Grief, Loss, Tragedy and Court Cases…a Common Thread

My early morning flight out of Tampa yesterday was more invigorating that a cup of coffee. Squeezed in like sardines (the flight was FULL), I sat in the same row as a woman from Paris headed to Baltimore and a grandfather headed to Maine. As we all chatted about where we were going and why, the conversation casually turned to children. When the man asked our seat mate how old her son was, she responded that he was 28.

“Twenty-eight was how old my son was when he died.” And this began the story of how this man’s son had died of an overdose of Methadone, prescribed by a highly unethical doctor named Kadosa. This grandfather had taken it upon himself to file charges and chase this doctor into court, but the doctor has managed to flee the country (back to his native Hungary) before any decisions could be made. All of this happened about four years ago, and this man and his wife now have permanent custody of their 7-year-old granddaughter.

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My background in trauma and adoption led me to ask many questions about the girl, how she was coping with all that has happened in her young life and what things they were doing to help her. The woman between us was overwhelmed I’m sure as we talked about the struggles they experience as they deal with their grief and loss issues from this tragedy, and the on-going tension with the granddaughter’s drug-addicted biological mother.

Then the conversation turned to my family and I offered up that I was an adoptive mom of a special needs child from China. They had several questions about what her disabilities looked like, what her life was like in China, etc. Somewhere in the conversation I mentioned the struggles with the school district, and must have said the words “court case”.

I watched this grandfather, who has been through so much in his own life over the last few years soften and actually tear up when I briefly explained what struggles we had with the school system and why we were in the legal battle.

“I understand what it’s like,” he offered, “to need to right a wrong and to spend so much time, energy and passion to do so.”

And I knew I’d met a kindred spirit, one who had been on a mission. In his case, he opined that the legal pursuit had ended in vain, since the doctor was now safely out of the reach of the U.S. legal system. But as he talked further, it was evident that a number of people benefited from this grandfather’s perseverance and passion. He had helped his granddaughter’s teenage half-sister as she went to high school and started college, and now this young lady was headed to law school. He had saved untold lives of people in Florida who would have gotten hooked up with this unscrupulous doctor, and then, of course…and this is no small mission…there was parenting his own granddaughter.

So, I hopped off the plane inspired to keep on “righting the wrongs” for our kids, with the knowledge that I’m truly not alone in those pursuits. When it seems like tragedies involving children are happening every day (and they are), remember that people doing the right thing for kids are also out there…everywhere you travel.

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