I spent this session just bringing him up to speed and I didn’t realize how much shit I’ve been through.
There were many things brought up but two of them were the most difficult.
The first thing that eats away at my soul is Gavin. Having to watch him continually decline and struggle in pretty much every aspect of his life is killing me. This is a rabbit hole for a different day though.
I’ve never spoken to anyone about the second thing because very few people would ever understand. This has to do with my time as a firefighter/paramedic.
Some of the things I’ve experienced as a paramedic especially, have scarred me in many ways. I don’t want to go into details but while I’ve literally saved countless lives over the thousands of runs I’ve been on, it’s the ones that I couldn’t save that stay with me.
I can remember the faces of every person that I couldn’t save. It’s the children though that truly haunt me.
There are three calls in particular that broke me. Between my back injury, the need for me to be home and simply not being able to take anymore, I quit.
One of these involved an elderly gentleman who had been fighting with his wife because she called 911 and he didn’t want to go to the hospital. The last words he said to her were in anger and before he passed away, he told me to tell his wife how sorry he was and that he loved her. I was never able to do that because we had to leave before she arrived.
Hi Rob, I’m glad that you’re getting some individual help, I think it will really make you feel better in terms of how overwhelming your life can be at times. I have a question that I wanted to ask yesterday (on your post about seeking help) but I was in appointments most of the day and never got around to it. I know your family has been going to Dr. Pattie since Gavin was young, but what exactly does she do for all of you? You often mention Family Therapy, but what does that entail? Also, I am very curious how Dr. Pattie saw Lizze every week but never saw any signs of caregiver burnout in her. That a trained therapist/counselor wouldn’t recognize that something was going on is somewhat alarming to me. Please don’t take this as me throwing rocks at your doctor because that’s not my intent, I am genuinely curious. As for your new doctor, hopefully he can help you come to terms with some of the issues that contribute to your depression. Good luck.
(Unrelated, is Gavin feeling better? I replied to the post about him but didn’t know if you saw it.)
Super quick because I’m not feeling good today. I saw you comment the other day but my server had been hacked and I have been working on lots of backend stuff and haven’t had a chance to get caught up with comments.
Gavin is feeling better as of right now. I’ll try to circle back around when I’m feeling better and touch on the burnout questions.
Thank you again for suggesting I see someone on my own. While I was resistant, it got me thinking.