close

Mary Ellen – How did you deal with stress at first?

Mary Ellen – How did you deal with stress at first?

More Videos by Mary Ellen
Transcript
Badly, I dealt with it badly. I was a physician, I had, I wasn't working full time, but I had a pretty busy part-time practice which in many other realms would be considered almost full-time, with the number of hours we put in. I told them that I... Show More

Badly, I dealt with it badly. I was a physician, I had, I wasn't working full time, but I had a pretty busy part-time practice which in many other realms would be considered almost full-time, with the number of hours we put in. I told them that I was taking a leave, effective immediately, and that was it. And my partners were great, but I made no effort to transition, to make that transition; made no effort to contact my patients, I couldn't deal with that. I said, all I can do at this moment is to concentrate my energies on my daughter, and that's about all I could do. And that was followed by a prolonged grieving process. Lots of crying, lots of times where it was very difficult to get up in the morning, and we got up because we had to get up, Mollie needed someone to help her with everything she needed in the hospital. I was the go-to person because I was a physician with all the other docs. So I was trying to manage all those things in the midst of all this tremendous grieving. And when she got back home, there were times when I would get her up and help her get to school, which was a several hour project at the beginning, and then I'd go back to bed, and I'd stay in bed for the rest of the day. That was literally all I could handle. And then, very gradually, you start to come out of it. There are days when you can actually think about something else for a couple of minutes. I had friends that pulled me into a book club where I think the first three meetings I just sat there trying not to cry; I don't think I participated in anyway. And then you start to talk to other people who have family members with spinal cord injuries, and you realize life goes on, and she has a life, and it's up to us to help her make the most of that life. So it was a very gradual process.

Show Less
add

Mary Ellen – How did you deal with stress at first?

Mary Ellen

Daughter injured in 2005 at age 15, quadriplegic
More Videos by Mary
Transcriptadd

Badly, I dealt with it badly. I was a physician, I had, I wasn't working full time, but I had a pretty busy part-time practice which in many other realms would be considered almost full-time, with the number of hours we put in. I told them that I was taking a leave, effective immediately, and that was it. And my partners were great, but I made no effort to transition, to make that transition; made no effort to contact my patients, I couldn't deal with that. I said, all I can do at this moment is to concentrate my energies on my daughter, and that's about all I could do. And that was followed by a prolonged grieving process. Lots of crying, lots of times where it was very difficult to get up in the morning, and we got up because we had to get up, Mollie needed someone to help her with everything she needed in the hospital. I was the go-to person because I was a physician with all the other docs. So I was trying to manage all those things in the midst of all this tremendous grieving. And when she got back home, there were times when I would get her up and help her get to school, which was a several hour project at the beginning, and then I'd go back to bed, and I'd stay in bed for the rest of the day. That was literally all I could handle. And then, very gradually, you start to come out of it. There are days when you can actually think about something else for a couple of minutes. I had friends that pulled me into a book club where I think the first three meetings I just sat there trying not to cry; I don't think I participated in anyway. And then you start to talk to other people who have family members with spinal cord injuries, and you realize life goes on, and she has a life, and it's up to us to help her make the most of that life. So it was a very gradual process.

Mary Ellen – How did you deal with stress at first?
close