Bothell Native, Viet Vet Details Battles With Mental Illness in Memoir

You couldn’t come up with a more hometown title than the one Gene Olson picked for his memoir: “The Boy from Bothell.”

And it would be hard to find a more get-to-the-point opening sentence than this one: “I have a manic-depressive illness or ‘bipolar disorder.’ ”

What follows in the next 279 pages of this self-published book is the story of growing up in Bothell in the 1950s and 60s, the onset of mental illness after leaving the Navy, time in hospitals and institutions, and how lithium, his religion and a loving wife have helped do much more than just tread water in the river of life.

Olson, a stay-at-home dad who lives in Vancouver, WA, with his physician wife and two sons, obviously has fond memories of his Northshore childhood and school years. He was a big man on campus at Bothell High School, where he was class president his sophomore and senior years, sports editor of the school paper, and winner of the ASB Award as a senior in 1964.

His family lived north of Bothell, had farm animals including a cow, and his father was a meat-cutter. The family took in foster children and later his parents ran two group homes, one in Bothell and one in Arlington. One of his sisters, Aarlie (BHS ’60), was just inducted into the for her charitable work in New Guinea.

Olson is such a hometown guy that he twice mentions in the book how good the chocolate Cokes were at Crawford’s Rexall Drug Store.

“I left Bothell, but I will always be ‘The Boy From Bothell’,” he writes. “The beginning paths were smooth and sunny. Then the storms came. College. South Vietnam. Bipolar disorder.”

The book’s “in memory of” page is dedicated to Bothell classmate Rich Worthington, who died when the helicopter he was piloting was shot down in Vietnam in 1970. Olson’s time in Vietnam was served in the Navy on a troops-and-equipment transport ship on the Saigon River and other hot spots.

“The Navy taught me many valuable lessons,” Olson writes. “One lesson I wish I hadn’t learned was ‘How to become an alcoholic.’ ’’

He was arrested for drunk driving while attending Northwest Nazarene College in Nampa, ID, where he had earlier dropped out. Mental problems were next. There were hallucinations, erratic behavior, manic-depression and stays in various Washington mental hospitals over the years.

Olson poured himself into this heartfelt book. “At first I wrote the book strictly as therapy,” he said. “I'd write a chapter, put it away for a month. Then I'd write another chapter and put it away for a month.”

The book could have used an editor. The Inglewood Country Club (now Inglewood Golf Club) is called the Inglemoore Country Club. The description of Bothell’s location is botched and fits Kenmore rather than Bothell. There are some misspellings.

However, there are some polished passages, such as: “I consider myself half-Norwegian, half-Swede, half Democrat, half Republican, half Catholic, half Protestant, a fifty-fifty person.”

Olson had a four-month marriage before meeting his present wife, Jolanta, whom he met through a personals advertisement and married in 1984.

“God sent this angel from Poland to Seattle just in time,” he writes in the dedication.

What is most haunting in the book are his memories of being tied to his bed during the worst moments of his stays in mental facilities. And then there is the more recent episode, where he tried to dramatically decrease the amount of lithium he was taking, started yelling and screaming about helicopters (apparently from Vietnam), and had to be taken to the same hospital where his wife had walked in for work hours earlier as a respected professional.

I knew Olson as a likable fellow in high school (I was a year ahead of him) and he is a guy worth rooting for. I used to tilt my head and say “that can’t be true” when mental-health advocates claimed that one of four families is affected by mental illness. Now I believe they are correct. The biggest thing we can all learn from Olson’s book is that mental illnesses can be a brain disorder that is treatable with the right medication.

How to order The Boy From Bothell: CSNbooks.com. Toll-free order line: 1-800-636-7276. Cost, $17.95.)

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Craig Smith is a retired sportswriter for the Seattle Times and Kirkland resident.