Zibby Mag

By Meghan Riordan Jarvis

As with many of the hard things in my family, my father’s diagnosis was announced with a practiced emotional sleight of hand. My mother slipped the word “cancer” between descriptions of unseasonable weather and early blooming roses. She cushioned it with a “We expect everything to be fine” so subtly the worry almost didn’t register; it was hours later that I found myself thinking, Wait a minute…

I’m a “tell me everything” kind of gal. I want expert opinions and lots of them. I want the white blood cell count and the correct spelling of medications. I want every person who has been even adjacent to a similar story to take me through, day by day, what to expect. Information soothes me. Unfortunately, I was raised in a “shake it off, you’ll be fine, let’s just wait and see” kind of household.

That’s not to say my parents didn’t seek treatment: My father had as many rounds of chemo as his body could tolerate before the medicine transformed back into poison and began to kill rather than cure him. He fought, but even with the best chemical artillery, small cell cancer is a battle that typically ends within a year.

My parents and a few of my siblings didn’t exactly paint a rosy picture of my father’s diagnosis, but they still seemed to be wearing sunglasses despite the clouds. I sought my own experts, cried in the car and the shower, and ultimately decided to spend more time with him while he was quickly and quietly dying.

Late in his diagnosis, my father was in the ER hours after I had arrived to visit. His doctor sent him into a surgery that would hopefully stem pain they’d yet been able to get under a nine. My mother and I were assured the procedure was routine; we thought nothing of my staying while she returned home to water her early-blooming roses.

Back in his room a few hours later, my father was pain-free and smiling, flirty with the nurses, and, perhaps most remarkably, hungry for the first time in weeks. We ordered some tomato soup which he slurped happily until his face squeezed tight with pain and his head snapped back at an unnatural angle. In an instant, the room was filled with beeping and running and screaming.

I was screaming.

One of the medical staff guided me to the corner of the room and spoke to me in a hushed tone that was oddly audible despite the chaos. “You should think about calling anyone who might want to come,” she explained. But hours had passed; it was almost 2 a.m., and my people were too far or too asleep to make the phone call worthwhile.

The nurse walked away, but I stood breathless and planted. I was afraid if I moved I would detonate. Never have I felt so crowded yet completely alone.

Somehow, my father managed to not die. At dawn, he came out of his forced sedation teary and grateful. I’d stood like a statue for so long I did not trust myself to move without collapse, but I managed to kiss his forehead and told him to sleep.

Finally, I crept out of my father’s room through the silent, overly bright halls of the hospital into the chilly morning air outside, where the sun was just beginning to rise. I closed my eyes as the glowing pink covered my face, and I heard music.

The tune was familiar. I was surprised to discover the notes came from inside me — even more surprised when I began to hum.

Taking a deep breath, I walked toward my car, shaking off the panic and grief the way a dog shakes off fear.

Suddenly, I recognized it. The song was something I’d heard before.

I was afraid if I moved I would detonate. Never have I felt so crowded yet completely alone.

It had been more than a year since I’d heard it, maybe two. My husband had bribed me, promising tacos from my favorite food truck if I would meet him at a play that was still being workshopped. We sat five rows from the front and though I’d never even heard of Ben Platt, I would never forget him.

The plot of Dear Evan Hansen was enough to overwhelm me even when I wasn’t grieving. Ben Platt gutting his way through the soundtrack is what did me in. Written by then relatively unknown Benji Pasek and Justin Paul (who are also the geniuses responsible for The Greatest Showman), the first act ends with the ethereal song “You Will Be Found,” sung through tears by Platt.

I had only driven for a minute wishing I could recall the words to match the tune when it occurred to me that the play had made it to Broadway. I pulled over and searched iTunes, quickly finding the soundtrack and my specific song. The first bars of the song began, chills exploding across my body as I understood the unexpected echoes of my mind.

Like a sense memory, I was transported back to when I was frozen with emotional overload in that D.C. theater. I had held my breath until the lights came up at intermission, afraid of sobbing if I so much as twitched when my cheerful, thirsty husband asked if I wanted a drink from the bar.

Like a woman with a gun between her shoulder blades, “I’m afraid to move” was all I could manage to say.

My body remembered, though my mind may not have. In the throes of similar overwhelming emotions, my memory stitched the musical’s soundtrack to my sense of isolation. And just like that, my hero’s journey earned itself an anthem. I would mark the next few weeks of my father’s death with the accompaniment of a stirring musical score and the velvet voice of the devastated Ben Platt.

Evan Hansen’s story is one of isolation, self-destruction, and profound grief. By the time my dad died the show and the actors had won all of the awards; tickets seemed to cost roughly the price of a drug habit. But it was my drug, taking me away from the impossible moments, offering me sweet relief in the form of a melody.

My phone says the song is my most listened to by a long shot— something like 6,000 times. There were days when I had one AirPod in with the soundtrack on loop. I eventually saw the show again on Broadway — five times, actually.

My body remembered, though my mind may not have. In the throes of similar overwhelming emotions, my memory stitched the musical’s soundtrack to my sense of isolation.

None of us really know how to grieve; it’s a skill we learn by necessity and is often improvised. On anniversaries and those inevitable, random difficult days, I turn up the volume on Ben Platt and Rachel Bay Jones and their cast mates, allowing the grief in my body to swell with the notes.

Songs have a cadence — a beginning, a middle, and an end — which provides the perfect scaffolding for a few minutes to be deep in my feelings. Some days one song is all I need; on others, I listen to the soundtrack the whole way through. I know my grief will never end, but I can trust the music will find me, whenever I need it.

You Will Be Found

by Benj Pasek & Justin Paul

Have you ever felt like nobody was there?
Have you ever felt forgotten in the middle of nowhere?
Have you ever felt like you could disappear?
Like you could fall, and no one would hear?

Well, let that lonely feeling wash away
Maybe there’s a reason to believe you’ll be okay
’Cause when you don’t feel strong enough to stand
You can reach, reach out your hand

And oh, someone will come runnin’
And I know, they’ll take you home

Even when the dark comes crashin’ through
When you need a friend to carry you
And when you’re broken on the ground
You will be found
So let the sun come streamin’ in
’Cause you’ll reach up and you’ll rise again
Lift your head and look around
You will be found

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Meghan Riordan Jarvis, MA, LCSW is a psychotherapist specializing in trauma-informed care and grief and loss. She works in private practice in Washington, D.C. After experiencing PTSD after the death of both of her parents within two years of each other, Meghan started the platform Grief is My Side Hustle, which includes her popular blog, links to her podcast under the same name, and her free writing workshop “Grief Mates.”

Meghan’s memoir Chasing Dark Skies will be published by Zibby Books in 2023.