Picking Up a Year’s-Worth of Pieces

***Content Warning: Death, Self-Harm/Suicide, Trauma

It sucks being asked “how are you doing?” after the last couple years. Everyone’s been suffering in their own way through COVID-times: the drag of isolation, the hostility of neighbors when they’re asked to wear a mask, the exhaustion of having to work in-person when others have the ability to work remotely, the worry, the paranoia, the death. No one is doing well right now, even under the best of circumstances.

But when I answer “how are you doing?” with “Oh, you know!” it’s with the knowledge that few actually know. When I answer with “I’m still here!” it’s with a twinge that some people aren’t here anymore. My responses have been as much spoken muscle memory as they are masks for my own sanity. Almost a year ago, I responded to a suicide first-hand. It broke me in a lot of ways, so many of which I’m still trying to pick up and patch together.

Some background: I’ve worked in college residential life, both professionally and paraprofessionally, for about nine years. People like me are trained to respond to any number of situations on-campus: underage drinking, unknown persons on-campus, excessive noise, up to and including student suicide. But I’ve always told my coworkers, from when I was a student Resident Assistant up to my more recent professional roles, “You can learn how to do it all day, but you won’t know what to do until you actually do it.” How we marry our own knowledge with the situation at hand defines my work.

I’d responded to a lot of incidents. I’d responded to a lot of suicidal ideations. I’d never responded to a completed suicide. And just like I told my staff, I didn’t know what to do until I actually did it. For better and for worse, I wrote something that day, just to get my feelings out there. A firsthand experience that I wrote day-of, as fresh as the feelings could have been.

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“Other Duties as Assigned”

Dated 2/18/2021

Today, I tried to resuscitate a dead kid, and my day didn’t get much better from there.

Got a phone call this morning from security at work. This time of day, figured it was a lockout. Something easy. Something simple. Always was, for the few years I’ve worked here.

Someone hanged themselves. Tried to. Succeeded? Maybe the security officer said specifically when he called. I didn’t catch it, my mind was already at a full sprint.

Threw on jeans instead of lounge pants, kept my pullover from sleep, used slippers because shoes would take too long, ran upstairs, barely had to knock before one of my employees opened the door on the other side. Another officer doing CPR on the kid. The kid’s roommate, beside himself. The kid’s friend, trying to comfort the roommate, tears in her eyes. My employee, silent, stoic, barely holding on. I could hardly talk. Asked the roommate if he still wanted to be around. He did. Told the officer to let me know if he needed to change out with me. My whole staff was trained, certified in CPR not a few weeks prior. Paramedics were on the way. Officer looked tired, I told him to tag out.

I could hear air shooting out with every compression. I could smell it, mixed with my own unbrushed morning breath behind a double-layer of COVID masks. Tried to keep tempo to “Staying Alive” with every push. Lost the beat a few times. Forgot the lyrics, somehow. Found the beat again, but at an up-tempo. Caught it, brought it back down. Forgot to check for chest movement every thirty seconds. Too concentrated on the compressions. No change. The same bars, the recalled lyrics, now a sick taunt in my mind. Every so often, I’d hear my employee in my right ear, where he stood a couple feet away: “Come on, man. Come on.” I don’t know if he was talking to me or the kid.

I’d look over at the kid’s face every so often. Would try to catch his eye for a moment, but only as it gazed elsewhere. More white than iris. Eyelids half-shut. At one point, I swear the eyes moved, and that I actually made eye contact with him. And with another compression, they looked elsewhere. This happened…more than once. I can’t remember how many times. I just remember the white. The emptiness. The hope that I kept holding onto, that something would return to the kid’s eyes. Misplaced? Optimistic? Still trying to figure that out.

Paramedics showed up. Police. I tagged out. Tried to convince myself I did enough. Moved out of the room with non-medical people. My employee stood in the stairs, I took the other side of the hallway. Nobody tried to come by. The roommate and friend left. They were crying. I didn’t know what I could do. Reminded them to let me know if they needed anything. They nodded. Went to their rooms. Cried more. I could hear it from the hallways. I left them be. I didn’t know what to do.

The image of the hallway, stretching down to the far end, may stick more than I expected it to. Hearing beeping behind me as medics used a defibrillator. Chatter. Jargon. All of it pounding my ears as I just stared down the hallway, burning the straight lines into my head. I turned every so often because of a different noise, a different tone, weird jargon, a time (10:43), and to acknowledge a police officer.

I said “What’s up?” when she came up to me. So casual. So instinctive. I’m so used to talking to kids, no older than 21 or 22. It just came out. She apologized. I filled in the blanks before she could tell me. Asked for next of kin, emergency contacts. I could get the latter.

Almost punched a computer tower downstairs because Chrome was taking too long to open. I needed emergency contact info, and I needed it soon. Deep breath. Printed the info. Spoke with the Security Officer that was with me in the room. We talked. Checked in. He talked about the last time this happened to him, back in Corrections. Doesn’t get easier, does it? I didn’t ask him. I think I knew. Passed off contact information to police.

My supervisor showed up a bit later. We hugged. Long. She smelled like cigarette smoke, but I don’t think had smoked today. Not yet. Some time later, one of my coworkers came by. He knew the kid. I’d never seen my coworker cry before then. We hugged. The last time I was that physically close to him was months ago. Different circumstances. I squeezed tighter. Even later after that, another coworker came by. Cognizant of everything, but engaging me with humor. Levity. I appreciated it. Everyone left for a bit to do other tasks. I hugged her, too. She complimented my hugs, said they were “so good.” I half-joked that I chose workout routines based on what would make me a better hugger. We swayed. I thought, ironically, to the last time I hugged someone. Someone died that time, too. Why do I only hug when people die these days? Pandemic? Narcolepsy? Mental note to remedy that later.

Everyone asks me how I’m doing. Normally, I say “Oh, you know,” or, “Hanging in there.” Today, I stammer. I shrug. I tell them to check on me later. Check on me after things have processed. After it’s hit me. On-site counselor asks, says he knows I was in the middle of it. I tell him I’m looking forward to talking to someone. I’m scared of seeing those eyes when I sleep. I already see them while I’m awake.

Other kids are crying all throughout the building. I’m here for them. They know that. Many have come to me already. I support them best I can. Validate them, their feelings, their pain. I can’t fathom losing a friend like that. I hope they can’t fathom the image of dead eyes looking back as they try to bring someone back. I hope they never do. I hope our trauma remains siloed.

I’m finally alone. People have been in and out of my apartment all day. I’ve longed for this company, a bit of “how things were” for months. I wish it wasn’t like this, but I still find myself grateful for it. Grateful for my team. Grateful for the abundant lunch delivery from our dining crew. Grateful for the text from my now-remote coworker, still thinking of us, of me. Grateful for our other coworker, quarantining because of COVID, still checking in on me. Grateful for our security team, making sure I’m processing, making sure I’m doing okay. Overwhelming gratitude, still muddled by confusion. By pain. By fear.

I’ll be checking in with kids throughout my building for…days. Weeks. Maybe months. Maybe longer. This doesn’t happen often around here. Not as long as I’ve been here, and I can’t remember my predecessors saying anything about it. I’m wringing my hands, just hoping I can be enough for them.

My job description generally ends with “Other Duties as Assigned;” an old catch-all used to encompass everything that we can’t expect, but are still responsible for assisting with. I’m used to responding to emergencies. I’m used to responding to crises. I’m not used to this. This is Other Duties as Assigned.

All day, I’ve been playing with my bracelets with the hand I had balled over the kid’s chest. I’ve been squeezing my arm, my shoulder, with the hand that forced its way down into his chest. I’ve been wringing my hands all day. My hand occasionally finds its way up to my heart. It feels different. I press into my own chest and breathe. For now, I think that’s all I can do. And that scares me.

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I went to therapy after clawing it out of my workplace; the good stuff, not just standard therapy. If anyone’s ever told you that you need EMDR therapy, just do it. It really does help. It took months of on-and-off sessions to be able to convince myself I hadn’t failed, that I had done everything I could have in the moment, and that it wasn’t my fault. Wounds heal, but you always remember where your scars are, even if others don’t see them.

My staff, my rock, were starting to trickle out, too. Coworkers transitioning into new sectors, supervisor leaving for a different college…and I eventually followed suit, scared of tackling a new year without all of them. Got a job closer to where I’d grown up…although, anywhere felt closer next to a twelve-hour drive or a thirty-plus hour Amtrak ride. There was too much hurt tied up in the place, so I packed up, helped the college start their year, and left for my new job.

It was new. High schoolers, not college students. Lots of medical elements. New pressure. Different pressure. A lot of new potential for something to go wrong. I cried in my office a number of times, and then cried at my (still mostly-in-boxes) apartment. Maybe it was just a days-long panic attack? But near the end of my first week, I spoke with a good friend about my dilemma, my uncertainty, my pain. They reminded me I always had an out. I called my mother, and I remember her asking how my first week was going. And then I remember bursting into tears, and her stepping into another room as I asked if I could live with her for a while.

I lasted at the new place for a grand total of four workdays before resigning on Friday, five if you count the Student Carnival I helped at on Saturday. I can’t remember how I explained it to my supervisor, but she took it better than most places would. Residence Life is a difficult sector to work in, but I’ll always concede that they get it. They get how hard it can be. I vowed that would be my last time in ResLife.

That Sunday, I left to live with my mom and her husband in Indiana, just far enough out of my home region to feel foreign. I took a few weeks off from any kind of work to just be. Visited friends I hadn’t seen since before the pandemic. Walked and drove around my hometown, my college town. Ate regional food. Just lived. It was amazing.

And then bills and loans started to kick back up. Despite having squirreled away as much as my work would permit me to, I was terrified to dip too deeply into those savings. So I started applying for new work, all over the place: game stores, food service, retail, office. In total, I had eight interviews. Three of those interviews ended in complete ghosting by the employer; no follow-up, no final say.

Of tens of applications, I nabbed four offers: the first, resulted in too much physical pain. Resigned after three weeks. The second, debilitating atmosphere. Depressive. Resigned after one day. The third, I didn’t even start. Pay was abysmal, demanded full availability while being unable to promise any semblance of normalcy. The fourth, at the movie theater in my college’s town, was a step down from what I applied for, but it was work, and not as draining as the others.

I enjoyed the work. Movie theater popcorn never stopped smelling good, I could enjoy rushes and relish slow periods. I loved being responsible for myself and the work that I did, not other people. But the pay was abysmal everywhere. Affording a place to live was out of the question. Transferrable skills weren’t transferring fast enough. Nothing felt sustainable.

So, I caved. I started applying for work in ResLife again. It was familiar work, even as unpredictable and terrifying as it could be. The devil you know is better than the devil you don’t. I’ve mentioned it to some people; a few of them said something like “it sounds like you’re ready.” I don’t know if that’s the case. I think I’m just desperate enough to crawl back into a familiar space, a familiar rhythm, even if it almost destroyed me once before.

And now, I’m back in again. Back to the grind. Back on the old horse. Back to one of the only things it feels like I know, even when it’s constantly changing. In some ways, it feels better. More structured. Staff and coworkers are better about taking personal time, not always being on-the-clock. I met my RAs for the first time recently; they’re drained. This year’s been hard for them, in different ways. I tell them I’ll be there for them as much as I can, a promise I’ve made to every staff I’ve had to date. Time will tell what this year will do. What other years will do.

There have been a lot of bad days. Intrusive thoughts. Catching glimpses of traumatic memories in mind’s eye. Calculating out fatal equations. “Oh if I just fall off this balcony like this, maybe it won’t hurt when I die.” Bouts of phantom pain. Feeling unable to justify living. Bad days.

But there have been good days. Times with friends, with family, that I hadn’t seen in far too long. Fun days at work, with coworkers who have become chosen families. More fun evenings after work, with movies, and dogs, and cats that I’m magically not allergic to, and cats that I am allergic to, but love all the same. Laughter. Love. Hugs. Good days.

I can’t quantify or predict if the bad days in my life will outnumber the good, or vice versa. All I can do, and all I want to do, is keep living regardless. Living out of spite. Living for the sake of living. Living because there’s bound to be another great day on the horizon. My scars will always be with me, but the fact that I suffered them need not define me. I’ve done, and I did, everything I could.