An Unquiet Mind

“This Medicine, Love” deals primarily with Jamison’s love life and relationships, including the way she had to navigate her illness. “An Officer and a Gentleman” is about Jamison’s relationship with David, an English psychiatrist and military officer. The pair met in 1975, when David joined UCLA as a visiting professor on leave from the Royal Army Medical Corps. They “liked one another immediately” and began working and lunching together (141). As she had recently moved back in with her husband, in an effort to work out their marriage, Jamison declined his advances. However, they remained in touch even after David returned to England, and after she and her husband officially and finally separated, David returned to surprise her with a visit.

After spending time together in Los Angeles, David invited her to London. While there, visiting Canterbury on her own, Jamison accidentally spills her lithium onto the floor. Knowing that she cannot go without her medicine, she realizes that she will need to tell David about her condition and ask him to write her a new script. Despite her fears and his initial silence, David simply responds that her illness is rotten luck for her; this is not only a relief, but a realization that it is, in fact, rotten luck, not an indictment of her character.