Every day I wake up and my daughter isn’t here

I just found this unpublished piece from October 2021…

Every day I wake up and my daughter isn’t here. Gratitude pops in to remind me that, but for a dead car battery, my daughter wouldn’t be here at all. She is, at least, safe in the child and adolescent psychiatric inpatient unit (capis, as it’s known) just 25 minutes from home. The hospital is no more than five years old and in some ways feels more like a shopping mall than a hospital. By the time I visit in the evening, or perhaps because of covid, the round food court is all but closed. A long line up for Tim Hortons is the single exception to the rule. Across the hall is a women’s clothing store and a gift shop, closing for the day. Farther down the hall, a sushi place and Starbucks are still keeping busy, although the grates around Starbucks are halfway closed, suggesting imminent closure for the night. The pharmacy, which looks more like a boutique than a traditional drugstore, is the lone holdout.

All in all, if you have to visit your suicidal teen in hospital, it could be a lot worse.

Thanks to covid, visitors are restricted to entering via the northern most doors. A couple of workers behind plexiglass screens check each person in. They seem to have grown tired of the covid questions — do you have a fever? Have you been out of the country in the past 14 days? And so on. Most of us have heard them so many times we could recite the words ourselves.  Instead, they enquire as to whom I am hoping to visit. “Charlie”, I tell them, knowing full well that her deadname is still the one on their list. “May I ask your name?” they enquire. “Rachel. I’m HER mum”, I say emphatically to be sure that they get her name and pronouns right. I am fiercely protective of my girl and hospital bureaucracy has led to her being misgendered far too many times already in the week she has been here. Anything I can do to prevent the harm that is done every time she is referred to as a male, I do. It may seem tedious to others but it’s literally a matter of life or death for my child.

“Go on up”, they tell me. Unfortunately, CAPIS is in the southern most part of the hospital so it’s a bit of a hike to get from the north doors to the south elevators. Not that I am complaining— well perhaps a little bit. In truth, I am mostly grateful that my daughter is one of the few patients who is visited every day. I wish they were all so fortunate. Every child has a story and sadly not all of them include a family like ours, supportive, loving, and privileged enough to be able to visit daily.

I exit the elevators and turn to my left. The door is only a few yards away and I pick up the phone to call the unit. “Charlie’s mum here”. “Come in. The door is open,” they respond immediately.

The next stop is the nurse’s station, where they ask me if I have brought anything for Charlie. Today it’s just food. Granny has made a plum torte, Charlie’s favourite, for me to bring her. Most days, it has been books, which she’s going through at a rate of about a book a day.

Next, I stroll down the hall and knock on the big hospital room door. Charlie has a private room, likely because nobody seems to know what to do with a trans child. Socially, she would be better off with roommates. For the purpose of our visits, a private room is a luxury.

If only they had kept her for longer. Ten days there and Charlie left just as broken as she arrived. Less than two months later, we lost Charlie forever. Too little was available to us in the way of support. Our provincial government is more concerned about lining the pockets of their millionaire friends and building needless highways than saving the lives of our precious children.

Every day I wake up and my daughter isn’t here. I cry tears from a spout that never dries. I am broken in a way only fellow mourning parents can ever understand. I’m not the person I want to be. I can’t even feel empathy for so many who deserve it. I simply don’t have the capacity. I’m sorry.