I don’t know how you feel about getting a new phone. I show my sub-par abilities with smart phones, and I generally dislike change in this area of necessity. But my phone started to glitch and I found out it was obsolete and not getting updates. (Yes – it is THAT old!) I didn’t keep much stored on my old phone, but I did have audio recordings that I re-recorded from an even older phone. It was time to download these to my computer.
I had about 25 recording. They were from the first days after Nolan passed, up to 13 months after his passing. I have not listened to these recordings for years.
I couldn’t listen to all of the recordings at one sitting. That would be too hard. Over these past days I listened to a few at a time. I heard my absolute sadness. My raw emotion. I am glad I did these recordings. My writing does not convey my emotion as well as my voice does in these treasures from my past.
There was a lot I talked about. Some things I don’t want to share. But I will share some thoughts from these recordings….
I felt so loved during the first weeks after Nolan passed
I promised Nolan I would keep going
I made the commitment to keep helping people (not just as a pediatrician)
I expressed my deep guilt
I knew Nolan was with Jesus
I gave thanks for signs from Nolan
I feel comfortable sharing two recordings with you.
A saying we all know and use. When you lose a loved one your world stops, but everyone else keeps moving on. Eventually you have to continue on too. Some people find it hard that their friends and family that experienced the loss can go back to a routine life. What I have learned is that our loved ones that have passed want us to live. To go on.
It took me until year five to really feel I was fully moving forward. I guess because it took me all those years to be able to wake up and not immediately remember Nolan was gone. And I was not crying everyday. Reflecting back, I cried EVERY DAY for the first two years. No wonder I was so tired!
But don’t think I don’t break down anymore.
There are months where I rarely cry. My solid group of less grief feeling months are June to August. The month of September is pretty much crap. Ask anyone who has loss and they can tell you they can feel a change a few weeks before the date of the passing.
Anticipation of the loss day is like a bird that flies by your house the first few days, then rests on a fence in your yard the next days, and then builds a big nest in the tree right next to your house and declares “Here I am. You remember that day? Now I am going to hang out and constantly chirp so you don’t forget me. Think about the bad memories. Sleep? You don’t need to do that. Pay attention to me!”
Yet this September I started with attending a concert with my best friend.
Friday Night Concert Fun!!!
And I continued the next days with bicycle rides, walking with my husband, sitting outside, swimming in my pool and volunteering at a race. The day before Nolan’s Angelversary I paid a visit to the dunes.
All this time outside made me think… September is a beautiful month. The sky is a crisp blue, many days are sunny and warm, and nights are a little cool where you welcome a bonfire. You feel the anticipation of the changing of season.
So how in this great time of the year could Nolan feel so bad that he ended his life? He was starting again in college with close friends by his side. He was so good the months prior. What happened?
I will never know.
Reasons for suicide are complex. Suicide is scary and confusing. And for us that are left with the why- it is really hard.
Thirty years ago on May 1st, 1993, Scott and I got married.
26 year olds- back then, a bit old to tie the knot
I picked May first for a couple of reasons. May Day is the start of spring, of new beginnings.
I had my last 6 weeks of medical school scheduled as off of rotation. I could get married, go on a honeymoon and not have the stress of school responsibilities. Graduation was in June and the start of my pediatric residency in Phoenix on July first. Many new beginnings.
I also picked May Day because I though Scott would forever jokingly remember our anniversary due to the distress phrase.
So here we are thirty years later.
I still love Scott.
We still laugh.
We have spent 22% of our married years as parents who lost a son to suicide. We are according to statistics “not the norm” since it was expected that we blame each other for our son’s act and we were expected to divorce. Well frankly I will show my sassy side and say “F that.” If anyone wants to see a couple that have lived through the pain of a child’s suicide, losing one set of parents in a 13 month time span (my parents), Scott’s father passing from COVID, loss of jobs, parenting a now only young adult son, stress of a full time medical career and teaching junior high kids (who has the harder job??) and still go on together – just look at us.
I have no words of advice. How we continue on as a couple works for us, but just as love is unique so is our relationship and what we find as our glue may not be the same for others.
My parents were married 51 years. I don’t know if Scott and I will be around to celebrate a fortieth or fiftieth anniversary. But if we are both alive, I think we will. We hold each other up, live each day, laugh, and kiss each other goodnight.
I remember my first 365 days without my son Nolan.
I counted by day of the week, then by month, then each holiday without him. It was all very new and different.
Now years later my memories are less crisp and ripe with detail. I have to think hard to remember some things. When did I see him last before he took his life? Was it six days before? or longer?
What was the last thing he text to me? I remember the message but what were the exact words?
I can look back and search for the answer if I want.
I guess it is my mind saying the specific details don’t matter. It is love, the soft caring memories and emotions I carry when I think of him.
Five years later I don’t miss him any less. My love for him is not diminished. I miss him every day,
I wake up and he is in my thoughts. I talk to him in my head. I know he is with me and sees I sometimes struggle with grief. His spirit sees I am still living and serving my purpose.
You were here for a moment but left a lifetime of love
To celebrate my 25 years of service as a general pediatrician I share with you 25 of my thoughts in no particular order. These thoughts are mine and are not supported by my employer.
When I celebrated twenty years of working it was two months before my world fell apart. I am acknowledging my 25 but not celebrating it. These past five years feel like twenty and are not the best ones of my life.
I am sorry to say my profession is slowly eroding in respect. Pediatricians are at the bottom of the pay scale for physician salaries but we take care of the most important patient population. (I am biased I know) I have been called horrible names by angry parents, told I am stupid and selfish and that I work just for the money. (huh?)
God made puppies and babies cute because they poop and pee a lot and many times in places they are not supposed to.
Being a parent is the hardest job in the world. Sometimes you feel rewarded. Sometimes you get your heart broken.
I think I hold the record for the most newborn circumcisions performed in my hospital in a 24 hour period.
Don’t tell me you understand how it is to grieve the loss of a child. Until you bury your son due to suicide don’t tell me your perspective. I don’t tell people how to grieve. I listen. That is what I ask people to do.
Kingdom, Phylum, Class , Order, Family, Genus, Species. If you don’t get it you did not major in Biology.
Practicing medicine would be so much better if I didn’t have to spend hours at my computer charting and justifying medications, studies/labs and therapies to insurance companies.
When you make a mistake in medicine you can cause permanent damage, have a patient suffer or have a fatal outcome. I do not take my job lightly. I ask people to honor my 25 plus years experience when I recommend a treatment or give advice.
In my early twenties I used to attend Friday night lectures at Fermilab, a particle physics laboratory in Batavia, IL. Yes – I loved physics and I am a science geek.
Don’t expect another 25 years of work from me. How many I have left I don’t know. I DO know it is time to retire when nobody wants to see me or listen to my advice.
If I knew back in 1996 what life was going to be like in 2021….
I think all women have been sexually harassed at work sometime in their career. My most memorable event was in med school when I was invited to “help” a senior resident in his call room. Hell. No.
It is not an emergency at 2 am if your child has not pooped in a week and you feel now is the time to get advice.
Goldfish crackers are not a protein food.
The medical profession had been waiting for a pandemic to happen. It was never if – but when. I thought it would be a super strain of influenza. I never thought it would be so politized.
Our brain is the least understood organ of our body and obviously the most important.
I feel I will still need to defend vaccines and discuss how they do not cause autism until my last days of work and up to the end of my life.
The first child I ever saw die was carried into the emergency room crying and fully awake. 30 minutes later meningococcemia took his life. The worst sound is hearing a mother wail when she is told her child is dead.
You don’t need to tell me I am strong. I know I am. I also know people who are much stronger than me.
The parent who rubs you the wrong way, the one who makes you feel frustrated during your visit with their child, is the one who you need to listen to and spend more time with.
The worst recurring thought is when you remember your child is dead. Every morning you awaken and are reminded of this.
Pediatricians have the best patients and even on my saddest day I feel joy when I see them. Ok – maybe not 15 month olds – they hate being at our office no matter what and scream and cry the whole time.
It is my honor to be a doctor. I worked hard and thank God for my talent. I am grateful that I found my purpose.
Every day I wake up and pray my intentions: I pray for others and for our world, I pray to serve God thru my work, I pray to share and be present for those that are suffering like me, and I give thanks that I am one day closer to being Home.
I had no idea I could cry so many tears in 5 years.
I don’t know why we are here on this earth at this time 2000+ A.D. But I do know we all are really strong spirits living during this time on this blue ball in this big universe.
Thank you for allowing me to be your child’s doctor
The Grieving Doctor Mom 