Day 183

Dear Reader, 

Throughout this post I speak in the first person using “I” and “me”. I do this not to exclude Dawn, my loving wife of 29 years, but because I want to speak for me, not her. Dawn has her own amazing voice; I don’t want to assume that she shares my same perceptions, recollections and feelings related to the event described below... 

 

At 8:03AM on Saturday, December 11, 2021, six months ago today, my world unexpectedly shattered. It was at this moment that I walked into my shop in the basement of our house and discovered the lifeless body of our 15 year old son Damian. I knew in an instant that he was gone, beyond saving. My grief and terror were sudden and emotionally violent. Over the ensuing days, weeks and months, I have worked hard to build a new life, one that resembles my life from the Before but feels very different. In my new life, here in the After, there is a huge piece of my old life that is missing – it is a hole that cannot be plugged. An overwhelming part of my journey these last six months has been learning how to cope with what happened while also training myself to look forward and embrace the life that I still have, a life without Damian, my amazing, precocious, mischievous, old souled, ginger-haired son.  

 

Although I am only six months into this journey, I have been told that I am much farther along, emotionally speaking, than most who have experience a similar tragedy. Based on a recent experience of being around other parents who have also lost a child, I not only accept this as true but am eternally grateful for the help that I received in making this possible. While I have had exceptional support from my wife, family, close friends and colleagues, I give much of the credit, for helping me get past the trauma of losing Damian and learning to live my life anew, to our grief counselor and therapist, Dr. Andrea Cook, PhD. 

 

Andrea has been with Dawn and I since the day after Damian died. The first time I spoke to her, late that first Sunday afternoon over the phone, Andrea was profoundly compassionate but also very specific in her directions: “I need you eat three times a day, drink water and try to get some sleep.” I still regularly remind myself to do all three even now six months later. Andrea has been an amazing ally, advocate, sounding board, and counselor. I am humbled and honored to now also call her my friend. She has availed herself to both Dawn and I after hours on numerous occasions when one of us was having a particularly rough day. To further reinforce this point, Andrea even reached out early this morning knowing the significance today carries for us. Andrea has always been exceptionally compassionate and empathetic of the trauma that we endured while also encouraging us to look forward, to find a healthy balance between the Before and the After.  The most impactful thing that Andrea did for me in this last regard was to encourage us both to write. To journal every day. 

 

Taking to heart what Andrea said about the power of writing, of expressing our thoughts and feelings on “paper”,  I have written every day since, beginning the fourth day after Damian died. I am not well-connected with my feelings. This is especially true of the softer emotions like sadness. Through the act of writing, I have been able to better connect with my emotions and, at times, have even been able to figure out the reason I feel the way I do. Just as important, or maybe even more so, writing has helped me to frame Damian’s death in the context of my own life both in terms of before he died (the Before) and the days after (the After), and to find new purpose to my life now that he is gone.  Everyone should have an Andrea in their corner in times of crisis. And this brings me to the reason for today's post. 

 

There is a mental health crisis happening in our country. Mental health facilities and clinics are today overrun with patients. Counselors, therapists, psychiatrists are just as overworked as doctors and nurses in the ERs and ICUs were with each new COVID surge, but they don’t get the same recognition for their efforts. I’d like to change that and work to help change the perception of the importance of access to quality to mental health services. 

 

To my first point, I say to Andrea and all the other men and women who tirelessly provide counseling and psychiatric care THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE. I do not envy the job that you do, having to listen to a never-ending stream of suffering caused by unspeakable tragedies and traumas, but you have my utmost admiration for making it your life’s work to help others, especially when they are at their lowest. While it may not be as glamorous as the trauma surgeon who can repair the physically broken, what you do is, in my opinion, just as important. Being physically fit but mentally broken is no better than the reverse. To truly live our lives to the fullest, we need to be sound of both body AND mind. So again, thank you. 

 

As far as access to mental health services is concerned, I’m not an expert but the few stories that I’ve seen recently on TV or read about online all say the same thing: mental health systems are overloaded making it exceedingly difficult to find help, especially in times of crisis. I don’t know how to fix this problem but we need to talk about it and work together to find viable solutions. Consider for a moment what the parents of the school children gunned down in Uvalde, Texas are going through today. Now imagine being in their place and without immediate access to anyone who can help guide you on the path called grief. That’s like being dropped alone into the middle of a  huge forest with no map, compass or training. It’s for this reason that many do not survive the aftermath of emotional trauma. They become a shell of their former self stuck in the purgatory of the overwhelming loss they constantly feel, unable to look forward. This is not living; it’s whiling away the time waiting to die. 

 

Dawn and I were fortunate in that we had the benefit of good insurance, solid financial footing and found Andrea with our first call when looking for a grief counselor. Not everyone is as fortunate. Given the capricious nature of tragedy – it can strike anywhere at any time – we should develop systems that are better equipped to handle these emergencies when they arise, similar to hospital ERs and trauma centers for the physically injured. It will take time and perseverance to affect meaningful change but it is, in my opinion, worth fighting for. 

 

The final thought that I want to share is this: there is NO shame in talking to a counselor or therapist. I knew instinctively the day Damian died that I would need help to survive this ordeal. I feel no shame in saying this because I know, unequivocally, that I would not be where I am today without the help that I received and continue to receive. Help for which I will be eternally grateful. 

 

Chris Beisner