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“I made a friend,” I go into the story of how I met Melanie, another person at a low point in life like me, and how she overcame it and talked me into taking a baby step by coming to her wedding, but how that was all it was going to be.
“But then I met someone,” I continue with the next part of my story, telling them about the woman who has not only done hard and scary things, but has done them numerous times in her life, no matter how badly she didn’t want to. For her, there isn’t even a question, she just faces these things; and I want to do it too. I want to do it with her.
“She makes you want to live again?” my mother asks, with a soft, understanding smile.
“More than that… she makes me want to love again.”
And I do.
After the reunion that was predictably uncomfortable but not as horrendous as expected, I take some time to wander around the home I grew up in, nervously trying to let the memories of my old life come to me and do their worst.
I feel a strong pull to one room in particular; my father’s office. The large picture window behind his desk lets in an abundance of light, showcasing the white shelves lined with endless medical textbooks and journals. On his mahogany desk lays a mess of papers and printed articles, and of course, his burgundy stethoscope. Even though there’s not a patient in sight in his home office, he always has kept one in here. He always said it centered him, like a security blanket of sorts; reminded him of his purpose while he was toiling away over his research.
I stare down at it a moment, before drawing in a deep breath and picking it up. I hold it in my hands as memories flood back to me in the same flashes the accident usually does. I let them come at me, one by one, in sequence, from the first time I held one, all through college and med school, residency, and my first day as an attending. I can hear the beats of hearts that are healthy, as well as those that are fading. I hear loud breaths of lungs that are clear and equal, and remember the excitement I felt the first time I detected asthma in a seven-year-old when I heard the whistling wheeze through the ear buds.
The memories hurt, excite, thrill and scare me all at once. But they don’t crush and kill me. I’m still standing here.
“Never thought I’d see you give it up,” the low tenor of my father’s voice jolts me out of my reverie, and I look up to see him leaning in the doorway with a somber smile on his face. “I remember you used to light up when your mother would bring you to see me at the hospital when you were just a little guy. It was better than any candy store or Disney attraction for you; the way you’d rush around wide-eyed, looking at every piece of equipment and asking how it worked. I would explain what was going on in every X-ray on my light board, and you’d hang on my every word.”
I gently nod at the memories he’s summoning. I feel a pang and it makes my heart ache.
“Are you happy driving that boat?” he asks, and there’s sincerity and an air of genuine concern in his voice. No mocking, no criticism. He wants to know I’m okay.
“It doesn’t make me torturously sad,” I shrug as I lay the stethoscope back down. “I don’t know, it just… keeps me calm I guess. And after the chaos and upheaval of the accident, that was what I craved,” I voice as I start to zone out to my time in Bali, trying to remember if being out on the water was truly my bliss. I once thrived on the energy of the ER; the pace, the pressure to save someone clinging to life, the rush I’d feel when I did save it, and the respite of sprained ankles and superficial lacerations I’d get in between.
“Practicing medicine made you happy once,” my father’s voice cuts in again, echoing my very thoughts.
“Yeah…” I nod, still looking down at the stethoscope. “It did. After what happened though, I just couldn’t ever see myself doing it again; not without being assaulted by memories.”
“What about now?” he asks calmly as he walks further into the room, coming to stand beside me. Clearly, Mom gave him an impromptu, condensed therapy session downstairs.
“I don’t know,” I breathe out heavily. “I think maybe if I can find a way to reconcile the chaos with the calm…” I trail off, beginning to see that missing piece finally start to take form in front of me.
“You’ll be able to function like a person again?” My dad finishes the thought for me, and when I nod up at him, he adds, “Sounds like a life to me.”
Kasey
My bones are going to shatter from the ass-freezing cold and the non-stop violent shaking.
“Mom?” Luna asks, with half of her face lifted up in a confused look that would look comical if I weren’t freezing my ass off and incapable of any emotional reaction or facial expressions (other than the one of agony I’m currently sporting). “Just… why?”
She wants to know why I’m voluntarily subjecting myself to full immersion in frigid waters in a metal soaking tub I purchased and placed on the back lawn beside the deck. No way in hell would I actually put it on the deck that I have fashioned into my own little happy place, because, let’s face it, a happy place, this tub is not.
But hey, it’s my third time, and I’m getting better with it. Case in point, I didn’t need a coach to get in this time. I did itallllby myself.Yay.
“It’s s-s-sup-p-posed to help,” I answer between teeth chatters.
“Withwhat?” she asks incredulously, waving her homemade slushy around before putting the straw back in her mouth.
“It’s a g-grown-up mental health thing,” I respond, irritated. I tried to explain it the best I could in nine-year-old terms earlier. It’s fine. What matters is that it’s helping, oddly enough. Yes, putting myself through a few minutes of hell frozen over has made me have more control over my emotions for the rest of the day… for some reason.
“When’s Ben coming back?” She switches gears, her face taking on a slightly somber expression.
I draw in a long breath over several seconds despite the fact that it’s shallow and shuddery, and let my answer out in one long whoosh.
“I don’t know baby, but the important thing is that heis!”
Ugggghhh… good God.
