Hidden Valley Road - Inside the Mind of an American Family - Robert Kolker Page 0,154

another surprise. For several years before Don died, Lindsay learned, he’d been traveling to Pueblo on a regular basis for ECT sessions. The stated reason was depression he’d been experiencing since the early 1990s, after multiple occurrences of cancer and the death of one of his brothers. But of course this new information only brought on more questions. Was their father having ECT because of a clinical depression that was genetic, tied to schizophrenia? Was this the same condition that had hit him in Canada in 1955, as Mimi had thought? Or was Don caught up in an entirely new depression at the end of his life, because who wouldn’t be, in his situation—with one of his sons dead in a murder-suicide, another five hopelessly delusional, one a compulsive child molester? After so little about his life had turned out even remotely the way he’d wanted?

Mimi had to have known about Don’s ECT sessions. She’d gone there with him, and no doubt driven him home afterward, as often as once a month for years on end. She’d kept this secret, too. To be a member of the Galvin family is to never stop tripping on land mines of family history, buried in odd places, stashed away out of shame.

Lindsay didn’t know how to react to this one, except to muse yet again about the damage caused by that secrecy, and to try to live her own life differently. Maybe, she thought, her family’s story was not just about the secrets, not just about a disease—but about how all of that experience, with the help of Drs. Freedman and DeLisi, might make life better for others.

Was it worth it to them? Not really. But maybe there was something for her to hold on to now, with Robert Freedman’s choline trials and Lynn DeLisi’s SHANK2 revelation—a sense that their sacrifice may make it better for future generations. Isn’t that how science works—how history works?

DONALD

JOHN

MICHAEL

RICHARD

MARK

MATTHEW

PETER

MARGARET

LINDSAY

CHAPTER 42

One night a few years before Mimi got sick, Margaret woke up crying from a dream that was too much for her to bear.

In the dream, she and her sister were in Vail after a day of skiing. Lindsay didn’t say where they were going—and the knowledge that her little sister knew and Margaret did not is, perhaps, a telling detail in its own right—but soon Margaret realized they were heading toward the condominium owned by Sam and Nancy Gary. When they arrived, the door was unlocked.

Lindsay walked through, and Margaret followed her. They were alone. The place was not in the best shape. Lindsay said that Sam’s children use it now. That got Margaret thinking of all the Gary family members she once knew and had not seen in years. Sure enough, Nancy and Sam came through the door, along with their children and their friends. Clearly, they were having some sort of party to celebrate something.

Margaret felt awkward. She did not know why she was there. Only when she noticed her sister using a measuring tape to gauge the size of the room did she understand. They had been asked to help plan a party for Sam and Nancy.

It was too late now to set up. More guests were coming through the door, filing along a wooden walkway into the living room. Margaret saw Sam’s secretary, the Garys’ drivers, their cooks, their housekeepers, even the tennis instructor who came to Montana to give Margaret and the others lessons by the lake house. They all were older now, but Margaret recognized them just the same.

She was uneasy, convinced she did not belong there. Then one of the family’s tutors came up to her and smiled. “I don’t know why I’ve been gone so long,” Margaret told him. “You all are such great people.” The tutor replied, “Well, we’ve got to get you into our family history.”

Margaret felt better, but the feeling didn’t last. She overheard other guests mentioning other parties she hadn’t been invited to.