I'm going to be honest and say I'm not exactly sure how I ended up here. A couple hours ago I was checking my email before bed. I scrolled through the latest weekly roundup from Tim Ferris and started reading, "How to Show Up for Someone in a Crisis." I was impressed - I've been through my fair share and I'm also an ICU nurse which means I see people going through crises on a regular basis. Then I clicked a link to a book and started reading...until I had read all I could for free and it cut me off. I never have time to read. I'm not even sure the last time I used my eyes to read a book - I always listen to them. But this is different... and the timing of all of this is too surreal. If your book is a nonfiction book then your dad was/is a cardiothoracic surgeon. Two weeks ago one of our cardiothoracic surgeons passed away completely unexpectedly. I've known him for 20 years, since I was 19 years old. I felt I needed to honor him in some way and also process my own emotions, so I wrote a little eulogy and posted it to my Facebook. A few people have reached out since and said I should write more often. I hate writing. I used to anyways. Now maybe it does feel different.... Freeing....? Is freeing even a word? Anyways I'm still amazed at all of this. At some point after the book cut off I clicked on something that led me to somewhere that mentioned a writing club for medical professionals that looks like it started during the start of the pandemic. Am I in the Twilight Zone? I feel like this is one of those butterfly effect moments. It's almost 2AM. I shouldn't have been looking at my phone before bed, but I was. It led me to my closet, where I am still currently, reading your book and clicking around in this substack place that I've heard about on podcasts but never explored. I read a couple of your writing prompts and started crying, which has to mean something. Maybe it means I'm tired. I haven't heard anyone talk about avocado trees in a long time but my mom used to tell me about her avocado and lemon trees in California growing up...
I've subscribed to Dark Horse because it seems fabulous and I'm looking into the writing class but I work most Saturdays so I'm not sure it'll work out. I've ordered your book because even though I've only read four chapters it's one of the most refreshing things I've read in a long time. I can tell it will be dark at times and heavy but at the same time it's honest, rich and beautiful.
I have *zero* doubt this book will be a bestseller. Have you heard of the podcast The Doctor's Art? I think you'd be a fabulous guest and it would be a great way to promote your book. I'm just a listener but I imagine if you reach out they'd be thrilled to have you on the show ☺️
Ashley I love this so much. You made my day and then some. ICU nurses are my heroes. And your note is chock full of gems. I hope you like the rest of the book as much as the first few chapters and I also hope you are able to write in response to some of the prompts here someday. I can only imagine how beautiful the eulogy you wrote is for your colleague and friend.
My sister committed suicide when she was 21. I’m always scared when someone is suicidal, and traumatized all over again when one of my patients or someone I care about dies that way. My ex-husband tried killing himself with alcohol and loaded guns and deep, dark depression when I left him 10 years ago, after 32 years of marriage.
A year ago my ex had a major stroke. He was an amazing musician who survived life and its traumas by immersing himself always in music and song. He is paralyzed in his right arm and can’t write or play guitar, mandolin, saxophone, bass, or concertina. Now he is limited to the one-handed harmonica. He loved telling stories, being with people, traveling, talking. His expressive aphasia gives him the ability to understand what people are saying and writing, but the inability to talk or write in response. His garbled responses are frustrating to the extreme.
In the past, we talked about life worth living or not. He would have looked at someone like he is now, and said, “If that happens to me, send me out in the tundra on a cold winter’s night. Hypothermia is not a bad way to go.” But a year later, he has survived, and keeps trying to talk, and walk, and play harmonica. He’s not happy, but he wasn’t happy before. Its actually really hard to die, or to choose to die. What value is any life when the alternative is death?
I’ve had conversations with my daughter and friends about how he could kill himself if he didn’t want to live like this anymore. I took away all his guns because I can’t bear the thought of him shooting himself. He could stop taking his medicines. He’s already started drinking and smoking again. He could stop eating. He could go on hospice in Oregon and get the death with dignity drugs. I’ve thought about these things, but I realize I am very scared of him actively making himself die. It is much easier to passively wait for “come what may”. Even if life is hard, and unhappy, and most things you care about are gone, if you don’t believe in an afterlife, when you die you are gone too.
I’m scared to talk with him about these things. And I’m more scared that he will do any of them. And if he does, here is my survival guide:
1. I don’t have to and I don’t want to participate. I don’t believe in suicide as a way out of this world for myself, and it doesn’t feel right to actively help anyone else do it either. But I do believe in people having self will and the right to make their own choices for life and death.
2. Remind me, my kids, and everyone else that what he has done was his choice.
3. Take a break from work. Take as much time as I really need, to be OK, and ready to help other people again.
4. Take care of myself in all the ways I know are good for me – walking and exercise, mountains and beaches, gardening and reading, writing and talking, and being close to my friends and family.
5. Be there for our kids, and support them emotionally and practically – whatever that may mean for however long it may take.
6. Play music and dance, and share that with his friends who have lost him.
7. Remind myself that he didn’t want to live this way.
I'm going to be honest and say I'm not exactly sure how I ended up here. A couple hours ago I was checking my email before bed. I scrolled through the latest weekly roundup from Tim Ferris and started reading, "How to Show Up for Someone in a Crisis." I was impressed - I've been through my fair share and I'm also an ICU nurse which means I see people going through crises on a regular basis. Then I clicked a link to a book and started reading...until I had read all I could for free and it cut me off. I never have time to read. I'm not even sure the last time I used my eyes to read a book - I always listen to them. But this is different... and the timing of all of this is too surreal. If your book is a nonfiction book then your dad was/is a cardiothoracic surgeon. Two weeks ago one of our cardiothoracic surgeons passed away completely unexpectedly. I've known him for 20 years, since I was 19 years old. I felt I needed to honor him in some way and also process my own emotions, so I wrote a little eulogy and posted it to my Facebook. A few people have reached out since and said I should write more often. I hate writing. I used to anyways. Now maybe it does feel different.... Freeing....? Is freeing even a word? Anyways I'm still amazed at all of this. At some point after the book cut off I clicked on something that led me to somewhere that mentioned a writing club for medical professionals that looks like it started during the start of the pandemic. Am I in the Twilight Zone? I feel like this is one of those butterfly effect moments. It's almost 2AM. I shouldn't have been looking at my phone before bed, but I was. It led me to my closet, where I am still currently, reading your book and clicking around in this substack place that I've heard about on podcasts but never explored. I read a couple of your writing prompts and started crying, which has to mean something. Maybe it means I'm tired. I haven't heard anyone talk about avocado trees in a long time but my mom used to tell me about her avocado and lemon trees in California growing up...
I've subscribed to Dark Horse because it seems fabulous and I'm looking into the writing class but I work most Saturdays so I'm not sure it'll work out. I've ordered your book because even though I've only read four chapters it's one of the most refreshing things I've read in a long time. I can tell it will be dark at times and heavy but at the same time it's honest, rich and beautiful.
I have *zero* doubt this book will be a bestseller. Have you heard of the podcast The Doctor's Art? I think you'd be a fabulous guest and it would be a great way to promote your book. I'm just a listener but I imagine if you reach out they'd be thrilled to have you on the show ☺️
Ashley I love this so much. You made my day and then some. ICU nurses are my heroes. And your note is chock full of gems. I hope you like the rest of the book as much as the first few chapters and I also hope you are able to write in response to some of the prompts here someday. I can only imagine how beautiful the eulogy you wrote is for your colleague and friend.
And yes, my book is nonfiction ❤️❤️
A conversation about life and suicide:
My sister committed suicide when she was 21. I’m always scared when someone is suicidal, and traumatized all over again when one of my patients or someone I care about dies that way. My ex-husband tried killing himself with alcohol and loaded guns and deep, dark depression when I left him 10 years ago, after 32 years of marriage.
A year ago my ex had a major stroke. He was an amazing musician who survived life and its traumas by immersing himself always in music and song. He is paralyzed in his right arm and can’t write or play guitar, mandolin, saxophone, bass, or concertina. Now he is limited to the one-handed harmonica. He loved telling stories, being with people, traveling, talking. His expressive aphasia gives him the ability to understand what people are saying and writing, but the inability to talk or write in response. His garbled responses are frustrating to the extreme.
In the past, we talked about life worth living or not. He would have looked at someone like he is now, and said, “If that happens to me, send me out in the tundra on a cold winter’s night. Hypothermia is not a bad way to go.” But a year later, he has survived, and keeps trying to talk, and walk, and play harmonica. He’s not happy, but he wasn’t happy before. Its actually really hard to die, or to choose to die. What value is any life when the alternative is death?
I’ve had conversations with my daughter and friends about how he could kill himself if he didn’t want to live like this anymore. I took away all his guns because I can’t bear the thought of him shooting himself. He could stop taking his medicines. He’s already started drinking and smoking again. He could stop eating. He could go on hospice in Oregon and get the death with dignity drugs. I’ve thought about these things, but I realize I am very scared of him actively making himself die. It is much easier to passively wait for “come what may”. Even if life is hard, and unhappy, and most things you care about are gone, if you don’t believe in an afterlife, when you die you are gone too.
I’m scared to talk with him about these things. And I’m more scared that he will do any of them. And if he does, here is my survival guide:
1. I don’t have to and I don’t want to participate. I don’t believe in suicide as a way out of this world for myself, and it doesn’t feel right to actively help anyone else do it either. But I do believe in people having self will and the right to make their own choices for life and death.
2. Remind me, my kids, and everyone else that what he has done was his choice.
3. Take a break from work. Take as much time as I really need, to be OK, and ready to help other people again.
4. Take care of myself in all the ways I know are good for me – walking and exercise, mountains and beaches, gardening and reading, writing and talking, and being close to my friends and family.
5. Be there for our kids, and support them emotionally and practically – whatever that may mean for however long it may take.
6. Play music and dance, and share that with his friends who have lost him.
7. Remind myself that he didn’t want to live this way.