Death

Less than 5 months ago, I sat in a graveyard surrounded by freshly dug graves. In those graves were the bodies of hundreds of Ebola victims. In those bodies, lived beautiful souls.

Death is so final.

Not including war and HIV/AIDS, I’ve now worked disasters that led to the total death of over 20, 000 people. That is only my international experience. An experience I don’t often discuss. How can you even begin to describe what that feels like? How can you even want to explain what that looks like?

Death ends a life and destroys so many others.

It’s an interesting thing for me though, death. Being faced with so much of it, I’ve spent a lot of time processing what it means to die. And what it means to watch someone die. And what it means to be the one that gets to live.

I’ve seen some of the most violent deaths you can imagine. In my field, death is rarely peaceful. I’ve heard countless stories of the same. I’ve seen the scars; physical, mental and emotional. I’ve wiped the tears. I’ve held children that were now left completely alone in this world. Sometimes I wonder how I can be so numb to it all.

But I am numb.

You go through periods where you question how you can do what you do. How you can watch everyone around you fall apart completely, and you don’t even shed a tear. That’s often spoken of as a strength, but the truth is, it scares the hell out of me sometimes. In the moment and shortly afterwards.

But I am only numb because I have to be.

There is no weakness in feeling. There is no shame in crying. But I have to play a role that involves allowing everyone else to do that, without turning to that myself. In the moment, I have to be numb to keep moving. To keep working. To keep my focus.

It scares me but I understand it.

You don’t bounce back from this work. You don’t heal. You don’t forget. But you get to survive. Sometimes, even that can feel like you drew the short straw. But I am grateful. Always.

You go numb and you do whatever you have to do to feel again. My self care routine is strong. So strong, that sometimes it looks selfish to those who don’t understand. I don’t fault them for their feelings, but I don’t care either. I take my time to myself. I work out. I travel alone. I speak about it when I need to. I write. I do what I have to do to process my feelings. To feel again. To remember that my numbness isn’t as permanent as the death that causes it.

5 months ago, I returned from Sierra Leone, after working at the Ebola Treatment Centre. I left death and arrived home, to the news of another death. A more personal one. I thought I was ready for the funeral. I was still numb.

Standing in that graveyard, the whole world was spinning around me. I was surrounded by people who were feeling something. So much of something. So much of everything. People that I loved.

I stood there and all I could see was death. I couldn’t hear anything. I couldn’t breathe. In a graveyard, so close to home. I saw names. I saw graves. I saw Sierra Leone. Africa. The Ebola Treatment Centre. Death. I could feel the vomit coming. I couldn’t stop the tears. I had to leave.

It was in that moment that I came back to me.

I always do and I always will. This is the cycle I live.

Until my dying day.