The episode begins with Bailey, Sarah, Cooper and Julia playing drinking games in the house with loud music while Charlie and Kirsten can't sleep. In bed, he says he'll tell them to turn it down, but Kirsten answers that she's ok. He thinks they'll leave soon so he doesn't complain in the moment, but in the morning, after they yelled until 4 am, Charlie put things under control. Sadly, this is a common situation, even more in the 21th century, where young people don't have any consideration for the troubles that parents have. Anyway, Bailey agrees in no more loud nights in the house so he starts looking for a dorm in college, first choosing Cooper's place. But when Cooper and Julia start dating, and they don't stop despite Bailey's warnings, he decides to move into a dorm with Callie, a woman little older than him, who seems to date easily any guy and is exhibicionist. Sarah is really upset and worried about this but Bailey doesn't care, thinking he can handle temptation. For some reason, Bailey entered in the wolf's mouth, indirectly caused by Cooper and Julia's immature behavior. Poor Sarah, she didn't even wanted him to leave the house. On the other hand, there's no hot water in the house, the heater is broken and the pipes need changing. Claudia has a shower and screams because the cold water, and the siblings rush to check on her. I didn't like this detail, after the loud night, Claudia's scream was scary considering Kirsten's state. Anyway, Claudia must solve the issue with the heater-pipes, while Charlie is taking care of Kirsten and working in the restaurant, and the other two siblings are avoiding responsibilities. When the repair guy arrives in the afternoon, only Claudia is there, and he tells her that they need a whole new system (pipes are corroded, the heater is too old) and gives her some numbers because he can't do the job. The next day, Claudia tells Charlie what the guy said so he answers "call and ask for bids", while he checks if Kirsten is in the backyard and then goes to their bedroom (Claudia said she didn't see her). In the meantime, Claudia also watches Owen. She calls three different plumbers at the same time, and they complain to her because only one can do the job (funny scene). In this case, Claudia was more compassive with her "parents" situation (although seems that she didn't pay much attention to Kirsten's suffering when Charlie was working), so she got mad at Bailey and Julia when they yelled at her over the high cost of fixing the water system.
Anyway, for the best of the episode and the most dramatic side: To make his "wife" feel better, when she is up and sitting "reading" in the backyard, Charlie offers her a change of clothes to take her as a hostess at Salinger's, despite that she's not in the mood. She has been in the same clothes for 3 days so he takes her for a "cold shower", promising to help to wash her back, and front if she wants (what a wonderful husband he is being). This wasn't a great idea but I think that Charlie thought that with her in the restaurant, he can be close and watch her, otherwise he'd we worried all the time he's working, thinking what she does alone in the house (besides, Claudia's scream scared him). Anyway, later at Salinger's, he watches Kirsten doing well, welcoming people, but unnotices the time when she cries outside near the alley (very sad scene). The next day, he thinks she slept well and that she's better, so he goes to work, leaving a coffee cake in the oven for her when she gets up. She doesn't say she's still depressed and tells she has her shrink at 5 pm. But she can't leave their bedroom in all day, so Charlie returns worried from the restaurant (that's when he talks to Claudia), and finds her crying. He wraps her with a coat, and she explains she wants to sleep to wake up better, but she can't, feeling she can't breathe. She can't get dressed, feeling she lost something inside, and she can't button her shirt until she finds it, but it's gone. I think she lost the "patch" that cured her heart after the failed wedding. She has been fine since they got back together in march, but now there's a relapse in depression, even though she is with Charlie and "their kids" in the house. Without the job and without medication, she has to spend the whole day in the place where the bad things happened. She has nothing else to focus on besides the family, so her life is unbalanced just like after the disaster. The first time, she lost her not yet official "husband" and the kids (her family) because her mother's lousy advice and Charlie's unbelievable words (the writers idea), this time, she lost what allowed her to get pass the break up, the job/profession (the other life goal), so her depression returns. When he suggests calling her parents, she says no without doubt (Kirsten is aware of what her dad would do and she doesn't want to leave Charlie and the family). He knows she has to see her psychiatrist, but she says she can't, not by herself. So next day, he goes to see Dr Leto, alone this time, and asks him the same medication that cured her last time. Anyway, Dr Leto says it might take 6 weeks for the medication to become effective, and considering that after the failed wedding she was on medication for two months, he might be right. Charlie doesn't want to see her suffering for all those weeks until november, and asks him some faster solution, but the doctor implies that there's no faster way, he has to accept that will take time. Then, the last scene between Charlie and Kirsten is really touching, tearful, heartbreaking, for me, one of the best moments of the whole series: while she looks at him from the bed, he's standing near the door, thinking what to say that's not for him, but for her. He explains how he'd like to say "there's pasta downstairs, I can heat it up" or "hey sweetie I got a movie", but he realized that those things would be to make him feel better and that's not what she needs. So he simply asks her "how are you" and she says how good, great he is. She recognizes this is awful, she's awful but he's so good with her. He feels deeply guilty of her suffering so he can't admit he's good. Finally, he tells her that he'll prepare dinner for Claudia and Owen and let her choose to eat with them or not, he won't put pressure on her. Before going downstairs, he tells he loves her and kisses her forehead. And is not showed, so I can even imagine in dinner how he'd explain to Owen, that "mum" is upstairs and is sad but she'll be fine, he's taking care of her. Charlie is being the best man he can be, a deep loving and caring husband, a truly responsible father. At the end, in the backyard, he confides in Julia, he has some doubts about if he can do this for two more months, is not easy, (he related this situation to how a wife/husband, after winning an award would thank the spouse for overcoming a tragedy), but Julia assures him that he can because he changed, he already grew up. She's not scared because he has been there for them, and she knows he can be there for Kirsten, support her all the way.
All the depression storyline is excellent, emotional, touching, tearful, simply outstanding and clearly underrated. I've done some research online and the diagnosis was never certain, even in 1996 there wasn't enough information. Kirsten has a form of manic depression, Bipolar II Disorder. Unlike the type I, type II includes mainly symptoms of clinical depression (also known as unipolar depression), and occasionally hypomanic states. The disease is not very rare and some famous people suffer it. Still, I consider the case different than other people because Kirsten never had any drinking or drug disorder. Her illness is mostly genetic. Given that major traumas can cause a long time of clinical depression, and those symptoms are more frequent in Type II, the diagnosis is complicated because can be confused with BD II. But the BD II is characterized by hypomania, which often can be taken as normal because is not severe as the manic crisis. If you think, in Dearly Beloved, Kirsten had some anxiety crisis, even insomnia (in 2x02 and 2x12 too). Then, her intention to marry Michael in march 1996 was incredibly rushed and ilogical, considering she had clinical depression recently before meeting him, in december-january (like she explained in Shortcuts). When she got the job at Seaside 2 episodes ago, she was euphoric, yet this could be considered common. Though Kirsten's behavior has been pretty normal overall, these were some hints that the trauma of the failed wedding triggered something. Medication helped her before, but she left it and though she was ok between january and august, now she has to take them again because losing her job and Phd caused a relapse, making worse the prognosis if she's not treated properly. Seems that not even Dr. Leto did right the diagnosis, for now he thinks it's unipolar depression, but was 1996, there's no one to blame, besides, the hypomania will be clearer in next episodes. And Charlie obviously knows less, yet he sees that Kirsten is not fine, and he's doing the best he can to help her. So considering all that, all the info you can read about the disease, these episodes treat the theme very well, the writers, directors, Paula Devicq, and Matthew Fox did an excellent job. And for the emotional side, the series is showing some of the greatests acts of love a man can do for a woman. Charlie knows very well how Kirsten is, how great she is with Claudia and Owen, and with him. She's wonderful person, who loves him more than any other woman in the world, and has shown that all the times she supported him and forgave him. And though he just discovered the illness she suffers, he loves her as much as she loves him, so he'll stay with her beyond everything. Charlie is holding his wife and taking care of her in this moments of deep sorrow and sickness, just as the vows he will pronounce one day in front of her says.
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