Innocence Revisited

by Cathy Kezelman

  I had a fantastic understanding of grief before Angie died. At least I thought I did. In twenty years of medicine I’d seen lots of loss; a widowed spouse; a family in mourning; accidents; operations and illnesses; the countless tragedies of living. But my grief seemed much worse than any I’d ever witnessed. It tore me apart, pounding me from morning to night, to morning again.

  My internal monologue was a tirade. ‘Hey world, stop what you’re doing! Why world, why did you take Angie away? Why? Tell me why, I’m begging you! What is wrong with you WORLD? Bring her back right now, you hear? Right NOW!’

  Eyes prised apart, sitting bolt upright in bed, pillows crumpled behind my back, I tried to shield my eyes from another night of horror. The tape replayed night after night, a ghoulish panoply of images; the mangled wreck of twisted metal; Angie’s lifeless body pinioned to a tree; the rot of death. I clutched the tangle of sweat-soaked sheets to my chest, shaking.

  I dreaded the nights. I could not rest.

  Angie had now been dead for two months.

  Only the light of morning brought any possibility of relief from the cruel limbo of my nights.

  ‘Come on now. Think of the kids. You need to get out of bed for the kids! Come on now, you can do it. Yes you can. Come on, Cathy, you can’t spend the whole day in bed!’

  I was really scared. I didn’t know what was happening to me. I’d never felt so out of control before. Formerly a person who didn’t acknowledge her feelings; now I was being ruled by them. I couldn’t deny the facts any longer. I was a bundle of nerves and I wasn’t coping. It was obvious that I needed help. But how should I get it and who from?

  I didn’t want to see a shrink. The thought of that was way too confronting. Somehow seeing a psychologist wasn’t as threatening. One benefit of being a doctor is that you get to hear who’s worth seeing across a range of fields. I’d heard good reports about a clinical psychologist, a woman called Kate, so I decided to start with her.

  Seeking help was a big step for someone as independent as me. I abhorred weakness; weakness in others and especially weakness in me. Yet my deteriorating mental state left me little choice. I dialled Kate’s number and found myself fronting up for my first session one week later.

  ‘Hello Cathy, I’m Kate. Come on in and take a seat.’ Kate’s words, although expected, caught me off guard. I momentarily considered making a break for it, thought better of it and obediently followed Kate into her office. On stepping across the threshold I spotted a chunky armchair in the opposite corner and made a beeline for it, sat down and tried to mark out my territory. It didn’t work. I felt like an alien. I didn’t belong in a psychologist’s office.

  Kate shut the door behind me and went to the matching armchair opposite me. I squirmed in my chair and sized her up. She was middle-aged and had no blatantly aversive features. It didn’t mean I could get comfortable though. I tried snuggling up against the armrest on one side and then right back into the corner of the chair. Damn armchair was too big. When I sat back, my feet didn’t reach the floor. I felt small and insignificant, like a child. I tried tucking my legs under me, but they shot back out leaving me perched like shag on a rock. By then the perspiration was flowing; my armpits were sodden. Kate watched all of my machinations. She’d effortlessly settled back into her chair with one simple manoeuvre.

  She looked across at me and smiled. I averted my eyes and studiedly looked past her to the muted apricot wall behind. From there I followed the wall around the room. The room was pleasing to the eye, painted soothing pastel hues throughout and peppered with a few vibrant paintings. On the table next to me was a vase with flowers. A nice touch, I thought.

  Kate smiled again and nodded. I looked away and over to the desk covered with papers towards the far wall. Then checked out the couch on the other side of me and gazed up at the ceiling. Although Kate’s ceiling was more captivating than most, I soon had to look back down. An old hand at such games, she caught my eye and nodded again. This nod, a little more pointed than the first, was harder to ignore. I wiped the sweat off my brow and gulped hard.

  ‘I don’t know whether you can help me. I don’t know. I just don’t know what’s wrong.’

  I can’t remember precisely what I said, but none of the words came easily. I can recall the long awkward silences and the forced reluctant snippets offered to fill them. I didn’t ever feel comfortable. In fact I spent the entire session wanting to bolt. Somehow I survived but not without being bathed in a lather of sweat by the end of the fifty minutes.

  ‘Yes Angie and I were very close. Yes we were.’

  Kate looked straight at me; I looked away. I’d said enough. I didn’t want to give too much away, not yet. Not ever.

  I hadn’t come to terms with the news delivered that fateful ‘Good Friday’ just over a year earlier. I was at home with three of my children.

  ‘Hey behave yourselves, will you? We need to pack.’

  My three youngest children were horsing around like kids do best.

  I tried to look stern. ‘Okay now off you go and get your stuff ready, you hear? Lay it out on your beds. That way I can check it all to see that you haven’t forgotten anything.’

  ‘But Muuuum!’

  ‘Yes darling, I know that you can pack your own things, I do, but just let Mummy make sure that you haven’t forgotten anything, okay? We don’t want to get all the way up to Coffs Harbour and find something missing, now do we?’

  They scurried off to their rooms, chuckling. The house bubbled.

  That’s when the door bell rang. I couldn’t imagine who it might be. I wasn’t expecting anyone.

  ‘Here!’ I shouted tossing the clothes I had in my hands to my son. ‘Thanks darling. Just put them on my bed, will you?’

  I didn’t know what to make of the young police officer standing in front of me. He looked serious, but then they always do.

  ‘Good morning, ma’am. I-I’m looking for Dr Kezelman,’

  ‘That’s me,’ I nodded. ‘What can I do for you officer?’ I asked, ushering him inside.

  ‘I think you should ah… sit down, ma’am,’ His lips were quivering and he looked awfully pale with his forehead full of pimples.

  ‘No thanks. I’d rather stand.’ I felt a hand slip into mine. My thirteen year old son had taken a break from terrorising his younger sisters with his Hannibal Lecter mask and returned to my side.

  ‘Your brother contacted us. He asked us to come and see you. I-I’m afraid that I have some bad news. It’s your niece, Angela.’

  ‘Angela?’

  ‘Yes, Angela. I’m afraid, ma’am that Angela died this morning… in a car accident up north. Your brother, Simon isn’t it? Well he asked us to…’

  My son gripped my hand with all his might. His eyes were welling up.

  ‘Angie? Angie’s dead?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am. I’m afraid she is.’

  ‘But how? It’s not possible?’

  ‘I’m so sorry…’

  My legs gave way as I slammed the young constable back outside. I steadied myself against the doorframe and pulled my son against me. As we slumped to the floor we clung to one another, sobbing hard. The girls came barrelling over, tears streaming, anticipating something bad, but not yet knowing the news. How could I tell them what I knew would break their hearts? All of my kids adored their big country cousin. Angie had always been special to them, like a sister.

  People don’t die at eighteen! Surely it was a mistake? Angie couldn’t be dead. No way! Not Angie! I’d only just spoken to her the night before, she was alive then. And she’d sounded great, the best she’d sounded in ages. The last year had been ghastly; she’d lost her Mum and then had all that awful family drama. No way, Angie wasn’t dead. She couldn’t be!

  ‘I’m going up to see the whole clan, Auntie Cathy. Up to the farm and you know what? It’s all going to be okay. I’m sure of it. Linda’s picking me up around nine and we’ll be off…’

  It wasn’t all okay at all.

>   Our dear sweet Angie died on 9th April 1998, a road statistic. A meaningless number that flashed up onto television screens at the end of the news, after the feel-good animal story, and just before the weather report.

  Somehow I bumbled through that first session of therapy and went back for more. After a few more sessions I reluctantly signed up for more ongoing sessions; every Monday and Thursday for the foreseeable future. There were a few rules:

  All consultations would last fifty minutes.

  If I arrived late, the time wouldn’t be made up; my session would be shorter.

  If I wanted to cancel an appointment, 24 hours notice was expected, otherwise I would be charged.

  Twice a week thereafter I fronted up to therapy, feeling like a lamb to the slaughter. It wasn’t Kate’s fault. I would have felt that way with any therapist. It was circumstantial, not personal. For the first time in my life I had been granted the opportunity to talk about myself, but I struggled with the attention and with having to explore and reveal aspects of myself which I had kept hidden, even from me.

  Kate’s therapeutic style not only discourages small talk but puts the onus on the client to get the ball rolling. At first I’d do whatever I could to derail the beginnings of my sessions.

  ‘I’m just going to sit here and say nothing. Whatever she does she’s not going to make me talk.’ My attempts at winning silences didn’t work because Kate could sit in silence longer than I could.

  ‘I know her game; I can stare longer than she can. Okay, okay. You win!’ I tried staring Kate down frequently, but she’d invariably stare back longer and harder than I could. Asides, distractions and any attempt to steer the conversation away from me failed dismally in the hands of an expert. So eventually I’d start to talk and I’d keep on talking. I’d talk about myself again and again and then I’d come back for another appointment and do it all over again.

  chapter 3

  ‘So Cathy, tell me. Did you have many friends in primary school?’

  I’d been in therapy for a few weeks and Kate was trying to find out more about my childhood. Being a doctor I was used to taking a history. Asking the questions, that is. Answering them was a whole new ball game.

  I cast my mind back to my schoolgirl days.

  ‘Hmm, let’s see. I would have been 5, maybe 6, when I started school. And say 11 or 12 when I left. That was Humpybong. Humpybong first, and then Indooroopilly, but only a couple of years at Indooroopilly. That’s all.’

  I tried to conjure an image of Humpybong primary; the playground, classrooms, teachers, any friends, but I couldn’t. Not one.

  ‘And how about Indooroopilly? I asked myself. I could feel Kate’s eyes on me, watching me and waiting for an answer.

  ‘I don’t know. I can’t remember.’ I mumbled looking at my feet.

  I felt the heat rush to my face and I wanted to disappear; the shame of it. If only the floor would rise up and swallow me whole. I’d never felt comfortable talking about myself but this was excruciating.

  ‘And, Cathy what did you like to eat when you were younger?’

  My own children’s likes and dislikes came to me in a flash, but that wasn’t the question. I needed to produce some of my own, but they weren’t mine at all. None were.

  ‘I don’t know. I can’t remember.’

  ‘What did you do on weekends, Cathy?’

  More questions. Enough already! Why won’t she stop?

  ‘I don’t know. I can’t remember.’ But this time I added, ‘But I did have a happy childhood. I know I did. My mother told me so.’

  I heard how this sounded as I articulated the words out loud. As the sweat cascaded down my face I slumped down in my chair. I wanted to hide but there was nowhere to go. I felt utterly exposed with my failure laid out for the whole world to see.

  So my memory wasn’t the best. So what? That’s what I’d told myself over the years. Boy how I’d hated it whenever my friends reminisced; remembering where they sat in a classroom, a teacher’s name, things which had been said. I’d sit frozen in silence feeling more inadequate by the second and ever more alienated. I was forever wanting to contribute, but invariably unable to make a start.

  And now for the first time, saying it aloud to a stranger, I was admitting that it wasn’t okay. In fact it never had been. Something was wrong. Seriously wrong.

  ‘Cathy… Cathy!’ Kate’s insistent tone penetrated my psyche from the back of beyond and I stirred. We were reaching the end of the session. I couldn’t give any answers to any of the questions about my childhood she had posed. At first my inability to answer had rattled me, but my subconscious soon steered my escape as I spaced out. As I lifted my head back out of my lap, the apricot walls came back into focus. I looked to the side and saw the detail of a vase with lilac tulips of the most dulcet tones beside me. Nothing had changed in the room and yet everything had changed for me. I was missing large chunks of my childhood memory and for the first time in my life I was acknowledging just how abnormal that was.

  But I did have a happy childhood, didn’t I? Yes, of course I did. I tried replaying the message that I’d heard repeatedly over the years, on the stuck turntable of my mother’s affirmation, ‘Baba, you had a happy childhood. Everything was done for you.’

  But its persuasion had faded. If I’d had a happy childhood, why couldn’t I remember it? What was wrong with me?

  chapter 4

  I peeked out from the cocoon I’d fashioned between the sheets, dreading the day. I’d tossed and turned all night and even though the sun was shining and the sky was an iridescent blue, the world felt bleak.

  Despite four months having passed since Angie’s death, my grief felt as raw as it had on day one. Grieving is a gradual process and these were early days. Yet while other members of my family were starting to get on with their lives, I was coping less well all the time. I fought every morning just to get out of bed. Luckily, the thought that my family and patients needed me helped me sustain some of the motions of daily life. There were many activities; however, that I couldn’t tackle. My husband struggled, not just to handle those practicalities that I couldn’t, but to also follow the change in me. Being able to articulate what was happening to me would have helped, but I was too confused to be able to do that. I was not only overcome with grief, but was also shattered by my memory loss. Further exploration had defined a ten year stretch during which few childhood memories remained, and that realisation scared the hell out of me.

  There was one day in particular which heralded a further downhill slide. It started with the usual daily push to get myself out of bed, the extra effort for taking a shower and the cursory brushing of my hair. I didn’t even bother to look in the mirror. I rarely sought the mirror’s approval anymore; I didn’t like what I saw. I donned a sombre grey ensemble, packed my kids in the car, drove them to school and cajoled myself into my surgery.

  I consulted the first few patients on autopilot, but as the morning marched on, the icy chill of Angie’s death made me lose track of what I was doing. One minute I was writing a prescription for Mr Thomson’s blood pressure pills and the next, Mrs McKay, an octogenarian with diabetes, was retrieving a frothy sample from her coat pocket. Problem was that I couldn’t remember Mr Thomson leaving or Mrs McKay arriving.

  Responding to a quizzical looking Mrs McKay, I covered as best I could. ‘Very well, Mrs McKay, now let’s see how we’re going, shall we?’ and transported her offering to the sink. ‘No problem there, Mrs… er…’ and returned to my seat.

  Mrs… er… said something. I nodded and she said something else and Mrs… er… kept talking, but her words ran together into one long word which I couldn’t recognise. My head was pounding, my pulse pelting along at twenty to the dozen. I felt like a pressure cooker about to blow.

  ‘If she doesn’t shut up, I-I’ll do something, I will. I’ll scream!’

  I grabbed the front of my desk and gritted my teeth.

  Next time I looked up the room was empty.
No Mr Thomson and no Mrs McKay either.

  ‘Dr Kezelman, are you ready in there? Can I come in?’

  The door swung open and Mr McIntyre, an old repat patient, normally a favourite, shuffled in. Mr McIntyre talked at me and he was asking me things, wanting… Next thing I knew, my secretary was bending over me, asking me if I was alright. From my position, splayed across the desk and bewildered as to how I’d got there, I didn’t know how to answer her.

  After several such incidents I was forced to take stock. In twenty years of practice I’d dragged myself out of a sick bed on more than one occasion because of a misguided sense of duty. In this case I couldn’t maintain the facade. I knew it was only a matter of time before I’d commit a serious blunder. Fortunately the doctor in me was still functioning enough to force an admission; that I was no longer fit to practice.

  I considered my options. I had to take some time off work, but how much time was the question. I settled on a four month sabbatical, a period which seemed long enough to regain my health, and brief enough that I might preserve my skills. Having never taken a day’s sick leave, four months seemed like an eternity. I was convinced that by the end of the period I would be completely back on deck.

  I couldn’t have been more wrong. At the end of the allotted time I was feeling worse than ever. I was forced to make one of the hardest decisions of my life. Rather than extending my leave further, I decided to quit altogether.

  In leaving work I relinquished not only a role but a self-definition. Being a doctor gave me respectability and a confidence I hadn’t found in my everyday life. As a doctor behind the consulting desk, I was the person in authority. People came to me to seek advice and counsel. It was a vital role for me. Once discarded, it rendered me more vulnerable than ever.