My most recent hobble is the fact that at least for now, Ryder Trauma Center will not be able to host my South Florida trauma survivor meetings. This news has come from one single person and I’m sure it won’t be the final word, whether that changes next week, or well after I fully convince Ryder to embrace the Trauma Survivors Network; whether THAT is a couple months from now or a couple years. I will not be defeated, I will not rest.

I write about my one true and amazing encounter with the Living God in my story, specifically in the article I wrote about my experience of being pinned in the wreckage of my first accident (and only trauma experience), that one of the things that truly gave me the strength to survive was a presence. Upon further reflection, I know now almost for certain that presence was the Lord Jesus Christ, because it certainly was manifested to me as a physical presence, and in the trinity as it’s spelled out in the pages of the new testament, Jesus is the only part of the trinity that has a physical body. That it was physical was certain.

As I write in the article, I knew it was of God and that it was the presence of Deity because beyond sensing the physical presence; and it was indeed physical, positioned in the driver side back seat, there emanated from this presence a flow of love the likes of which I had never come close to sensing before or after. The only way to explain it is that it was a pure love, completely unfettered by any human filter. It was God’s Love.

This got me thinking about where I am at right now, what my goals are for seeing drastic change in this monster known as surviving trauma injury, and my role. It’s clear now that my role is not my own, but one assigned. God knew before the foundation of the world that on November 20th 1982, a guy by the name of Grant Deckert would fall asleep at the wheel as he headed down the hill towards the Montgomery County line on Maryland Rt 27 at 12:15 am. He knew that my friend Gerry and I, having just left a mutual friend; driving home, would begin to climb that same hill at that same exact time. He knew that despite Gerry’s valiant efforts, the cars would collide in an offset head-on crash, pinning me horribly in the vehicle.

I believe in fate. I believe that things happen for a reason.

I am going through a season of intently studying the Bible, and a verse recently fell off the page and smacked me in the face. It was the words of Jesus, stated in Matthew 25:

³⁵For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, ³⁶I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

³⁷"Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? ³⁸When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? ³⁹When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

⁴⁰"The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’ [NIV]

If I ever did get a hankerin’ to don a tattoo, it would be these words.

God knows my heart, he knew me even before the universe stood.

Sometimes things happen for amazing reasons. That tragedy on Nov. 20th 1982 set me on a path, a very long path. I now know for certain what that path is.

Really what I have set before me is the possibility and in fact the duty to turn that tragedy into an enormous triumph. A triumph not for me, but for God.

One of the really odd things about that hour and a half I was pinned in the car was, not a single rescue worker consoled me or spoke to me or encouraged me or held my hand. It was almost as if they couldn’t bolt the chains to the bumper and get the two Hurst spreaders in place to pull the front end off of me quick enough, probably less to save me and more to dispense with me.

But God was with me.

He is with me now.

He has demonstrated to me in spades as I was pinned in that vehicle how very much he cares for people in those situations. I’m quite certain that it is in His heart that trauma survivors deserve an even shake; that trauma survivors deserve a shot at getting past it and moving on.

I understand now that it is appointed to me to do as Jesus asked me to do.

The amazing thing is, this for me is not so much the beginning of a huge amount of work and commitment the likes of which I’ve never taken on…

I’ve already turned my tragedy into triumph a couple times over.

What this really is; is an opportunity to turn that tragedy into triumph that I could have never imagined or thought possible.

Results for a search using bing.com for "trauma survivor"

At first I was delighted! For just a moment, pride began to seep in.

Soon pride turned to sorrow as I began to realize how this simply should not be so. There are what? 10 million? 15 million? 25 million of us in the US alone? And you’re telling me that I crowd page one of a Bing search in that way?

Something is terribly terribly wrong and completely broken. I should not even be on page one. I would be much happier if I was trumped by several hundred far more furvent far more capable champions of the cause than I. The potential for such is certainly there, but it’s just not happening.

Reasons? Anybody?

My summation is as its been for several years now. As I’ve said before, I chalk it up to the "deserted island" syndrome. We are all; each of us survivors on our own individual deserted island. Alone to our thoughts, alone in figuring all this out. It is that way (in my humble opinion) again, because of the very nature of trauma injury. It’s a very ugly thing. The very thought of trauma injury strikes at the deepest, most primal fears of most everyone on the planet, save those that have actually suffered it.

Because of this, very few of us ever get the support, the ear that the vast majority have earned and deserve.

I’ve yet to have someone strike up a conversation: "So Steve; I understand you’ve been cut out of a car… what’s that like?". When I wrote the article "Sick of the GodDamned Outline", I meant it. Some articles I may delete over time, but that one will stay, because it’s the heart of truth for me. The "outline" is all it takes for me to summize that a person would really prefer to change the subject or do what ever is required to get off that topic.

This is what the vast majority of us face (again, based on anecdotal information). That is a clue that things are broken.

We are very good at treating trauma in this nation, amazingly so. Very poor at giving survivors a second shot at a fulfulled life.

So how do we fix that?

Well, if we are as I put it; each on our own deserted island, what we need to do is to start a massive bridge building program. Those bridges would connect each of the deserted islands one to another. I think that’s the perfect metaphor to demonstrate both the problem and the solution.

So how do we get to the solution?

We build?

The Trauma Survivors Network is an awesome start. I wish it was further along than it is. What I think we need is a grass roots organization. I have a picture in my own mind what that should look like, but I need to kick the can a little further down the road before I can do anything to affect change. Rest assured I’m kicking as hard as I can, but these things do take time.

I’ve gotten back into talks with the Ryder Trauma Center about the possibility of starting a trauma survivor group there. Even after just an initial conversation, I’m now very hopeful that will happen. The group will happen regardless, but I really would like to hold it at Ryder, because that will hasten the convincing, acceptance and building of the Trauma Survivors Network in that trauma center, which as anyone that’s followed me knows has been a desire of mine long before the program was initiated.

Can you build bridges where you are? This is something that all survivors need to think about. Anyone that’s interested, PLEASE contact me. I would be thrilled to speak with you and work with you and offer some guidance.

I’ve been trying to be on the forefront of Trauma Survivor Issues for some time now. The first step was to start this blog and the now defunct traumasurvivor.org—a stab at a community venue for survivors. The trauma survivor community clearly wasn’t ready to jump out and be heard. I guess that’s my first point of frustration. I now clearly understand the hurt, frustration and isolation that Trauma Survivors face, and it seems to me generally speaking that almost to a person, Trauma Survivors are pretty much convinced that they are on their own; that their situation is something they won’t find any help with what they’re facing and going through which is clear truth, not just opinion.

As a member of the Consumer Advisory Board of the American Trauma Society, I know that help is on the way, and in fact is here for at least some new survivors lucky enough to be treated in a Trauma Center that has active components of the Trauma Survivors Network, but it has been slow going for the program. The promise of an active website for the TSN this summer fades with summer itself. The end result for me is having so much hope and inside knowledge that things will soon change. Still, I find it very frustrating waiting and waiting for things to move along.

Even once the Trauma Survivors Network begins to blossom, there will be something of a paradigm shift in surviving trauma. That’s still sometime in the future. The need is great, the need is now. It’s of ultimate importance to me that this happen sooner rather than later. Even my desire and efforts to bring the TSN to the Ryder Trauma Center locally has been frustrating with little to no results so far. There is a very clinical approach, and I’m trying to get through a heart issue. There seems to be very little interest there in issues of the heart. I’ll continue those efforts there, and at some point hope to find the office door of a human heart that has the power and vision to set the process in place.

In the meantime, not enough is being done. Not by me, not by trauma centers, not by the American Trauma Society, none of us.

I’ve been thinking through this dilemma and I really believe the only way to break thorough the slowness and clinical approach to the issue, and that is one of a grass roots movement. What I would really like to do is establish a non-profit to affect and start to fill this void. As I see it, what is really needed is movement and organization by the grass roots, by the survivors. Putting together an organization to do this is a vision I’m now at the very begriming of undertaking. As I see it, this organization should:

• First and foremost; promote and support the efforts of the American Trauma Society and the Trauma Survivors Network, and not do anything to subvert their efforts and presence.
• To begin to develop networks nationwide, groups environments for survivors that will
  • Meet on a bimonthly basis.
  • Discuss and deal with their own issues.
  • Identify the local Trauma Centers and be a voice for the development of the TSN in those Trauma Centers.
  • Be members of the TSN website (if and when it becomes a viable site).
  • Once a Trauma Center joins the TSN, become members of that local body and get and stay involved.
• Supply these groups with places to meet and support for the needs of the meetings, such as:
  • Paying for room leases as required.
  • Provide food and beverage.
  • Provide a website as an internet resource for them to build the group.
  • Provide advertisement on the internet on a local basis through many means, a few could be:
    • Google Adwords
    • Craigslist
    • Meetup.com
    • Facebook ads
• Provide them with the tools and training they need to run the group effectively – that work has largely be done by the ATS, and I would have no doubt they wouldn’t so much mind sharing and advising me on how to effectively pull this off.

This is no small vision. I’m not even sure I can start, much less pull it off, but I’m more and more convinced that it needs to be done and it certainly should be done. My resources are slim at best. Working an hourly job at a meager hourly wage, I’m not even sure I can pull together the resources to apply for the non-profit status with the IRS. If and when I do this, I’m not going to try to undertake the application process by myself. I want the best shot of it being approved first time through and quickly. Pulling together the funding is nearly impossible until that non-profit status is applied for and granted. So I’m currently in a catch-22 of sorts.

Anyone out there with resources they want to share towards this vision would be welcomed indeed. In fact, any other survivors out there with or without resources that think they can share the dream, I’m open to partnering with anyone out there who’s sole burns for these issues.

With the American Trauma Societies efforts, there exists the possibilities that trauma survivors may at one point finally get the resources that every other major disease out there now has. The time has come, WE the survivors out there need to step up and make sure this happens. With my vision of a grass roots effort, all these things can come to fruition a lot sooner than they otherwise would, but I need some help getting it going. I’m well connected with the ATS as a member of the Consumer Advisory Board, I have no doubt that I can put together an amazing board for this endeavor just through the contacts I have, all I need to do is get to the point where this vision can get off the ground.

As I reflect on what is important to me in life, working for trauma survivor’s issues has been and now even more the most important part of me. Being a trauma survivor is an identity that I guess I have always had since that fateful day in 1982, I suppose I just didn’t know what being a trauma survivor meant. The same was true back then for cancer survivors, and survivors of other life threatening diseases. I suppose the big difference was and is that trauma survivors have been separated and isolated to deal with their situation with whatever tools they have and if any; the support structure around them, which I believe to be a rare thing.

The Trauma Survivor Network represents a paradigm shift for all that. I believe it’s time now for all you trauma survivors out there that have the will to champion any cause at all, to pick up the cause that will fulfil their lives far more than any other, trauma survivor issues. We have pretty much for time and memoriam been each of us isolated, on our own deserted islands if you will. If you are willing to accept the cause in your own heart, that HAS changed. With the advent of the TSN, there is now a center to our universe.

This program is destined to change the face of surviving trauma for so very many new survivors, and the opportunity is there for it to radically change your life too. This program desperately needs and will feed off of long time survivors. It’s the ones who have spent plenty of time figuring all this stuff out that life after trauma leaves us all that will be the strength of the program. There are no trauma health care professionals, no trauma clinicians, no trauma surgeons that can possibly understand the issues at hand the way that we can. It’s our lives, our history, our hearts that will drive this program, and make it the best darned program of its kind on the planet. It’s already designed to do so, but without participation from you, it will be lacking the most important ingredient.

Without participation from all of you long time survivors out there, many more new survivors will suffer because a trauma center in your area needs to be convinced the program is needed and/or worth it. From the moment the website opens up (scheduled for June 2008) the expectation is there that Trauma Survivors will begin to trickle in from various parts of the US and perhaps from other parts of the world,

The way it will work is, if there is a trauma center in your area that is already a part of the TSN, you can choose to associate yourself with that trauma center. Doing so does not necessarily commit you to anything beyond involvement in the site, but you will be receiving email and alerts from that trauma center. However, if there is a trauma center that is already a part of the Trauma Survivors Network close enough to you, we strongly suggest you get involved in that trauma center as a volunteer. There will likely be two fronts on which you can be involved on the local level, the first being a group environment where you can gather and share with other trauma survivors. For most of you, it will be the first such experience. I can say from my own experience that it is a very powerful experience being in a group of people that have walked a mile in your bloody shoes; who can understand from their own experiences what you have been through and are facing at the moment.

Lets say for a second you feel like you’re doing ok, a group really isn’t for you. Fine. There is still an opportunity for you to help bring a sense of hope and can represent light at the end of the tunnel for these new trauma survivors by becoming trained as and involved with the Peer Visitation program. This is another unique and powerful component of the TSN, and one that many long time trauma survivors will find very rewarding. There is definitely a sense of redemption when you’re put in a position of offering hope through your own experiences. There is great power in doing this and probably will be the most rewarding thing you do in your life. For long time trauma survivors, the Peer Visitation program really is a great opportunity to turn tragedy into triumph in your own life while offering a presence of hope to new trauma survivors that no one else can.

So… a new day begins. This is your time! Your involvement is necessary to the TSN and will enrich your life, I can assure you. Many people reach that time in their life where they feel it’s time to give back, to do something good. For trauma survivors, that road has been made easy thanks to the ATS and their thoughtful development of the Trauma Survivors Network. There are a lot of people out there to champion the causes that are so needed, right now there is almost no one championing OUR cause, so why not you?

The seeds were planted several years ago, while germination has taken longer than any of us had hoped, it is going to soon be reality. I can say for sure, that the very heart of the American Trauma Society is in this thing, and they all — WE all want to see it in effect in as many trauma centers as possible as soon as possible.

TSN represents a para gm shift for trauma survivors in the US. I can certainly testify from my own trauma experience, and from what I’ve learned from getting to know and work with other trauma survivors that this program will fill a complete void; a void that has been around longer than trauma medicine itself. Void pretty much sums it up. Every trauma survivor, almost to a person has had to do the tough work of recovery on their own. There are very few people out there that haven’t had a trauma experience that are the least bit interested in what it’s like, aren’t the least bit interested in talking about the subject in general, and certainly unwilling to be a true friend to someone who has faced horrors that they just can’t imagine.

Full orbed coverage is what TSN is all about. It has 4 key components:

• Peer Visitation – long time trauma survivors that are a part of the TSN in any TSN trauma center will regularly visit new hospitalized trauma survivors on a regular and constant basis. Experience from the few trauma survivor programs out there now show that this is a very important and needed component to the program. Simply modeling light at the end of the tunnel is often very reassuring to new trauma survivors. Another aspect of this program is a regular group environment that is open to new and long time survivors. Part of the challenge any trauma center will have in developing this program will be attracting long time survivors well suited for peer visitation. Those who have settled all the issues that come with surviving trauma to the extent they can carry out this mission in a healthy way. Instructions and training on peer visitation will be a part of this group environment.
• Second Trauma – A vital part of the program that teaches front line doctors and nurses the finer points of communication with the families of survivors. It has been proven in many cases that special attention on the front end of the experience for the family members gives them a level of comfort that their loved one is getting the best possible care, it gives them a real picture of expected outcomes without them having to guess what the future may hold. While a vital thing to do in trauma centers, it’s easy for staff to overlook, because in this day of ever shrinking budgets and personnel cutbacks, it’s easy to say "we don’t have the resources to do this". Fact is, every trauma center need to be doing it, and this system has been developed to instruct hospitals how it should be done.
• Survivor Boot Camp – While the name of this program has changed a few times, this is likely the one they’ll stick with. To me, it’s not so important what you call it, the important thing is implementation. This will be a regular course offered to all trauma survivors that aids trauma survivors in dealing with life after trauma. Specifically offering training in the re-assimilation process back to work and back to the circle of friends, simply stated, getting back to life. It offers specific training in these areas as well as coping skills for fighting depression and the other common pitfalls that survivors often incur. This will also feed into the group environment, and every attendee will be encouraged to continue in that group environment, While these types of things are not for everyone (that is, it’s an individuals own decision whether they want to continue in a group environment or not), it will become clear early on the benefits of regularly attending a group. Often, it’s a survivors only opportunity to meet and work with other survivors on an equal plane.
• Web Site – There will be a comprehensive website offering helpful information for trauma survivors, one done in a wiki format, so that survivors, doctors, surgeons and other trauma health professionals will be able to contribute, as well as specific help to the survivor while they are in the hospital and in the early stages of recovery after release, that will be a blog type environment where friends and family members can track the progress of their loved one, often sparing immediate family from the constant loud drumbeat of phone call after phone call answering the many questions loved ones will have. It will be a great tool for communication and a blessing to both the survivor and their immediate family.

I came to the Ryder Trauma Center here in South Florida a little over a year ago with one specific mission in mind, to make darned sure that this, one of the largest and best level 1 trauma centers out there implement this program as early as possible and be a shining example and encouragement to other trauma centers to get on board with this extremely important program. We are still at the starting gate with it, but hope to have this vehicle in first gear soon. Complications with funding and the need for double blind studies for this program in order to get the funding needed has slowed and driven back the roll out, but that’s the way it goes. For major funding, the CDC wants evidence that this will be a worthwhile recipient for funding that the CDC does not have an unlimited source of.

My hope is that my efforts on the internet, speaking about trauma survivor issues and speaking out about the need for advocacy and support from trauma survivors themselves will be some aid to the ATS and this program. As a member of the Consumer Advisory Board of the American Trauma Society, I’ll have an inside track on the program, and actually help to shape what it will become. The formation of this panel is an important step for the ATS, as having real survivors who’s heart is really in trauma survivor issues will be able to help guide the creators of the program in directions that may have escaped them. Every trauma experience is as different as the individual survivor themselves, but there is a great deal of commonality as well between various trauma experiences that only a survivor will know.

On my blog as well as on my community site for trauma survivors, I’ll be talking this program up in a big way. We need involvement; especially from long time trauma survivors nation wide in the US. Long time survivors will play one of the most important roles in the program, especially when it comes to the peer visitation component, because this is a job for long time survivors. Each hospital will certainly continue to work with the newer survivors to get them to a place where they can be involved as well, it is necessary however to be certain that everyone involved in peer visitation has their own issues settled to the point where none of the anger and negative feelings that newer survivors inevitably face. That is what is great about the group environment though; those that get involved and stay involved in the group at their level 1 trauma center will do much better in terms of psycho-social recovery, because they will have others there that have worked through the issues helping them to resolve theirs.

I encourage anyone interested in this ground breaking program to stay tuned to this blog and even my survivor community site for news and headlines of where this amazing program is at and where it is going. I would further encourage all you survivors out there to join Trauma-Survivor-Community.org. The only site of its kind, it’s geared towards bringing trauma survivors together in an environment where everyone can feel safe and feel free to speak their mind on what ever issues they may have.

Irrespective of those feelings, I really have to give Ms. Hilton an enormous amount of credit for taking the punishment dealt her with dignity that I think surprised us all, it certainly did me. The degree to which she took responsibility for what she went through was both astounding and very refreshing at the same time. No one would have ever considered her a role model, but I do now, at least for the masses in Hollywood she showed what remorse and repentance actually looks like, and I think she did a fine job of it. Would I have rather seen more? Sure; but I was actually taken aback by the degree to which she did take responsibility.

Here; several months after her release, it seems no flash in the pan either, which demonstrates that her "conversion" or whatever you want to call it is real and lasting. That is a good sign, and a good thing for society in general, but especially for all those out there that can’t get enough of the Hollywood gossip, because reasons for salacious articles about here seem to have come to an end.

I don’t want to be put in a place where I’m some kind of moral authority, I am anything but. This was however one big shot at getting the message out that there are consequences to drunk driving. Yes, the judge was overly harsh on here, he gave her a sentence that he would rarely give others in the same predicament in accordance with the local laws he had to go by, on the other hand, she got off very lightly compared to others in other jurisdictions that treat probation violations for drunk driving convictions with the seriousness that all jurisdictions should. Whatever was meted out legally, she took it, kicking and screaming at first, but then something in her changed, she changed. Perhaps for the first time in her life, she realized that her money and all the people she pays to keep her safe and out of trouble could not help her in this predicament, and she did come to realize that she was responsible for what had taken place. Good for her! The most important thing though of this change in her life is; to whatever degree, she will be a voice from the glitteratti that says don’t drink and drive. That by any measure is a good thing.

Every year, about half of all traffic collision fatalities involved alcohol. In 2006, that means that about 22,222 people died in alcohol related accidents. As we go through yet another anniversary of 9/11, we mourn. We lost a lot of wonderful and brave men and women. Yet every year, we loose 7.4 times that amount due to drinking and driving, and we barely bat an eye lid. I don’t know how we change that, I don’t know if we ever do, I’m not sure we as a society even care, more than any other single issue in my life and world, this a problem for me.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. The only way we will ever bring this under control is to ramp up the penalties for DUI offenses. NOT more fines, NOT stiffer suspensions, but jail time. It sounds harsh on the surface, but the truth is, if you drink and drive and get caught, and caught again, and again and don’t harm anyone or kill anyone, chances are, you’ll never see the inside of a jail cell. That needs to change. It is the only way I see to make people finally sit up and take notice that they cannot risk it.

I’ve made a proposal in one of my earlier rants on Paris, but I’ve modified them just a bit. We cannot jail people without conviction unless it’s in the absence of bond. We cannot set bail at a ridiculous amount, and it would be inequitable to do so, just as the laws now are inequitable. We need to put jail time on the FIRST offense of .08 and up; 4 weekends in jail for .8 and an extra weekend for each extra two tenths of a point in blood alcohol. Follow that up with 20hrs mandatory volunteer service in a level 1 trauma center in either resuscitation or the trauma icu. Second offense, 4 months jail time, no exceptions, no excuses, no time off for good behavior. 1 year for the third offense, again, no excuses, no time off for good behavior. What we are doing now isn’t working. Well over 10,000/yr are dying because what we are doing now isn’t working. It seems apparent that this is just an acceptable cost for us as a society, but it’s not acceptable to me.

I can already hear legislatures crying the blues about what that would cost. We are speaking though in the currency of human lives. The ONLY way we are going to slow the carnage is to get serious about the penalties. We accept the unacceptable right now; that is, all the families that don’t have to burry a loved one or help them deal with a life long disability. At what point to we speak up for them? At what point do we EVER get serious and deal with this "problem"? Nothing will change until we decide we are going to get serious. Until we decide we are going to exact serious penalties for drunk driving, we will continue to count half the fatalities on our highways as alcohol related, and that simply won’t change until we as a nation grow some balls and actually deal with the problem.

he was stationed high in the mountains of Burma (now Myanmar) as a radio operator guiding our planes over the Hump (the Himalayas), mostly resupply to China in their effort to fight the Japanese. A lonely, thankless job; and yet very important to the war effort. Even though he didn’t face the trauma of war like many of our soldiers over-seas in WWII, like so many of his fellow patriots, he never spoke much of the war or his service – that was the way our greatest generation “rolled”. In the last few years though, he did open up about his experiences. He had occasion to be on the cable channel for the retirement community he lived in in which two of the many of our greatest generation in that community were given an opportunity to reflect on their service.

It was a little odd watching my dad on video tape giving more details about his experiences than I had ever heard before. I took that as an opportunity to prod even further, and got a wealth of information out of him. Stuff I didn’t NEED to know, but stuff I wanted to know. That is an interesting reflection for me. As a Trauma survivor having been forced to keep my “stuff” inside me for lack of willingness, tools or ability on the part of those close to me to listen, I would have bent the ear of just about anyone who asked questions. It’s a dynamic I still don’t understand; why we choose to hold things inside (when it is a choice), and why people don’t need or want to know. I really do want an opportunity to understand this better if I’m allowed to live life long enough to find some answers.

Most of my life, I didn’t know my dad “the soldier”, but I sure did know him as a father. A very introspective man, my dad; not one to discuss at length any matter of the heart. Growing up, that was the job of my mom, and she did it to a fault. I took for granted for so much of my life the quiet strength and resolve of this amazing man, it really was in his death that I began to better understand this strength and resolve he modeled his whole life. I struggled mightily to have what he had his own life – joy and contentment; oh had I only realized that I had the perfect model right in front of me all along! I guess we each need to find our own path to that point — those of us that are fortunate enough that it should be one of the chief goals in life. My dad had it in spades his whole life really, and in his quiet unassuming manner, he never really talked about it, he may not have even known how he does it, frankly, I think he was just wired for it.

I wish it had been that easy for me, but in retrospect, it’s good that it wasn’t. Learning the skills of joy and contentment on my own (and yes, they can both be considered skills) was a process for me that gave me the understanding of what it takes not just to have it, but maintain it. I have been appointed to the consumer advisory board for the American Trauma Society. The night before our first meeting in DC (which incidentally gave me the opportunity to see my dad once more face-to-face before his death), here in the midst of some of the great minds in trauma care I put forth the proposal as the survivors were talking about their experiences that; if I had the opportunity to go back and change one thing in my life, it would NOT be my trauma experience. This was met with shock and disbelief, but it’s true. I would not be where I am today without having gone through all the ugliness and emotional struggles that came after that event. I would not have the joy and contentment that permeates every hour of every day of my life. My dad had that naturally (I assume), I had to pay a heavy price to find it, it’s the price that I paid to find it that is my assurance that it won’t go away.

To my shame, I didn’t have any pictures of my dad or my mom for the longest time, but have gotten many from my brother who took the time to plow through boxes and boxes of slides to pick out his few “favs” I hope to get that opportunity soon myself, but for now I’m so happy that I have this one picture.

So on this day, I salute my dad, may he rest in peace; and thank him for the love, trust and other things he gave me in abundance, including the patience of a saint when I was anything but saintly. I love you dad, that will never change. And we will be together again soon enough – hopefully not too soon.

And yet sad at the same time. People everywhere are cheering the fact that she’s going to jail – not because she drove drunk, but because they want to see her in jail for no apparent reason. So even in this, the result I am looking for, the drunk drivers in this country win yet again.

I keep asking “what’s it going to take”. Every week I see the consequences in terms of broken lives all due to drunk drivers through my volunteer work at Ryder Trauma Center. The results I don’t see are the ones that die before they get up to the trauma ICU or die at the scene or die somewhere in between. Instead of grieving for the death and trauma that drunk drivers cause, we cheer the fact that a celeb is going to jail simply because we don’t really care for her.

Here on South Beach, my hat truly goes off to the fine men and women of the MBPD. This summer, they caught not one, but TWO local sports stars driving drunk here. There are celebs all over South Florida, yet they only seem to be caught on South Beach. I admit that South Beach is about a good time, drinking to the wee hours of the morning, etc.; something I don’t really have a problem with… UNTIL one steps behind the wheel. That’s what sets the Miami Beach Police Department apart from all the rest here in South Florida as the ONE force that knows how to profile and catch drunk drivers.

Unfortunately, both these sports stars, specifically Dontrell Willis, the anchor of the starting rotation for the Florida Marlins and James Posey who comes off the bench for the Miami Heat will or have gotten of easy, because the laws have no real teeth for those with money. That’s why mandatory jail time of some sort for the first offense NEEDS to be seriously considered. We do it for ALL criminal elements that cause death EXCEPT for drunk drivers. Harsh? Sure. Is what we are currently doing stopping the blood on our streets? Nope, hardly at all.

Sure, if most police departments would grow some balls and actually treat it like the crisis it is, the current laws might eventually make a difference of some sort – MIGHT.

In the mean time, we drive, some of us drunk as hell, and the dice are rolled each time we do; weighted a lot heavier with the chance of death, trauma and disability, and we just shrug our shoulders. When you’ve been involved in a fatal drunk driving accident, it gets hard to do the old “oh well”, let me tell ya.

So roll the dice. The status quo is what we are used to, paying the price for such a lack of common sense and caring is what we hope to avoid; but we roll the dice.

Not a thing funny about that, folks.

He had been doing MUCH better though in the last couple of months; in my last conversation with him, the improvement was so significant at that point, it’s like he was back to his old self. In the long run, it was the liver that killed him – it’s just one of those things. I have to wonder if his strongly improving health is what killed him. As the diseased liver pushes against the esophagus, that part of the digestive track fights back by growing more veins to improve blood flow, the unfortunate fact is though, they grow in a very unhealthy way. The morning that he died, those vessels burst in a profound way and there simply was nothing they could do to control or stop the bleeding.

If you read through the series of events leading up to the day of my mom’s death, how I completely shut down emotionally on that day and was really and still really am unable to process the grief, you can imagine I had curiosity about how I might react when my dad died. Would EVERYTHING come pouring into it and become a grief-a-thon? Would I treat it as the death of a man I loved so much that had the life of Reilly for all intents of purposes, and simply celebrate? I really didn’t know for sure, but I had suspicions that the latter would be true, and it was.

I have had occasion to work with a really good psychiatrist on a few occasions recently on another matter – screening for adhd, which I always suspected was a problem in my life, and was enough of one as it turns out, for that it was a wise thing to do. In the process, I had the unbelievable privilege to talk about many of the issues that surrounded my trauma experience as well as some of the experience itself. When I got to the part where I told her that I had never grieved my mom’s death, she stopped me right there and said “that’s ok” in the most reassuring manner. She went on to explain that the brain knows what it can handle and what it cannot, and it decided that I had been through quite enough, and it simply wasn’t going to process the grief.

I sort of knew that all my life, but it sure was amazingly reassuring to hear it from a psych pro. It’s funny, so many of us (myself included) go through most of are lives fearing psychiatry, because we’re scared of revealing the secret parts of our inner sanctum, or discovering that we really are “weird”. For me though now, it’s something I’m not the least bit afraid of. Being in a place where I’m about as emotionally stable as a person can expect to be, where I have a very healthy understanding of what I can and cannot expect from life, and have found contentment the likes of which I fear few people ever find, I’m almost too comfortable in my own skin. So it’s easy to look any psych pro in the eye and hold a normal conversation, because I no longer have any fear about who I am – what a glorious place that is!

Still, in prepping for the flight up to DC after I learned that my dad had died, there was just the slightest trepidation in the back of my head… Will the pipe burst? Will I just “loose it” in grief? Fact is, I didn’t know and wasn’t worried. I was prepared to get on the roller coaster ride and let it take me where it would; after all, it’s the roller coaster that predicts the path, not the car’s occupants. I knew that, and was prepared. You have heard and will continue to hear “it is what it is” from me. That is no “Dr, Phil-ism” in my book, it’s just the plain truth. That psych pros get that doesn’t come as a surprise to me.

An aside; the service would be at the retirement campus on which he lived in their chapel. As you could imagine, there is always a time limit set at such a place – something I wasn’t thrilled about; having to rush through such an important goodbye, but it was what it was! As my younger brother and step-mom were pouring over my dad’s highly detailed and specific requests for his service, they came to the realization that there would only be a short time for specific remembrances. My brother (half jokingly) turned to my step-mom and said “you know what this means…. we can’t let Steven speak”. HA! As if that was ever going to happen!

The service was amazing, a fine tribute to such a great man. Very well attended, and you know how it goes… you get to see people you haven’t seen in years and years – that turned into a wonderful experience in the gathering to follow in one of the halls on that campus.

I was speaking to an aunt (sister of my dad) and her husband for some time. The thought suddenly came to me, and I expressed it with them… this death really was the completing of a circle left half drawn for 24 years. Trust me, I would have been just thrilled for my dad to have another happy, healthy 20 years or more, but our clocks stop ticking, and nothing we can do can buy another minute from that clock. To have though this whole “life after mom” experience of the last 24 years come to a close was an amazingly freeing thing for me.

It’s a freedom that I would not choose to have, and it’s not as if it turns my Dad’s death into a joy for me, and yet I am joyful that he is at his final peace with God in heaven. Bigger still the joy that I will again see him, just as I will for certain see my mom again.

The grief outburst that I was curious I might have never came, I was pretty sure it wouldn’t, but I left myself open fully to the possibility it would, no matter how remote. You see, even though my trauma experience 25 years ago prevented me from ever grieving my mom’s death, it’s not as if the grief was stuffed down deep inside waiting for the opportunity to come out, it just wasn’t there. The way this psychiatrist explained it to me is that my brain just chose to shut down emotionally, to not try to process that which would have been too much for it. The horrible memory imprint forever tattooed on my brain of 6 weeks earlier being hopelessly pinned in a car and having to sit in that crushed car for over an hour while the fire dept. struggled to streach the car back out so they could cut and peel the roof back to get me out, all the indescribable pain I suffered both in the car and at the hospital; that experience was so much larger than life that it was all my brain could do to process that. Something so tragic, such a deep and profound loss coming right off the heels of that experience was simply too much.

It’s not though that because I couldn’t process my moms death at the time does not mean that I haven’t done so slowly and rationally over the course of the last 24 years, and it certainly didn’t prevent me from processing my dad’s death either. To not deeply grieve a death is not an abnormal thing, not by a long shot. It really is the tools I’ve found in my life to help me deal with life and find contentment, peace and joy in my own life that came in very handy at the time of my dad’s death. I certainly did have a short grief response after his death and certainly did get caught up in the emotion at his funeral.

Just because I didn’t have some huge grief response doesn’t mean that I didn’t miss him from the moment I knew he was gone, it won’t prevent me from missing him until we meet again, it just means that I have come to a point in my life where processing and dealing with things rationally is just a part of who I am now; a huge part of who I am.

Thanks dad; thanks for everything, and especially on this day, thanks for your service to this great country.

Having had the privilege of killing a drunk driver myself and walking away from it without a scratch (thanks ONLY to safety belts), this is kinda sorta a hot button issue for me. We talk tough. We do the checkpoints and spend money on adds that really do effectively get in your face and warn you that "you will be arrested". It’s not working. Every thirty minutes some family buries another loved one because it’s not working. So, what is the problem? I don’t know… I don’t have the resources to find out, but we need to find the resources… we need to find something that works… we need to stop the needless carnage. The Paris Hilton story in the news today shows that we just don’t get it. Yes, we’ve passed "tougher laws", but the police and the states attorneys and the courts continue to show mercy. Every thirty minutes, there is no mercy for the next dead person on our roads because of this.

So what do we do? New legislation? More legislation? That’s probably a good start. Fines and community service obviously is not working. Here’s what I would like to see just ONE state grow the balls to do:

• First offense: Keep your license, but do a MANDATORY 4 weekends in jail BEFORE your trial, $5,000 MANDITORY fine and 200 MANDITORY community service hours in a level one trauma ICU with one day in prison for each mandatory hour missed.
• Second offense: MANDATORY 6 months in jail, loss of ALL driving privileges for a year (not including the prison time), double the fines of the first offense, and another 200 hours community service in a level one trauma ICU and one week in jail for every hour of mandatory service missed.
• Third offense: MANDATORY 2 years in jail, permanent revocation of your drivers license, $20,000 in fines and mandatory alcohol substance abuse counseling for the remainder of your life at your cost, 600 mandatory community service hours in a level 1 trauma ICU with one week in jail for every hour missed.
• Fourth offense: 20 years MANDATORY in jail, that’s enough.

This is for ANYONE blowing a .08. Sounds kind of harsh, doesn’t it? It is. Anyone who has buried a loved one because of drunk driving may think it’s still too lenient. We have to draw the line somewhere, but at the same time we can’t be too over the top with it. One things for sure, it would stem the tide. We are pouring BILLIONS of dollars at homeland security. I think we probably should. On 9/11 3,000 brave americans lost their lives. That year, 17,400 americans died in alcohol related crashes. One tragedy horrified and unified the nation. 17,400 little tragedies did not cause us to bat an eye. We just don’t care.

I’ve spent two days a week at Ryder Trauma Center for over 2 months now, almost strictly in the Trauma ICU. I have already seen the effects of "statistics" over and over again. I guess just like everyone else, I have to accept it, but I just can’t. We have lived with the terror of drunk driving since cars were invented. We are just as complacent as we can be. Shit happens. Maybe one day, when you burry a daughter or a son or a brother or a sister or a mother or a father, or any combination therein, it will be important to you too.

Paris Hilton certainly isn’t the problem, but her arrest brought light TO the problem. If she did 4 weekends in jail, maybe a more people would understand this is important. If she had ANY real understanding of the problam and the toll, she would tell her lawyer to made sure the states attorneys threw the book at her, and then get out on the road and use her popularity to save lives. I’m sure it isn’t important to her either. We all just hire the best attorney we can afford to get the least punishment we can, and the courts cave, and we go out and get drunk again and drive again; and that is why a person dies every 30 minutes because of all this. I wish it wasn’t the end of the story, but it is. If we haven’t cared by now, we never will.