One of my favorite parts about biking on our metroparks bikeway is when I come up on someone who is going slower than me and I have to pass them. I get to shout out “On your left!” so they have a heads up that I’m coming and will stay to the right so we don’t collide.
Now, before you think I am a fast rider, these “slower” people I’m referring to are dog walkers, joggers, and the occasional octogenarian biker. Slow and steady wins the race!
In the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), the first time that Steve Rogers (aka: Captain America) and Sam Wilson (aka: Falcon) meet is in the 2014 movie “Captain America: The Winter Soldier” when they are both running laps around the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.
Since Captain America is a super soldier, he laps Sam over and over again. Every time he passes he says “On your left.” Sam gets so tired of being outrun that on Cap’s approach he starts yelling “Don’t say it! Don’t you say it!”
“On your left!”
Throughout the movie franchise, that phrase becomes so much more as the friendship between Steve and Sam evolves.
Steve wakes up in the hospital with Sam by his side. Steve sees him and says “On your left”…meaning “Hey, I’m still here with you.”
Then in the climactic ending of the 2019 film, “Avengers: Endgame”, Sam has been snapped out of existence for the past 5 years along with half of all life on earth. As Steve, and the few Avengers left, attempt to undo what the bad guy, Thanos, has done he hears a voice he hasn’t heard in half a decade…
“Hey, Cap, do you read me? Cap, it’s Sam. Can you hear me? On your left.”
Sam comes in through the portal on Cap’s left, after having been one of the missing for 5 years, and they fight side by side to defeat their enemy.
On his left.
I Get By With a Little Help From My Friends
My big sister, Judy, was the best.
When I was a little girl, I wanted to be her when I grew up. She enjoyed being with me even though I was 12 years younger. She took me and my younger sibs to the movies and rollerskating. She had us over on Friday nights for sleepovers after she got married. She also drove a 1965 powder blue mustang and wore huge bell bottom pants with platform shoes! She was the coolest person I knew.
When Judy was 24 she had her first baby, a boy she named Michael Christopher. And I became an aunt for the first time at the age of 12.
Within hours, doctors knew something was wrong. Mike was taken by ambulance to Akron Children’s Hospital and in the first few days of his life he was diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis. In 1974, the average life expectancy of a baby born with CF was 12 years old.
Mike was in and out of the hospital as he grew up. Judy worked full time and all of her “vacation time” was spent in the hospital with Mike. When Mike was 14 years old he became a big brother when Judy gave birth to her second son, Anthony, who was born with cerebral palsy.
Mike’s illness continued to progress and in 1998, he needed a double lung transplant. Even though he did well for several years, Mike’s body eventually rejected the lungs and my 25 year old, kind, hilarious, fun-loving nephew died on September 26, 2000.
So when Nick died 5 years and 11 months after Mike, Judy never actually said the words “on your left” but that’s where she always was. On my left. She had my back. She was the one person who really understood and listened through the dark days of early grief.
At a time when grief support did not exist at St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, I had grief support from my big sis.
And then she died.
Several years into my work as a St. Jude Parent Adviser, I co-authored an article that was published in the Journal of Pain and Symptom Management, titled “Empowering Bereaved Parents Through the Development of a Comprehensive Bereavement Program”.
At the end of this article, I shared part of Judy’s story:
“Eight months after my son Nick died of cancer, my sister Judy died suddenly. She had been living as a bereaved mom for 7 years after her son Mike died from complications of Cystic Fibrosis (CF). Our family supported Judy in the best way that we knew how but, until I lost Nick, I couldn’t fully understand the depth of her grief. Judy was a single mom with 2 boys, one with CF and the other with cerebral palsy. Her life struggles set her up for complicated grief after Mike died and that is exactly what happened. When Judy was found dead in her home of an apparent heart attack, it was also discovered that over the past year of her life she had been living as a hoarder. Many times people become hoarders because they have experienced so much loss that they no longer can get rid of anything.
None of us knew.
In that moment, standing in Judy’s living room, I made a conscious decision that I would not end up the same way.
My sister is the reason why I became involved in the development of our bereavement program at St. Jude. I am determined to do whatever it takes to ensure that as few people as possible end up like Judy. If we are doing the best that we can to support our bereaved families, we are helping them to not only live, but also eventually thrive again. Using bereaved parents as a part of that supportive process makes it even more meaningful as no one can understand what it feels like to lose a child except for another parent who has lost a child.
As our bereavement program grows and develops even further, I am hopeful that the things we have learned along the way might also be helpful to other institutions around the world as we strive together to bring hope and healing to bereaved families everywhere.”
You can read the full text of the article here:
https://www.jpsmjournal.com/article/S0885-3924(16)31201-5/fulltext
No One is Alone
Just last evening I had a zoom meeting with a children’s hospital in Australia. I have been meeting with this team for several years as they have worked to develop their own parent support program.
Last night’s meeting was a continued conversation I’ve been having with bereaved dad, Wayne, who has been an instrumental part of getting this program off the ground in Australia. He wanted to talk about his very first bereaved parent mentoring encounter that happened just yesterday.
He told me how hard and how beautiful it was. I always call it “the worst best thing” that I do. We chatted about what it is like to hear those nightmare stories that other parents have lived when we have lived them ourselves. And how necessary it is for us to listen and bear witness to the pain of others like ourselves.
Wayne asked me what my first parent mentor encounter was like. It happened very organically and wasn’t really official since we were still in the pilot phase of our Parent Mentor program and hadn’t added the bereaved portion yet.
I was at St. Jude for meetings. My son, Josh, had gone with me on this particular trip. We met up with Nick’s doctor outside of the cafeteria just to catch up. As we sat there chatting, Nick’s doctor got a text. He looked at me and asked if I could come to the clinic area with him. He wanted to introduce me to a mom whose 3 year old daughter had died just 3 days before. This family could not find the strength to go home to face family and friends and plan a funeral for their baby.
When we got back to the leukemia clinic, the place where Nick and I spent so much of our time, I saw a young mom and dad with 3 little children standing and talking with the clinic staff. If I had not known the story I would not have thought their daughter had just died.
We approached them and Nick’s doctor introduced me…”This is Wendy Avery. Her son Nick was a patient of mine. He died a few years ago.” This mom stopped everything and looked in my eyes. Then she grabbed me, held on, and began weeping. I had not yet said a word.
But at that moment, she knew that I knew.
All I could tell her was this: “I know how hard it is to go home. I remember. And it will be one of the hardest things you ever have to do. But you can do it. I am living proof that you can do it.”
They went home the next morning.
All I did was let that mom know that she was not alone. Today, she mentors other moms who are in the early days of grief.
There is a beautiful song toward the end of the musical “Into the Woods”. (Listen here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unVTf5_p_1A )
Four people have been thrown together in the worst of situations. All have experienced the death of someone they love and are feeling completely alone. In that moment of aloneness they find family in each other and in their shared losses.
“Mother cannot guide you
Now you’re on your own
Only me beside you
Still, you’re not alone
No one is alone. Truly
No one is alone
Someone is on your side
No one is alone”
This is why I believe in the work of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.
They are saving the lives of children around the world with cancer and other catastrophic diseases every single day.
And they are saving the lives of the families left behind after a child dies. Not just here but around the globe.
On your left. Someone is on your side. No one is alone.
I am committing to biking 150 miles in the month of September and have set a lofty fundraising goal of $15,000…$1,000 for every year that Nick has been gone.
I have accumulated 35.65 miles in Week One! Come back here next week to check on my progress.
Please donate any amount you can and share this blog with others to help me get the word out.
Click the link below or on “Donate Now” at the top of this page to access my fundraising page.