The 5 Stages of Grief - One Time and Many Returns

7:00 am - Wake up, shower, get dressed, eat breakfast, walk to work (20 blocks north, 15-20 min). 

It’s a sunny, clear, not too warm -typical September day.  I pass busses, cars, and millions of other New Yorkers going to work.  I greet the Empire State Building a couple of blocks from my house and walk by Grand Central Station, no need to go through it today since it is not pouring rain yet.  

As I cross over from 3rd Avenue to Lexington and finally onto Park on 50th Street, I take in the openness and infiniteness of Park Avenue.  Former Pan Am building and Waldorf Astoria on the left, St. Bartholomew Church and the long stretch up town on my right, and my office building across the street. 

8:53 am - Arrive at NYC McKinsey office on 52nd Street between Madison Ave and Park Ave.  I make it to the 17th floor and greet my team, all there before me because of their early trains from outside the island.   

Kim looks up and tells me “A plane just hit one of the Twin Towers”.  Her mom was on the phone sharing the news.  We look at each other with a puzzled look and I reply: “What idiot doesn’t see the Twin Towers and hits them with his tiny one-man private plane?” -  DENIAL

We realize we need to learn more, something is not right.  We walk down to the 16th floor where we have one of the few shared TVs.  This is pre-smartphone, pre-internet gives you access to everything in real time, so live news on TV was the only way to know what was happening outside of our walls.

Others have already gathered from the other offices and floors (our company had about 4-5 floors in the building).   We are all looking at the images and that is when SHOCK sets in.  There is a commercial airplane shaped hole on the North Tower.   

My first thought was: “THIS WAS NO ACCIDENT, THIS IS TERRORISM” (a remnant of growing up in Europe in the 70s and 80s - random terrorist attacks happened too often).   As I try to understand what the broadcasters are saying and what is going on, we watch a second plane hit the South Tower right in front of our eyes (through the TV screen), now PANIC sets in.   

We are in a high rise in NYC, we are under clear attack, and we are surrounded by landmarks.  While our building is not anything special, Grand Central Station is 10 blocks down, the UN is 10 blocks away, the Empire State Building is 18 blocks away,  St. Patrick’s Cathedral and Rockefeller Center are across the street to the West.  Way too close for comfort.  

I realize I need to call my parents who are back in Italy and especially my mom who is a New Yorker to let them know what is going on...and then what? My mom picks up and I tell her:” Two planes hit the Twin Towers”.  She does not understand what I am saying, asking me to repeat it. She is at work (smartphones and internet at your fingertips were not a thing yet).  She is heartbroken: HER city was attacked, one of THE Landmarks of HER city was in flames, and HER daughter was just a few miles away, surrounded by a bunch of other landmarks.  

I hang up to go back downstairs to watch what seems like a science fiction movie with others.  The South Tower suddenly crumbles as if made of sand, more PANIC.   

Is this real? Who do I call? Where do I go? What do I do?

I call my brother, who is in San Diego working in Aerospace with clearance, I ask if he knows more “from the inside”. In the meantime, two other planes crash, one in the Pentagon, and one in PA in the middle of nowhere.  

I call my aunt in Italy, who has the news on and tells me that European news channels have already declared it a terrorist attack. They are saying 4 planes were confirmed hijacked, but there may be 4 more.   Osama Bin Laden claimed “credit” for it.  WHY DOESN’T ANYONE HAVE ANY ANSWERS?  -  ANGER

At this point, all phone lines are jammed or non-functional.  My brother can call me on my office line, and that’s it.  

I manage to reach my roommate who works 30 blocks South and we talk about plans.   We cannot go home, we live 3 blocks away from the Empire State Building, which no longer feels safe.  We are not getting on the subway that goes through tunnels, bridges, and under water.  All bridges and tunnels are mostly closed anyway.  The island is very close to fully ISOLATED at this point.  We decided we will wait until 3 pm and then start walking North and hope to make it through Washington Heights and off the island (we are talking hours of walking).  - BARGAINING

We sit still, we cannot work, we cannot think, we cannot eat, the world has just turned upside down.  We want to cry, but tears are not coming out, there is too much panic, we feel paralyzed for hours, which will eventually turn into days. - DEPRESSION

Somehow the hours pass and at 5:00 pm I head home, we decide it is as close to safe as it will get for now.  Air Force planes are circling Manhattan, no one is coming through now.  

We watch, endlessly,  the same images over and over for hours (and days).  I still cannot reach any of my family members, except my brother every once in a while from the office.  I go to the office the next day, not to work, but to be away from the temptation of watching the tragedy strike over and over.  AND the office line is the only way for me to connect with my family.    Time feels like it is moving in slow motions, days are long. I can hear the ticking of the seconds in my head.   

Streets are empty and the entire island of Manhattan is silent. Life is now a fiction movie. I see maybe 3 other people on my 20-block walk to the office, and there are national guard soldiers at every street corner. I was waiting for one of them to tell me I shouldn’t be out and about.

Our company (like most companies) told us we did not have to go in, we could stay home as long as needed. There was no “handbook” process for this. The office would be open for anyone who wanted to go in, but there was no obligation to show up and it would not be counted as PTO.  I went in every day. 

By Friday the landlines were mostly back up. First thing in the morning, my cell phone rang (first time in days), it was a friend from Rome.  I answered in Italian: “Pronto”. And the voice on the other side gasped and exclaimed: “Oh Madonna, Cristina, meno male”.   [Oh my God, Cristina, thank goodness].   And I CRIED, for what seemed like eternity, I did not stop. It was the first time since Tuesday morning, it all came out like a tsunami.  All the fear, all the anxiety, all the anger, all the loneliness, all the hopelessness, and the realization that I was still there.  

The city came together, vigils, people helping each other, there was a sense of ONENESS with the 8 million people around me, we were all feeling the same feelings, we were all grieving and would be for a long time.

I am not sure when ACCEPTANCE set in. Not sure it ever did, completely. At least not the “it’s OK” or  “ everything happens for a reason” kinds.  I guess some “moving forward” happened when I got on my first plane again, took the first subway, and was able to actually work at work.  

The cycle of DENIAL and ISOLATION, ANGER, DEPRESSION, and ACCEPTANCE is still there, it comes back on the anniversary of that day and throughout the year every time I hear a plane above my head.   

We never stop grieving some events, we just learn to live with the loss. Acceptance, I have learned, is not about “being OK” with what happened, it is about accepting that it DID happen and the scar and pain left behind will always be part of us.  

The loss we experienced 20 years ago on that day became part of us and we recognize our shared pain, our deep human connection, and our oneness when we talk to someone else who was in NYC on 9/11/2001.