My Psychologist Died and I’m Sad About It

When Zach died, I joined a Facebook group called Healing After Suicide Loss for Women. The moderator of the group, Jayne Madigan, hosts monthly zoom calls and would say (about our loss), “Year two is harder than the first.”

As I’ve written in earlier posts, Zach’s suicide wasn’t a complete shock to me. I discovered he had been suicidal before he acted on those thoughts. Added to this, he would often vocalize his distress in his last few months, in his own poetic shorthand announcing, “doom, doom, doom.” I knew he struggled. The best I could summon in those moments was a kind of weary optimism trying to bring him back from those bleak corners he had backed himself into: “It’s not all doom – you’ll be fine, we’ll work it out together…don’t be like that.” I hoped my sentiment was true.

I’m mindful to keep on top of my physical health, and as such I never truly absorbed that another would want to harm their own body. But that’s a whole other article. 

What I’m attempting to get to here is -- I didn’t quite believe year two would be harder than year one. Year one was awful – I’ve written about that – but I felt a lot stronger than the others on the group call who had readily agreed with Jayne, “yes, year two is worse.” Now we're in year two, and hmm - I’ve met the thud that comes along with it.

This whole nightmare has been especially hard because Zach was so meaningful to me. He was my best friend, my lover and my “yes” person. That kind of presence is rare – especially as one gets older, sinks into their usual routines, and spends the majority of their time alone and at home. Whatever energy I do have outside my work, I’ll mostly spend on life matters such as running household chores. The things I once loved and explored fervently in my 20s, such as music, theatre, art and dance – have quietly slipped away, gathering dust on the shelves of my life. They once filled the spaces around me, but now, without Zach with whom I had a brief renaissance enjoying such things again, they feel distant, less accessible and inviting.

I finally decided to reach out to someone who has helped me in times of suffering – my longtime therapist in Melbourne, who I’ve seen on and off for years; Peter Ross. I wanted to reconnect, to lean again on his wisdom and calm and to talk to someone who already knew my past.

I first saw Peter in 2000. He was about 50 then and I was 26. My seeking Peter out at that time was triggered by my dad meeting his now wife. Peter helped me sort through the unresolved grief of losing my mother to breast cancer and helped unpack the complicated emotions that came with my father’s new relationship and how that impacted my relationship with my dad.

Last week, I sent Peter an email, hoping to reconnect. It’d been five years since I’d last reached out. In 2020, I’d connected with him to discuss matters around my relationship with Zach. This time around I knew Peter would be saddened to hear what had come of our relationship; but I also knew he’d have comforting things to say. I’d been thinking about connecting with Peter for a few months, especially as the grief around losing Zach has lingered. When Peter didn’t respond overnight (respecting the time difference between Melbourne and LA), I had a small suspicion that perhaps he’d died. A quick search online, “Peter Ross obituary Melbourne” confirmed what I’d feared: yes - Peter had passed away, last year (November ‘24) quite unexpectedly after a brief illness at 75 years of age.

Over the years, Peter was a quiet, reassuring presence -- in person, and later through Skype calls, across continents and time zones. Peter had been my therapist through so many iterations of my life – I had sought sessions with him in person in Melbourne, and over skype in Darwin, Sydney, San Francisco, and Los Angeles. He was an unassuming constant through life’s ups and downs, and someone who held space for me without judgment. 

With Peter’s death I’m experiencing the loss of someone who took time to listen, who bore witness to my private history and helped shape how I was able to move forward and make sense of the world today. Peter’s death has left a hollow, and now I’m experiencing a double bereavement of sorts. Another piece of grief added to my already mourning Zach.

The following prayer was read out during Peter’s service (the service I found and watched online). I didn’t have a copy of the funeral program so I’m not sure where this prayer is from - but ChatGPT identifies it from “…the Bahá’í Faith or inspired by Sufi or Gnostic thought. It also echoes sentiments found in Christian mysticism and some writings from the early 20th century that sought to bridge spiritualism with faith traditions.”

Untitled

Mourn not over the death of your beloved
Call not back the traveler who is on his journey toward his goal,
for ye know not what he seeketh

You are on earth – and now he is in heaven

By weeping for the dead,
you will make sad the soul who cannot return to earth
By wishing to communicate with him,
you do but distress him

He is happy in the place at which he has arrived

By wanting to go to him,
you do not help him
Your life’s purpose still keepeth you on earth

No creature that has ever been born
has belonged in reality to any other
Every soul is the beloved of God
Doth not God love as we human beings cannot?

Death, therefore, doth but unite man with God –
for whom doth his soul in truth belong
To Him, in the end, is its return
sooner or later

Every death is a veil,
behind which is hidden life
beyond the comprehension of man on earth

If you knew the freedom of that world,
how sad hearts are unburdened of their load –
if you knew how the sick are cured,
how the wounded are healed,
and what freedom the soul experiences
as it goes further from this earthly life of limitations –

You would no longer mourn those who have passed,
but pray for their happiness in their future journey
and for the peace of their soul

Amen

LA Is Burning, but Not All of It

The LA fires were not on my radar until I logged into Facebook from my hotel room at the Plaza in downtown Las Vegas earlier this week. I was in town for the consumer electronics show (CES), the annual tech conference that attracts thousands of local, national and international attendees. My West Hollywood friend Bill's post caught my attention: he lives in a beautiful mansion in the Hollywood Hills and was sharing personal updates about the LA Fire and his surrounds.

It wasn’t long before messages started trickling in—my work, friends and acquaintances reaching out to check if I was okay. Fortunately the fires weren’t near my neighborhood in East Hollywood, however it was unsettling to piece together how quickly they had started and were spreading. A quick text into my LA neighbor confirmed that our homes were not, and unlikely to be, in danger. But the overwhelm and emotional ripple effects began to unfold.

My late bf, Zach’s former boss, a Judge at the Santa Monica Law Courts, seemed to confirm via text that she'd lost her home in the Pacific Palisades, "the whole neighborhood is gone."  Zach's friends who had recently bought a new home in Altadena close to Morgan's work at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory had to evacuate, finding refuge with friends. Even Harrington, who lives in West Hollywood, packed up and left with two friends (also living in West Hollywood) and his little dog Diesel for the night in San Diego when he had an order to evacuate. These connections gave the fires a personal weight, though my day-to-day life remained mostly untouched as I continued to battle the crowds at CES.

I flew back into Burbank Airport on Thursday night after my first flight was canceled (unsure why - as others were landing in Burbank). As soon as I stepped off the plane, the smell of smoke hit me—the air quality was noticeably different from Vegas. The taxi ride was swift and quick; the highway was largely empty around 9pm, a welcome and rare incidence. I could smell the smoke inside my home -- the sensory reminder of what’s happening miles away. 

Los Angeles County is vast and geographically dispersed, something that might not be immediately obvious to those unfamiliar with the area. The phrase “LA is burning” paints a vivid picture, but the reality is more complex. While some neighborhoods (they call them neighborhoods here, not suburbs like we do in Oz) are grappling with evacuation orders and destruction, other parts of the city feel untouched, like it’s just another week. The contrast is evident in this situation, but it’s also emblematic of how this city works—layered, sprawling, and full of parallel lives.

The fires have stirred plenty of conversations about responsibility and readiness, alongside the inevitable swirl of conspiracy theories about how they started. But for the people who’ve lost their homes, the focus is clear: What happens now? How do you rebuild after everything has been reduced to ash? There will inevitably be a lot of red tape in this process; and ripple effect for me, even though I was not directly impacted. Whether it’s housing markets, infrastructure strains, rising insurance premiums, or shifts in how we live alongside wildfire risks, I’m sure to feel those reverberations so long as I live in this city.

As a homeowner, this tragedy does question the notion of 'stability'. I’ve been fortunate that my home still stands this time, but tomorrow? The unpredictability of fires in Southern California (and elsewhere, such as my home country) and the precarious nature of life itself, serves as a constant undercurrent of unease. Naturally, Zach's untimely death proved how rapidly things can spiral and turn on a dime. 

One moment, you’re in Vegas marveling at the future of technology; the next, you’re bracing for news of how close disaster has come to your doorstep. With the LA fires we're witnessing how fleeting comfort can be. If nothing else, this week has driven home the importance of vigilance and safety; and for the parts of life that remain steady amid chaos.

One thing I know for sure. Zach would have had plenty to say about it. As an LA native, he was born and bred in this city. He loved it. And his community was on the West side (earlier note about his boss losing her home in the Pacific Palisades). I miss this about him. Our discourse, his local knowledge, and intellectual integrity. And I'm reminded that while the fires rage on in this city, so does my grief and mourning for the man who kept me here. 

Disclaimer -- unlike my usual modus operandi where I write all my blog content, the above post was initally generated from ChatGPT. I typed in a series of prompts and information, asked it to write in my usual blog post style, then spent a good time editing the generated result.