Cult of Personality - A Firsthand Experience

 When  I first moved to Los Angeles, I worked in locations.  A majority of the work was film locations, but we had one property that was widely used for special events: Union Station.  I started out as a site rep, which is the person designated to monitor the location and make sure that nothing is damaged, that the crew stays where they're supposed to, etc.  I eventually worked my way up to agent, but this story is from one of my very first assignments as a site rep.  

It was 2003, during the presidential primaries.  Howard Dean was a frontrunner.  It was an interesting campaign, because this was really the first presidential candidate to take hold using the internet to put together a grassroots following.  I was assigned to work a large fundraiser for Howard Dean at Union Station, and I was thrilled!  His trajectory fascinated me, in what was essentially a brave new world of online connectedness.  

My first red flags appeared when I realized that Howard Dean, as an early frontrunner, had refused secret service protection to avoid costing the taxpayers any money.  This made me uneasy in a post 9-11 world, working at an event with very little control over who was coming and going, as it was attached to Union Station, which is very much an active public transportation hub.  I noticed that the campaign had hired off duty police officers as security (which is pretty common in LA for both events and filming), and they're armed, so that gave me a little peace of mind.  For reference, because it will be relevant in this story, the security provided as part of the venue were minimum wage, unarmed security guards.  For weddings and smaller events, they essentially shoo away the lookie loos and make sure random train passengers aren't eating the catered food, and are provided as part of the venue rental for that purpose.  For larger events or film locations with expensive equipment, celebrities, blah blah blah...the off duty police officers were standard and were hired by the event organizers/film production.  

The next red flag appeared as I started interacting with the people running his campaign.  Many of them had this thousand mile stare of a cult follower, and the main person running the event (who was likely in her early 20's, as was I) affected this dreamy sound to her voice when discussing "the governor."  The way she said, "the governor," in her dreamy, breathy baby voice, with her cult-glazed eyes made my skin crawl. She sort of drew it out, like the *sigh* govern-oor.  I may have been fresh off the boat from the Midwest (or tractor...or outta the corn fields...whatever lol), but I have had an uncanny ability to see through bullshit for most of my life, which almost seems to be innate.  

She trailed me throughout the event, which was spread across the old ticket concourse (for the plebs) and the secluded north patio (for the VIPs).  Throughout the event, I mingled with celebrities in my cheap suit (thank God I was young and cute, because I did not know how to dress), and filled various requests for the *sigh* govern-oor...from the girl running the event.  

Aside: I met Martin Sheen at this event, who was playing the president on The West Wing at the time, and he was lovely.  I thought it was funny to see the pretend president at an actual presidential fundraiser. 

Here's where things get weird.  It was dark outside, and there is a short outdoor walk from the old ticket concourse to the north patio, and baby-voice cultface had another request: "The *sigh* govern-oor would like to go visit the VIP area, and he has to walk outside to get there.  I was wondering if we could borrow some of your security guards to surround the *sigh* govern-oor while he walks from the main event to the VIP area."    

I paused.  Over the course of working these events, I had gotten to know our security guards.  They worked long hours and made shitty money.  Many of them had families they were trying to support, and they were working their assess off trying to survive in LA.  I was enraged by this request.  My thoughts flashed to this joker's campaign, refusing secret service to make a political point, now asking for my grossly underpaid, unarmed security guards to form a bubble around the *sigh* govern-oor!  

I looked at her, and could feel the anger sparking through my eyes, "Let me see if I'm getting this right.  You're telling me that the candidate who refused secret service on principle, the 'people's candidate', wants to use my unarmed, $8 an hour security guards, as human bullet shields?  That's going to be a 'no.'  You have your own armed security.  Use them."  

Baby-voice appeared shocked, and scurried away.  Howard Dean found his way to the VIP area, without our security guards, and I didn't see my little cult follower for the rest of the night.  

This event forever changed the way that I look at politics.  I told everyone who would listen that Howard Dean's campaign was a nightmare, and while he was my first choice leading up to this, he had become my last.  The Dean Scream in early 2004 confirmed my suspicions that he was fully aware of his cult-like following.  

I had a visceral reaction the the Bernie Sanders campaign in 2016 and again in 2020, because I watched that same mentality in person years before.  *Makes note to avoid Vermont*  Politics, especially high level politics, are exciting.  There's an energy to that level that can be electric.  When it veers into the cult like territory of believing that your candidate can literally do no wrong is where we start flirting the cult of personality.  

I'm seeing this now with the garish Trump displays, where our country is leaning into propaganda.  The Howard Dean and Bernie Sanders campaigns pale in comparison.  People assume that I'm some ultra liberal because I've been so outspoken against Trump.  I've voted both dem and republican, and would say that being a parent has made me more liberal-leaning out of concerns for the environment and his future.  I wanted to share my own experience with cult politics as a cautionary tale, in the hopes that someone reads this and it parts the clouds of propaganda. 

Any political candidate with a cult-like following does not have your best interests at heart.  It becomes about the power, the grift, the ego...whatever the selfish motivation is that fans those flames.  Be it Trump, Sanders, Dean, whomever, you are the $8 an hour bullet shield and nothing more.                   

    

Dysfunctional grief and taking it out on the nurse

Now that I'm fully entrenched in my NP clinicals, it's starting to sink in that my career as a registered nurse is coming to a close.  I can still remember walking to the mailbox in my shitty apartment complex, and finding my acceptance letter into nursing school as if it were yesterday.  It's crazy that this all started with an associate's degree. 

I had a case this week that hit me hard.  I'm usually pretty disturbed when there is a disruption in the natural order of things, but I've been a hospice and palliative care nurse for 6 years.  Throughout those years, I've learned to compartmentalize an extraordinary amount of emotion.  I have loved being a hospice nurse, and the relationships that I've forged along the way.  There's this gray area in terms of clinical and personal that allows (in certain cases) for the formation of lasting friendships.  I adore those families (some of whom will very likely read this blog...you know who you are).  I've loved being able to walk people through this process, helping them navigate a situation that is impossible to spin into a positive.  I respect all of my patients and families for sharing this intimate part of life with me, and I have never taken my job lightly.  Hospice has never been just a job to me.  Let me back that up even further, nursing has never been just a job to me. 

That being said, I've had bad days....so many bad days.  I've cried (usually in my car, which seems to be my safe space) a lot.  I've had families that weren't handling grief well use me as the target of their angst.  As a nurse, who is intimately familiar with grief, I understand that.  As a human being, sometimes I would walk away from these exchanges severely wounded. 

There's one case that comes to mind.  During this time, I had an unusually high number of young cases on my caseload, which alone will wear down your emotional armor.  In the midst of this, I had a family member who was not managing their grief well at all.  Our first meeting involved them following me outside and screaming at me for a full 5 minutes over the fact that my name tag said "hospice" on it.  Shaken, I made sure to let the team know to take off their name tags before entering this home.   

As a hospice nurse, I never tell someone how I think they should be managing symptoms.  I make recommendations.  If someone is averse to pain medication, I try to offer alternative suggestions.  Acupuncture...aromatherapy.  I do my best to advocate for pain control, but ultimately it's not my decision to make.  This family member was averse to pain management.  I was conservative in my suggestions.   

I had to call them one day to let them know that the physician would be coming in my place.  I didn't want them to refuse the doctor's visit because I had already scheduled with them that day.  Ideally we schedule joint visits, but this particular day i was wrapped up in a crisis situation and wasn't able to coordinate.  This family member asked me, during this phone call if, "...you people just medicate your patients so that they die and you don't have to deal with them anymore."  I remember this moment vividly.  I remember where I was standing, the building I was in, the hateful tone as the words were spat out at me.  It felt like an arrow, finding the weakest point in my emotional armor, and succeeding in a kill shot to my heart. 

That night, I went home and couldn't find the wine bottle opener.  I took a bottle of wine over to a neighbor's house so that they could help me open it, and I sat there recapping my day.  I consumed the entire bottle that night, and then some.  I woke up early in the morning with a skull-crushing hangover.  Now, I've had cocktails with coworkers after a bad day, but this was veering into pathological territory.  The next day that I was scheduled to work, I asked to be removed from the case.  This was the first time I had asked to be removed from a case, and the only time I made that request because I felt abused.  Ultimately, I had to save myself. 

In thinking back on this experience, I wonder about this person.  Did they ever realize how hurtful their words and actions were?  Are they ok?  Did they eventually make peace with the loss and their inability to control the outcome?   

Nurses are often the target of dysfunctional grief.  My story is not unique to me and me alone.  I hope that someone reads this and thinks twice before verbally (or physically) abusing a nurse.  We go home to our families, after witnessing trauma on a daily basis (and working long hours).  We have to take that trauma, process it in a healthy way, and try to make ourselves whole.  We suffer when our patients suffer.   

           

The COVID Diaries (Losing Lucky)

 **First, whomever is feeding my blogs to toxic people who weaponize what I write against me - insert middle finger emoji here - Ok, moving on**

We thought we had it all planned out.  Lucky took a turn over the weekend and we thought for sure he would make it until Thursday evening.  I arranged to have my afternoon schedule blocked off so that I could be there.  He was doing well enough earlier in the week that I wondered if we had been too hasty, then he stopped eating yesterday. I went to bed last night thinking, less than 24 hours left...

This morning, we took Lucky outside.  We had coffee under the spectacular monsoon clouds.  I will always remember the cruel beauty of this morning.  I love clouds, and a spectacular, humid sky is a rarity in Southern California.  This morning was something special.  During our last morning as a family, Lucky lost the ability to walk.  We offered him Starbucks banana bread (weirdly, a kitty favorite in our house) and this absolutely disgusting chicken goo in a tube (also, a kitty favorite), with no response.  

We brought him upstairs while I was getting ready to work, not wanting to waste any time as a family during our final day together, when Lucky started to twitch.  Those twitches rapidly progressed to seizures, and our plan to have him put to sleep peacefully as a family turned into a frantic scramble to get him to the vet as soon as possible while I had to finish getting ready for work.  Blessedly, my employer rescheduled my initial consult.  I can compartmentalize with my existing patients, but an initial?  No way...Lucky died peacefully in Evan's arms at our trusted vet's office.

The thing about loss, and I've had my share of it recently (seriously, 2020...back off on the loss, ok?), is that it makes you reflect on your time.  Lucky was my first real adult responsibility.  He was my first baby.  He was probably too young to even adopt when I got him, but what did I know?  He was tiny, his eyes were still blue, and his ears were still a little droopy like brand new kitten ears tend to be.  He would knead so enthusiastically that he looked like he was marching, and he would rear up and violently crash into you to rub against your leg.  He loved with all he had.  He did not understand restraint when it came to affection. 

When Lucky came into my life, it was a case of who rescued who?  My life was evolving at a breakneck pace, at times threatening to throw me off the ride entirely.  I had a different career, lived in a different place, and was just learning who I really was.  Lucky was along for the ride.  He snuggled with me at night, let me hold his paw like I was holding his hand, and let me cry into his fur when life seemed impossibly unfair.  He was one of the few threads that still connected me to a time in my life where the only thing that was constant was change.  I feel like a connection to that part of my life was lost today.  My wild, complicated, chaotic, beautiful days in Los Angeles.  A fading memory, one more relic from that time gone.  

Those beautiful, cruel morning clouds gave way to oppressive heat.  A climate better matched to my heavy chest.  Like I tell my patients, the thing that sucks about grief is that the only way out is through it.  This one is going to be a long road.  

          

The COVID Diaries (Letters to Ethan #1)

 Dear Ethan,

What a long, strange trip it has been.  In March, existence as we knew it screeched to a halt.  Unfortunately, the timing lined up perfectly with your transition from toddlerhood to preschooler, and you will have vivid memories of this time in your life.  

I've tried to hold it together for you, but life has been so complicated lately...even without the glare of the global pandemic obscuring some of  the view.  I finished grad school, and this was supposed to be our time.  My time.  Life was supposed to settle into our new normal.  Just working, and spending time as a family.  Now I work from home, daddy will be changing careers, and I am just trying to keep the three of us afloat.  Grandma and Grandpa will be moving out here for a year to help us with you, because the schools are closed, and quite honestly I'm not fond of the idea of sending you to school with the specter of a brand new virus haunting our lives.  

I wanted to start writing sooner, but I was struggling with crippling depression anxiety.  I miss life as it was.  I miss my friends, and making play dates for you.  My Grandma Miller died in May, and I wasn't able to go see her.  We haven't been able to have a funeral.  My Great Aunt is now on hospice, and can't have visitors at her assisted living.  I spent the better part of a decade dealing with death professionally, my heart aches at the thought of my Aunt Marge dying alone.  I've seen people die alone more times than I can count, and I pitied them.  Now it is the new normal.  I want to get some of these thoughts out of my head and share then with you when you're older.  I hope this isn't our normal for years to come.  

You have been a bright spot in all of this.  You wear a mask without complaint, but I see the toll it takes on you.  You're an extrovert, just like me, and when we take you anywhere you crave interaction.  You tell anyone within shouting distance exactly what is on your mind.  "I like Tron," you yell...or, "We have 10 cats!"  Which is not true, but it feels like it some days.  You said to me a few weeks ago, when I was singing you to sleep, "Mom.  When this is all over, I want to go on play dates and get close to people again."  Me too, my love.  Me too. 

This weekend felt almost normal, with the exception of the masks and the excessive hand sanitizing that we do.  Yesterday we braved Costco, and visited one of the community pools that we had never been to.   Today, you and I went on a paddle board and navigated the entire harbor together.  You were not a fan.  You kept saying, "This is the last time I'm going to do this," when I asked if you were having fun.  When people would ask from the shore if you were having a good time, you told them, "No!"  I tried to point out the minnows and the Garibaldi, which did not interest you.  Instead, you preferred to keep your eyes fixed straight ahead, praying for the ride to be over.  You did enjoy seeing dogs in boats, "Captains," you called them.     

You also would shout to people who engaged with you, "My cat, Lucky, is going to go to heaven," after which I would have to uncomfortably explain to perfect strangers that my cat is sick, but that he's very old and this is kind of expected.  Lucky's illness seemed to carry more weight with you today.  You had a sadness about you when you spoke of him...an awareness of mortality that I had not seen in you before.  My professional advice has always been to be honest with children about death, but it's not so easy when I'm actually having to practice what I preach.  "He's my best friend," you said sadly.  

Lucky was mommy's first baby.  I got him just before my 24th birthday, a present to myself.  I remember the weight I felt from my new responsibility.  I had to actually care for something!  He was so tiny, barely the size of my hand.  I brought him home to my apartment in a cardboard box.  His tiny meows when I would leave for work were heartbreaking  We grew up together, Lucky and I.  From single and living in LA and being transported in cardboard boxes, to my wild house in Long Beach, to my small apartment in Orange County (living the academic life and using a proper carrier), to married and home ownership, to parenthood of a human child.  Lucky is my last thread to a life that is a quickly fading memory.  Growth, and pain.  Hard work and triumph.  Lucky was there when all I had were my cats, my car, and a plan for a better life which seemed nearly impossible to achieve.  He was along for the entire path to my American dream.  I've watched a lot of connections to the past slip away this year.  2020 has been really hard.  

We ended up spending the rest of the day in Grandma's pool, after our adventures in the harbor.  Your little nose is getting freckled from the sun, just like mine did when I was your age.  On the way home, we stopped by the mall where my replacement phone had been sent...it was sent to a store that is closed.  It was eerie seeing all of the empty shops and the still escalators.  I am truly afraid of what life will look like on the other side of all of this, which is ultimately what inspired me to get these thoughts out of my head and onto some other medium.          

Tonight we watched a move, read bedtime stories, and I sang you to sleep...your bedtime playlist, which is the same three songs every night.  You request them, and I oblige, because I will blink and you will not be asking me to sing you to sleep anymore.  

I don't know what the future holds, but I do know this: You will always know that you are loved.  Even when we are stuck wearing masks, we are grieving the terminal illness of our pet, all of the stores have closed, and nothing in life seems like it will ever go back to normal...you are loved and we will do the best we can to make sure that you are safe.  

Love, 

Mommy