This is a love story.

It’s about our friends Mark and Giulia and the courageous journey they took through and out of the dark, steep path of mental illness. I think like most of their friends, we never could have imagined that the always smiling, full of energy Giulia that we had grown to love during our time in San Francisco could be going through this. It felt so sudden. So unexpected. I remember getting the email from Mark that Giulia had been hospitalized and I must have read it a dozen times. I just couldn’t comprehend what they were going through and I didn’t know what to do or what to say. 

Months went by and we only got to see the outermost layer of the battle Mark and Giulia were fighting. Eventually, as Giulia began to find her way through, they did something drastic. They put their lives on hold and went on an around the world trip. We all followed their journey on twitter and their blog. I saw photos of my sweet friend with her hair whipping across her glowing cheeks, that familiar smile returning to her face.

So often in marriage, when the true test of commitment to a spouse is tested, things fall apart. I can thing of few things as devastating as losing a bright, witty, charming wife to the black hole of mental illness -  to have her there physically but somewhere far away mentally.

But Mark fought. and Giulia fought. and they found their way back. Their journey is more heroic than all the fairytales and story books ever written. It’s love. at its best and worst. and it deserves to be shared.

Love,

M