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One by one, U.S. military veterans walked to a podium at Kansas City’s VFW headquarters Tuesday, describing the brutal effects of exposure to toxic smoke while in the service. Headaches. Cancers. Difficulty breathing. Broken families and lost friends. Death. The vets have endured years of illness — and a government that too often seems indifferent to their suffering. “These veterans who are looking for care are being betrayed,” said William Wisner, who works with Burn Pits 360, an advocacy group for veterans dealing with toxic poisoning. “It’s not right,” he said. (4/20)

We have been receiving announcements about colleagues leaving primary care on a regular basis. Though a smattering of reasons are given, they usually fall into a few buckets: pursuing new ventures outside of health care, “needing a break” without any clear plan of returning, or early retirement. Their departures are both heartbreaking and unsurprising. And the gaps they leave threaten the entire health care system. A 2021 National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine report emphasized that primary care is the only health care component where an increased supply is directly associated with better population health, lower mortality rates, and more equitable health outcomes. (Katherine Gergen Barnett, 4/21)

My father took his life in November 2019. He was 83, of sound mind and terminally ill with Stage 4 cancer complicated by COPD. He’d been treated for melanoma a decade earlier and knew what that entailed. Fiercely independent, he considered what lay ahead as his condition progressed, weighed the pros and cons of the choices available to him and eventually decided to take matters into his own hands. In the note he left behind, my father wrote that he saw no point in seeing his cancer through to the end. So he shot himself. I'm at peace with my father's decision. I am not at peace with his means of dying. (Ann Schuur, 4/20)

It’s been 10 years. More than 10, and it still hurts. Maybe not as frequently as it once did, but the grief is there. It lingers on, waiting to pop up at the most inconvenient moments. Suicide is a complex type of grief. There’s the classic guilt. Doubt. Confusion. Betrayal. Sorrow. Shock. Trauma. All combined with the slow realization that what we’re grieving isn’t just the person. We grieve our former selves. I’m not who I was, but I sure do wish I were. It feels as though my very DNA has changed, and no matter what I do, I can’t get it to go back. (Kelly O'Malley, 4/21)

Talking about the end of our lives may be considered taboo, but it’s an important discussion to have with loved ones. In the decade I worked as a practicing nurse, I saw the struggle and grief of families who had to make end-of-life decisions without knowing what their loved ones wanted. It can be traumatizing to guess at these choices, especially following unexpected events. (Laura Templeton, 4/20)