Category: friends

State of Confusion

I have waited my entire life for one thing. And last night it finally happened! Leading up to last evening, I knew that there would be ugly crying. I am beyond grateful that they were tears of joy. Now you might be asking yourself, what could possibly be so important that I would hope and pray for one thing for several decades, without it coming to fruition? What one goal could be so meaningful as to inspire me to continue to remain optimistic year after year after year?

The Super Bowl of course! And last night, after decades of waiting, the Kansas City Chiefs won the Super Bowl! Just typing those words nearly invokes more ugly crying, but I will keep it in check long enough to address a very important issue…the existence of the apparently little known state of Missouri. Thanks to a rather infamous tweet immediately following last night’s game, I feel compelled to share a little excerpt from my manuscript that highlights the geographical conundrum that haunts me even now, twenty years after my departure from Kansas City.

I was born in Kansas City, Missouri, in a year that I do not wish to disclose as it forces me to remember my current age and somewhat recent(ish) milestone birthday. Now let us quickly dispense with the important burning questions. It is pronounced Missouri (miz-ur-ee) with an emphasis on the “ur” and with an “i” (long e sound). It is not “miz-er-uh.” You will note the lack of an “a” in its spelling. It is also not “misery” as the tired joke would suggest. But most importantly, Missouri and Kansas are not the same state. Yes there is also a Kansas City, Kansas. In fact, it shares a border with Kansas City, Missouri. But Missouri is still a separate state.  Why, you ask, would I state something so seemingly obvious? Well that is because ninety-eight percent of the time, the immediate response to the sentence “I am originally from Kansas City, Missouri” is one of the following questions or declarative statements:

  1. “Oh…what is it like growing up in Kansas?” I wouldn’t know. I just said I am from Missouri.
  2. “Wow. Kansas. So it’s really flat there, right?” Yeah, I have also heard that little rumor about Kansas. But I cannot speak from experience, as I grew up in Missouri.
  3. “Kansas? Well, I guess you’re not in Kansas anymore!” That is right. Because I wasn’t there to begin with…hence why I said I am from Kansas City, Missouri.

Now I could see how people might make assumptions had I merely stated “I am originally from Kansas City.” That would have left things open to interpretation and might invite the aforementioned questioning/commentary. However, knowing this reflexive dismissal of an entire midwestern state is so pervasive, I am always careful to include the “Missouri” after “Kansas City.” Even then, the questions are surprisingly the same. The even more surprising part is the varying degrees of incredulousness when confronted with the fact that there exists a Kansas City, within the state of Missouri. Some people seem convinced that I have fabricated its existence. When you find yourself defending your city’s existence to a flat-earther/alien conspiracy-theorist, you know that your city has an image problem. Then there are those that think perhaps I am really just from St. Louis, MO. Nope… that is yet another city within the state of Missouri, and it is on the other side of the state, no less. 

Of course for people who grew up in either KCMO or KCK as the vernacular goes, there are stereotypes about people who live in each of those cities and a very subtle rivalry on behalf of a few. Though I suspect that any real rivalry is likely born from the frustration that comes with having to explain, ad nauseum, the difference between Missouri and Kansas. Alright, I suppose that should suffice for the geography portion of our discussion. However, geographical rivalries aside, it is important to point out that given the proximity of Kansas, and the fact that it does not have a separate NFL team, a great many people in Kansas are Chiefs fans.

And as long as we are challenging assumptions here, I should add that I did not grow up on a farm, nor did I have cows. We did have dogs…many dogs…including two white and black ones. But no cows. And no, I have never milked a cow or any other farm animal, despite what you might ascertain given my deep love of all things dairy. I have been to farms (mostly my grandfather’s chicken farm in Arkansas as a child), so maybe that gives me a tiny bit of street cred….or pasture cred, as it were. But I just needed to dispel the myth that all of us from the Midwest grew up on farms, know how to birth a calf, and/or actually know the difference between hay and straw. Yes, there is a difference. No, I do not know what it is.

But what I do know is that Kansas City, is a city full of people so passionate about their Chiefs that even if they, say, move to California for many years, they still dress themselves, three kids, and one dog in Chiefs gear on Sundays…they still pace back and forth during important games, keeping hope alive year after year…and they still ugly cry when their beloved Chiefs win the Super Bowl! Congratulations to the Kansas City Chiefs, Super Bowl winners at long last!

Welcome To The Group…

I would like to think it was fitting that I spent the last night of my dear friend’s (all-too-short) life raising money and awareness at a JDRF fundraiser, for it was diabetes that first bonded us. Unfortunately, we were bonded by another illness, cancer. And it was that illness which caused her to breathe her last breath a handful of hours after I returned from said fundraiser. It was shortly after I emerged groggily from my bed, having perhaps overestimated my ability to stay up so late (and having slightly underestimated the appropriate food to cocktail ratio the night prior), that I learned of her passing. She had been on hospice a few short weeks, and I admit that each day I wondered if this would be the day that the world would lose an amazing woman, mother, physician, and friend.

I admit that my friend and I had what you might call an unusual friendship. It was non-traditional in the sense that our entire friendship occurred through the mediums of text, phone calls, social media, and messenger. Yes, that means we have never met in person. We live in entirely different states, 1300 miles away from one another. Yet, we led eerily similar lives, which united us in ways that likely no two people would ever hope to be aligned.

I first “met” her the day after my youngest child was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. He had just been admitted to the hospital, and I posted in a private physicians group about what it was like to watch my then 20-month-old son get his first insulin injection. She reached out to me, and the next thing I knew we were chatting away on the phone as she helped me navigate my first few days and weeks as a MOD (mother of a diabetic). Her own son had been diagnosed many months prior, and she already had some experience under her belt with navigating medical devices, carb counting, and the other details of the day-to-day care of a diabetic toddler. She understood what it felt like to be a mother, and a pediatrician, dealing with this disease, and her advice and support were invaluable to me. As I traversed the path from a pediatrician ordering all the shots, to a mom giving the shots, she was the one that shepherded me along the way.

Quite ironically, we had both been pediatric hospitalists (pediatricians who care for patients admitted to the hospital). I had transitioned to outpatient (working solely in the clinic) about 3 years prior to my son’s diagnosis. Shortly after we became friends, she considered and ultimately made a similar transition to outpatient medicine. Sadly, her tenure in the outpatient world would be way too short.

We both had three children, including an older daughter (hers a few years younger than my own) and two younger boys (hers are twins, mine are 5 years apart). Our type 1 diabetic boys even looked a bit like one another, and we kept saying how we needed to get the boys together. My heart aches when I consider that this particular play date never occurred.

As a person who values physical presence and touch, it might seem odd to feel so close to someone whom I have never hugged, other than in a virtual fashion. But sometimes empathy forges powerful connections that transcend physical distance. Something within me recognized and connected with something…many things… within her. And because of that recognition, my life was touched by having her in it. Likewise, because of that same connection, I now feel the void left behind by her absence.

Having been first diagnosed with cancer at an early age, I have had many occasions in which to experience survivor guilt. Most would say it is a good problem to have. And it is. I am grateful to be a survivor. But survivor guilt is a very real thing and in no way diminishes the gratitude of the survivor. And today that survivor guilt weighs more heavily than in the past. It is not merely because she and I both had a similar type of cancer (hers clearly worse than my own), though I have contemplated that particular unfairness on more days than I can count since she was diagnosed. It has less to do with our uncanny similarities, and much more to do with the fact that I know how incredibly heartbreaking it had to be to leave behind three young children, including one with a medical illness of his own. It is the pain of knowing that your babies need you, and that you will not be able to be there.  While I am sure she took some solace in knowing that her children will be loved, nurtured, and cared for, that knowledge cannot erase the reality she faced in these past few weeks. While I am grateful that her suffering has ended, I wish God and the universe had granted her more time with her children (and, selfishly, with the rest of us as well).

However, despite all that cancer has robbed us of with her passing, she managed to touch so many people in such a short time. And those memories will hopefully ease the ache that we now feel without her presence, physical or virtual. One of my first memories of her was during our first conversation, as I stood in my son’s hospital room with tears in my eyes. At the time she jokingly welcomed me to the “group that no one wanted to be a part of.” It broke my heart a year later when I welcomed her to the other “group that no one wanted to be a part of” after she was diagnosed with cancer.  My sincere hope is that her children will know there was one more “group” to which she belonged as well. A “group” that defined her more than her identity as a pediatrician, mother of a diabetic, or even a woman with cancer. It is the “group” of women who support, empower, and touch the lives of others.

Rest in peace, my beautiful friend. Your time here may be done, but your work continues.