejudice—they were women and they were black.” Despite the discrimination and dange
r, the 6888th persevered and triumphed.
Early in the writing process, I knew I wanted Catherine to be inspired by a figure from history, someone who had moved forward despite overwhelming odds. That idea led me to think about the first waves of soldiers who stormed the heavily fortified beaches in Normandy. It was complete serendipity that while doing research on the Normandy American Cemetery and Memorial, I found an article about the four women buried among the 9,383 men. Three of these women were from the 6888th: Mary H. Bankston, Mary J. Barlow and Delores Browne. They were killed in a jeep accident in Rouen, France. Their tragic story, as well as the overall courage of the 6888th, gripped me and became the inspiration for Jane Talmadge.
WHY I WROTE THIS BOOK
High school is a strange, surreal and sometimes intensely difficult four years when most of us, for the first time, take a long, hard look at ourselves and our parents, family and friends and start to see cracks or flaws. These years seem like a recipe for turmoil—huge physical and emotional changes are experienced within a very contained community. It can be destabilizing, but when our world has contracted, when our sense of self is often defined by the labels of others, it can be brutal. Let’s throw in social media that can publicize on a large scale the slightest incident. It jacks up the consequences of every action and increases the pressure.
Now let’s add more: anxiety, depression, eating disorders, drug abuse and addiction, alcoholism, obsessive-compulsive disorder, cutting and bipolar disorder and other disorders or afflictions, physical or mental. In addition to all the usual turbulence of these years, there are now these great, deep pockets of pain, of more pressure, many covered with a stinging layer of stigma. My heart is with those who bear this heavy weight. Know that this story exists because of you.
I wrote this book because I wanted to talk about handling pain: We need to acknowledge it out loud. We need to tell someone. We need to stay honest and say honest. I worry that we are programmed not to discuss pain; we manage our profiles with only our best photos and our happy times, and this filtering seeps into our personal interactions out of fear. Fear that too much disclosure will result in different treatment or outright rejection. But pain is a constant in life. The only way to get through it is to talk about it. To not keep it locked inside. Because not talking about pain means it doesn’t go away. And by talking about it, we may find others who share a similar pain. Who understand. Who can help.
There are many resources out there. If you are suffering or if you feel the urge to harm yourself, please tell someone. Let your pain out. And if the first person you contact doesn’t hear you, don’t quit. Talk. Keep talking.
Call 911 if you are in immediate danger of harming yourself.
Call 800-273-TALK (8255) (National Suicide Prevention Lifeline) if you are in crisis or having suicidal thoughts. It is a twenty-four-hour, toll-free, confidential hotline.
Contact the NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Health) HelpLine at 1-800-950-NAMI (6264) or [email protected]. The NAMI HelpLine can be reached Monday through Friday, ten a.m. to six p.m. EST, for answers to questions about mental health, including symptoms of mental illness, treatment options and support groups.
Association of Recovery in Higher Education. RECOVERY PROGRAMS. http://collegiaterecovery.org/programs/
Devlin, Philip R. “Connecticut Women and the Battle of Normandy: Can You Help Solve a Mystery?” Simsbury, Connecticut Patch, June 5, 2012, patch.com/connecticut/simsbury/connecticut-women-in-world-war-ii-and-the-battle-of-n6b0c8a5457.
Dunkins, Brittney, “Students with Depression Fight to Stay on the ‘Path,’ ” GW Today, http://gwtoday.gwu.edu/students-depression-fight-stay-‘path’.
Earley, Charity Adams. One Woman’s Army: A Black Officer Remembers the WAC. College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1989.
Jamison, Kay R. An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness. New York: Knopf, 1995.
Jamison, Kay R. Night Falls Fast: Understanding Suicide. New York: Knopf, 1999.
Khan, Amir. “Dating With a Mental Illness,” U.S.News & World Report, December 5, 2014, health.usnews.com/health-news/health-wellness/articles/2014/12/05/dating-with-a-mental-illness.
Moore, Brenda L. To Serve My Country, to Serve My Race: The Story of the Only African American WACS Stationed Overseas During World War II. New York: New York University Press, 1996.
Mullenbach, Cheryl. Double Victory: How African American Women Broke Race and Gender Barriers to Help Win World War II. Chicago: Chicago Review Press, 2013.
Williamson, Wendy K., and Honora Rose. Two Bipolar Chicks Guide to Survival: Tips for Living with Bipolar Disorder. Franklin, Tennessee: Post Hill Press, 2014.
“6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion (Women’s Army Corps),” 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, history.army.mil/html/topics/afam/6888thPBn/index.html.
After I finished this manuscript, I went online and ordered myself a pair of silver snowflake earrings, the same ones my research had uncovered while writing about Michael’s anniversary gift to Catherine. Soon after taking them out of the package, I lost them in my house, yet I couldn’t order another pair. I had linked some cosmic significance to the earrings, believing that the story’s publication somehow rested on their reappearance.
Two months later, on a late January morning, I found them deep in a kitchen drawer. Twenty minutes later, my phone chimed with an email from agent Sara Megibow offering me representation. The stars had aligned. Sara understood the story instinctively. Brilliant, sharp, enthusiastic and genuine, she is a continual advocate and support. This book would not have been possible without her. I am beyond grateful.
Editor Kate Sullivan transformed this story and deepened it in ways I could have never done on my own. It blossomed under her guidance. With Kate, no sentence was left behind, and she always seemed to catch—on instinct, I think—themes I had meant to expand upon but never actually did. I had no idea how collaborative the revision process would be, and I can’t imagine going through it on this story with anyone other than Kate.
Diane Cohen Schneider is a gifted writer and friend whose insight and skill shaped the story from page one. Darlene Beck-Jacobson’s insight and suggestions were spot-on. Arriving in the eleventh hour at the request of our agent, Miranda Kenneally’s suggestions proved pivotal and inspired me to write one of my favorite parts of the book, Chapter 45.
I’d also like to thank the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators (SCBWI) for the very generous grant that made this story possible. And Kathy Temean, former SCBWI regional advisor to the New Jersey chapter. It was at one of Kathy’s Avalon Workshops that she urged me to write something new. That something new was the first page of this story. Thank you, Kathy!
I’d also like to thank Regina Brooks of Serendipity Literary. Winning the 2013 YA Discovery Contest was my first professional validation as a writer, and it turbocharged the writing of this story. I am also grateful for another professional boost from the Shoreline Arts Alliance; this story was a finalist in the 2015 Tassey Walden Awards.
To my parents, thank you for always being in my corner and always ready to embrace my latest adventure. And for instilling deep love of reading and writing in me.
To Jenna and Frankie, thank you for your endless patience while I was writing this book. Thank you for repeating yourselves all those times I was still lost in the story and staring at you with glazed eyes. Thank you for pushing me to keep going. Jenna, your intelligence and sharp eyes made me fear your critique! Getting your stamp of approval was—in a word—priceless. Frankie, I am grateful for your technical advice on dialogue and texting and zombie apocalypse information. Thank you also for pointing out the quote from Otto Frank that day we visited the Anne Frank House and for telling me how you thought it was one of the most meaningful things you read.
And finally, to my husband, Frank: you were the inspiration for Dr. McCallum—an intuitive, caring and dedicated child psychiatrist.
This story is being published in large part because of you. From technical advice and general editing to continual support and encouragement, I could have never written it without you. Thank you.
Karen Fortunati is a former attorney whose experiences on the job with children and teens and personal experiences witnessing the impact of depression, bipolar disorder, and suicide inspired her to write this story of hope for those who struggle with mental illness. She wanted them to know that they are not alone in navigating the shame, stigma, and anxiety that often complicate the management of this chronic condition. Karen graduated from the University of Scranton and Georgetown Universtiy Law Center and attends graduate school at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. She works part-time as a museum educator and lives in Connecticut with her family and rescue dogs.
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The Weight of Zero Page 28