The "Cry"
There is nothing worse than the "cry" the family has when they realize they have lost a loved one. I have personally experienced it with the loss of my dad when I was 20.
Yesterday we in the ED witnessed it with the case of a very young boy who was run over by a vehicle. We usually don't get these type of cases, based upon our level of trauma center, but here we were..trauma code. We worked it feverishly for around 45 minutes without success. My first personal experience with something this bad. Grandma comes to the family room, and then the wail. I stepped out into the breeze of the day. Thank God for the wind; it seems to clear my mind as I walk for a bit. Of course everyone was in tears. We were all walking zombies for the next hour before shift change. The longest hour of my life I think...well, one of them. The waiting room is still packed. I go to help check people in. We focus upon the other tasks....other people are sick and needing to see the doctors. My relief arrives. I punch out and walk back out into the breeze. I call my husband on the 30 minute ride home. I call my mother. I need to just hear sounds of someone talking, something else to fill my head. My mother succeeds with something about her purchasing a new car this week, and I thank her. When I get home, my husband asks if there was CISD offered, or did I ask. I didn't ask, it all seemed to happen so quickly yet so slowly. He spends some time with me doing his best to do some of it on his own. I feel it helps. I hug my cats, watch my friend who won the PBA Tournament of Champions today on ESPN, watch West Wing, and fall asleep.
It is the next morning. The morning after. I can't sleep, so I get up early and perform the tasks which require no thought. The local news has bits about the accident, and the images and sounds come back, but now I am not crying. Not yet anyway. I prepare paperwork for lectures at school today, and realize there was some type of homework. You know, it doesn't really matter right now. I can miss the homework and not feel stressed at all. I know what this is, but I am just going with it.
I told my husband last night that I can't go back now. Not to 3 years ago. My mind can never find that place again with bowling, because everything seems so different now. I might be able to throw that strike to win without any stress anymore, but nothing can change the fact that a sport just doesn't have the significance to me anymore that it did back then. Not after seeing what I have seen. It's unbelievable that in just a short three years a person can be in such a different place mentally.
I am OK.
Yesterday we in the ED witnessed it with the case of a very young boy who was run over by a vehicle. We usually don't get these type of cases, based upon our level of trauma center, but here we were..trauma code. We worked it feverishly for around 45 minutes without success. My first personal experience with something this bad. Grandma comes to the family room, and then the wail. I stepped out into the breeze of the day. Thank God for the wind; it seems to clear my mind as I walk for a bit. Of course everyone was in tears. We were all walking zombies for the next hour before shift change. The longest hour of my life I think...well, one of them. The waiting room is still packed. I go to help check people in. We focus upon the other tasks....other people are sick and needing to see the doctors. My relief arrives. I punch out and walk back out into the breeze. I call my husband on the 30 minute ride home. I call my mother. I need to just hear sounds of someone talking, something else to fill my head. My mother succeeds with something about her purchasing a new car this week, and I thank her. When I get home, my husband asks if there was CISD offered, or did I ask. I didn't ask, it all seemed to happen so quickly yet so slowly. He spends some time with me doing his best to do some of it on his own. I feel it helps. I hug my cats, watch my friend who won the PBA Tournament of Champions today on ESPN, watch West Wing, and fall asleep.
It is the next morning. The morning after. I can't sleep, so I get up early and perform the tasks which require no thought. The local news has bits about the accident, and the images and sounds come back, but now I am not crying. Not yet anyway. I prepare paperwork for lectures at school today, and realize there was some type of homework. You know, it doesn't really matter right now. I can miss the homework and not feel stressed at all. I know what this is, but I am just going with it.
I told my husband last night that I can't go back now. Not to 3 years ago. My mind can never find that place again with bowling, because everything seems so different now. I might be able to throw that strike to win without any stress anymore, but nothing can change the fact that a sport just doesn't have the significance to me anymore that it did back then. Not after seeing what I have seen. It's unbelievable that in just a short three years a person can be in such a different place mentally.
I am OK.
posted by kimberly at 6:58 AM
2 Comments:
THis is a really powerful story. I think my similar experience is written about here:http://www.docshazam.com/2005/01/flight-025.html
But you'll find that at somepoint in the near future, bowling will become dear to you again. Even though it doesn't seem like it now, that peaceful serenity that you get from bowling a perfect game without any interference from your mind is something that can get you through your most difficult shift.
I am not a bowler, but I have had the same evolution of thinking regarding my own passions of rock & ice climbing as well as mountain biking.
Hang in there.
Thanks Doc. Your words are very helpful. Ride on. K
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