Life Is Short (No Pun Intended)

by Jennifer Arnold

  I still hold a grudge over failing my first test. My evaluator requested I make a left-hand turn on a single-lane road during rush hour where the oncoming traffic was backed up for twenty cars. I watched three green lights go by and couldn’t make the left due to oncoming traffic. There was a growing pile of cars building behind me. At the fourth green light, a car in the opposite lane flashed his lights, honked his horn, and waved me on so I could make the left. I felt very stressed because everyone behind me was freaking out, so I made the left. I failed the exam because you should never make a left with oncoming traffic regardless of whether they wave you on. Apparently, you’re supposed to just wait, even if it means waiting for rush hour to end. Needless to say, when I went to take my test the second time, it was not during rush hour.

  That fall, I was going to be moving into a high-rise apartment in a building across the street from the George Peabody Library, the exquisite library for the whole university, not the Welch Medical Library, which was for medical students on the hospital campus. My roommate was one of my medical school classmates, Aruna, whom I had become good friends with. My father drove back to Maryland with me, and we pretty much split the time behind the wheel on the trip. I didn’t mind the highway stretches as much as I thought I would, and at least I wasn’t alone in case I panicked. What a relief it was for me to be driving to Johns Hopkins to be on the opposite side of the “knife!” It was kind of funny that my first long haul in my new car with my newly gained license was to Johns Hopkins Hospital.

  It was no surprise, given the short time that I had to learn to drive, that within two weeks of getting back to Baltimore I got into my first car accident. I was with my friend Eileen, who had actually gone to St. Charles and Bishop Moore with me. Now she was in Baltimore getting a master’s in nursing at Johns Hopkins, and we had reconnected. The day of the accident, I was dropping her off at her condo after a day of fun bopping around the city. I was just pulling up to the front of her building when a parked car suddenly pulled out and hit me on the passenger side, where Eileen was sitting. I probably wasn’t road smart enough yet to notice that the car was about to move. The driver did not have her blinker on, which she was supposed to when leaving the curb. Nevertheless, she sideswiped us and caused significant damage to my car. Although I was pretty shaken up and that sound of metal on metal was etched in my mind, fortunately, everybody was okay. It was a very low-velocity accident.

  It was a Sunday afternoon, and we were stuck without transportation while my car was being towed. Donna lived pretty far outside of town, so I called Dr. Kopits to see if he could help. I trusted him and knew if he was available, he’d be there. He was there within half an hour and found us quite shaken up, but otherwise fine. He was very calm about it all, and to my great relief, he even agreed to call my mother. “Judy, Judy,” I could hear him say into his cell phone in his very thick Hungarian accent, “everything is okay.” He told her he would arrange for the car to be towed and take me home. Thank God for Dr. Kopits!

  I had a couple more fender-benders after that. One time, I sideswiped the concrete block inside the parking garage trying to back out of my space. I hate to make excuses for myself, but in all seriousness, having a fused neck that prevented me from rotating my head at all might have played a part in that particular bender.

  Another time, I was late getting to the hospital for one of my rotations and forgot that I was in reverse and slammed into a car behind me. I had just backed up a tiny bit in order to reach the button for the gate to the parking garage at the hospital, but then I forgot to put the car into drive before I stepped on the gas pedal, so I backed into the car behind me. What made this accident particularly bad was that the other driver was a pediatrician, which was the field I wanted to pursue. I was mortified. Even though I didn’t know this pediatrician well, I knew he would never forget me.

  At Johns Hopkins, I continued the passion for being involved in student government that I had developed at University of Miami. I became secretary and later vice president of my class during medical school. Along with three other class officers, I was responsible for academic affairs, activities, and planning social events. It took some time, but I developed some great friends in medical school—Aimee, Michelle, Tony, and my roommates, to name a few. I got along with everyone in my class, though. Given the amount of time and stress we all went through together, it was hard not to feel close to your medical school classmates.

  We planned one social event, the Fall Ball, that I will never forget. Because I lived so close to the Peabody Library, where we were holding the event, I offered to drop off the two-thousand-dollar deposit check at the office of the events coordinator. This part of town was not the safest, and I was not the speediest person on the block, but at four o’clock in the afternoon with the library directly across the street from my apartment, it didn’t make sense to drive across the street only to struggle to find parking.

  As I was moving down the sidewalk toward the library, a seedy-looking character walked right up to me out of nowhere, as if he were going to bump right into me. “Hey, I know you,” he said, “I’ve seen you in the ER.” I smiled and realized by his tone I was not getting by without speaking with him. I didn’t know who he was, but he said he was just in the ER and proceeded to lift up his pant leg to show me his recent gunshot wounds. He must have seen me while I was on my ER rotation, but of course I didn’t remember. I was concerned about the two-thousand-dollar check in my pocket, but I was more worried about my safety. Although we were on the sidewalk in broad daylight, a large semi truck was parked on the side of the street, so we were unfortunately sandwiched between the brick wall of my apartment complex and the truck. No one driving on the street or walking on the other side of the sidewalk could really see us. I just kept thinking to myself, maybe someone else will turn the corner and walk by, so he will leave me alone.

  “You are not walking away without talking to me,” he said, moving along the sidewalk to reach me again. He then asked me for some spare change for the bus. I gave him a couple of dollars, but he still didn’t back off. “Hey, you are really cute. Do you have a boyfriend?” he asked.

  I should have said yes and continued walking, but hindsight is always 20/20. This guy had caught me completely off-guard, and I stupidly blurted out that I didn’t. This was his opening to be my “friend.”

  “You are not going away without giving me your number,” he declared. I was afraid that if I continued walking and didn’t pay attention to him, he might get angry and do something aggressive. So I gave him a phone number—a made-up one, of course—and finally, he let me by. I walked as quickly as I could to the Peabody, delivered my check, and ran home.

  Some people may think I was a little paranoid, but at three feet tall, you can never be too careful. Fortunately, the anecdote ends there, with this creepy-looking person going his way and me going mine. The nicest part of the story was that the Fall Ball was one of the most successful events of the year. I even got to rotate in as one of the “bartenders” for a while. That was amusing, since I didn’t even know how to make a screwdriver at the time!

  During medical school, I also became more involved with the organization Little People of America, only this time on a national level. Little People of America is primarily a support network, with activities and social events taking place at all its branches. However, one of the greatest things about LPA is the access it gave us to the most up-to-date medical information and specialists in the world. The Medical Advisory Board consists of a wide range of medical specialists, and many attend the LPA convention every year. The medical specialists represented in many fields, not just orthopedics. They come to the conference to see patients and consult and network with each other. At the convention, many doctors not only give seminars, but they set up a “clinic” in hotel rooms to see patients. Their schedules usually book up nine months in advance, but it’s a great opportunity to see multiple specialists from all over the country or the world at one time.


  When I was younger, I had done a few things with the local LPA chapters in Florida, but I had never participated at the national levels. Now, I really wanted to go to a national convention, and this year it was in Atlanta, Georgia.

  In Atlanta, I shared a room with a Little Person named Angel, who was ten years older but whom I had known from our local chapter in Orlando. She was absolutely fantastic and helped me understand what a national convention is all about. The conference includes social, medical, and general networking meetings. Primarily, nationals are an opportunity for thousands of Little People and their families from all over the world to meet and socialize.

  At this first national meeting, I met Martha for the first time. Martha is my age, and she took me to parties and outings where I met more LPs from all over the world. I remember one party at which drinking, socializing, and hooking up was the theme—probably a good example of why my parents never wanted me to attend a national conference! Martha had her video camera out at the party and was documenting all the fun. She tells me to this day how ironic it was to capture me with a look of shock and awe as I took in all the partying, dancing, and drinking in the room. Because I didn’t know anyone other than Martha—and the famous Vern Troyer, Mini-Me from Austin Powers—I refrained from going crazy. I had a lot of fun at the Atlanta convention and made great friends that I kept in touch with for years, and I knew that I definitely wanted to come to another one soon.

  The LPA national convention moves to a different city each year, but always ends up in a destination known to be popular with tourists. But medical school and my first year of pediatric residency were so time-consuming and overwhelming that I didn’t go again for five years. With thirty approaching, and no prospect of finding true love, I finally decided to make it a priority to find time to start attending the national conventions. In my second year of pediatric residency at Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, I attended the LPA national in Salt Lake City. There, I befriended four ladies from New York and a woman named Melody, whom I am still good friends with.

  After the 2002 Salt Lake City convention came Boston. When I later met Bill in 2006, he said he had been planning on going to that one, which would have been his first national LPA conference, but work got in the way. He even had his ticket and his hotel room booked, and his mission in Boston was going to be to find a woman. But his company was in the midst of being sold, and his CEO called him back. So our chance encounter in Boston was not to be.

  The next LPA convention was in San Francisco. There I met my first long-term boyfriend, Jeff. He was a New Yorker, an international stock trader who did well. He lived in Manhattan and we completely hit it off at first. He seemed to really like me, but I think he just wasn’t ready to love someone long term. Although we had a whirlwind relationship for about six months, he broke it off after he said it was too hard not being able to see each other more easily. You see, I was in the middle of my neonatal-perinatal fellowship, working up to one hundred plus hours a week. He said he wanted to remain friends, and even invited me to go to Africa with him on a safari after we broke up. It took some time for me to realize it, but I had to ultimately break ties with him or I would continue to have my heart broken if we kept in touch as friends. I later came to realize, of course, that Jeff and I were not meant to be and my true love was still out there looking for me.

  Nevertheless, after four long years of medical school, I was ready to graduate. There had been enough study sessions, labs, and all-nighters to kill a moose. I had seen classmates break under the pressure, but remarkably few dropped out. I had taken a series of licensing exams that were required to take my study to the next level. I had worked in all areas of the hospital, from pediatric orthopedic surgery, to obstetrics and gynecology, to ophthalmology, to adult oncological surgery, to internal medicine, to pediatrics, and more. I had the privilege of taking care of patients and observing surgeries, and had finally decided on a specialty for residency—pediatrics.

  This final year had not been without family struggles. My mom had been diagnosed with a benign, but growing, brain tumor, a meningioma. She had gone through gamma knife radiation the previous year, but had suffered a severe complication, cerebral edema, from the treatment. For months she suffered from outrageous headaches and had to take high-dose steroids. She ultimately had to have brain surgery in the fall of my last year of medical school to have the tumor removed. Because it was my last year, I was able to take an “away” elective rotation at the children’s hospital in Orlando to be home for her surgery.

  By the spring of that year, things were looking up, and March 16, 2000, a few days after my birthday, was match day. That is the day when medical students all over the country find out where they will be spending the next three or more years in residency training. After students have applied, interviewed, and then ranked their top choices for residency through the National Resident Matching Program (NRMP), the NRMP pairs students with the needs of hospital residency programs based on both parties’ rank lists. This is another big milestone during medical school.

  At this event, I had a lot of support. My very good friend from college, Suketu, had driven from Pittsburgh, where he was an OB/GYN physician resident, to visit for the event, and my dad flew in. The genetics coordinator at the skeletal dysplasia center at Hopkins, Dee, came, and Donna also showed up to support me. At the ceremony, they distribute the envelopes to all the students, and then, in an almost drum roll fashion, everyone opens them at the same time! I was matched to Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. I was thrilled, because Suketu was already an OB/GYN resident there, so I would have an instant friend and colleague. I later found out my best friend from college, Lakshmi, who stayed at our alma mater for medical school, also matched to Pittsburgh that same day for family medicine. I had loved my interview at Pittsburgh, and ultimately I loved my three years of pediatric residency at Children’s so much I decided to stay an additional three years for my neonatal-perinatal fellowship. I couldn’t have been more thrilled with my match!

  After the match celebrations came spring break, and I had plans to take a last-hurrah road trip with my good friend in medical school, Michelle. We drove from Baltimore to Orlando and finally Miami for some fun in the sun! Those were good times, and by that point I was, fortunately, a much better driver! We called it our “Bad Girls, Good Road Trip.”

  My medical school graduation took place on Thursday afternoon, May 25, at the Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, one of the premier music venues in Baltimore. My dear friend Aimee Nielson gave our class’s graduation speech and the former surgeon general, Antonia C. Novello, was our guest commencement speaker. It is tradition at graduation to be able to invite either a family member who is a physician or, sometimes, your favorite faculty member or mentor from the school to “hood” you—or place a colorful hood over your graduation gown. Different degrees get different-colored hoods, and for medicine, it is green. Since I didn’t have a physician in the family and Dr. Kopits could not hood me because he no longer worked at Johns Hopkins, Dr. Victor McKusick, who had diagnosed me as an infant, offered to hood me at graduation. His brief bio in the program read: University Professor of Medical Genetics, Institute of Genetic Medicine, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. One of the founding fathers of medical genetic research, he has been a member of the Johns Hopkins University faculty since July 1, 1947. It was extraordinary—on the faculty of Johns Hopkins for more than fifty years. I was incredibly proud to be receiving my diploma in his presence.

  Dr. Kopits had planned to be at my graduation ceremony as well, just as he had been at my college graduation. He was my biggest supporter. He said he wouldn’t miss my graduation for all the world. However, he was delayed because of a patient issue—not surprising given his dedication to his patients—and missed the ceremony. That was Dr. Kopits, all right—the patient’s needs always came first. How could I forget how he had blasted out of a dinner ceremony honoring him in Buenos Air
es when he heard I was in crisis?

  He had a strained relationship with Johns Hopkins at this point, having opened his specialized pediatric orthopedic unit at a different hospital, but fortunately nobody was worrying about the politics on this glorious day.

  When I crossed the stage, Dr. McKusick was standing there in the middle to place my doctoral hood around my neck. I was smiling so hard, I wasn’t sure I could hold it together. It had been a rough four years, and I couldn’t believe I had made it. He draped the colorful hood around my shoulders, beaming just as much as I was, and the dean of the medical school handed me my diploma.

  As I walked off the stage, I waved my diploma in the air, smiling, and the entire audience cheered. I don’t really know what got into me at that moment, but I think I couldn’t hold back my pure excitement at that point! I was getting a standing ovation from the crowd! It was one of the highlights of my life, a memory I will cherish forever. As I walked back to my seat, my dad popped out into the aisle and gave me a big hug—my parents were very proud!

  The dinner afterward was pretty awesome as well. Besides my family, I was with so many of my heroes: Dr. Kopits, who fortunately at least made that event; Donna, my hero nurse and always my friend; Diane, another great caretaker throughout my surgeries and recoveries who had a proclivity for matchmaking; and Dr. McKusick, medical geneticist extraordinaire. They were all at my table rallying for me. I couldn’t believe that these were the same people who had held my hand and promised me everything would be all right when I was only two years old in the hospital. It was beyond—absolutely beyond—special.

  Sadly, Dr. Kopits was with us for only another two years after my graduation. The master healer for everyone he touched became terminally ill himself. Brain cancer, a gliobastoma multiforme, was his undoing, much too soon. He was only sixty-five when he died on June 2, 2002. There is not a day that goes by that I don’t think of him and the wonderful out-of-this-world things he did for Little People. I was in my second year of pediatric residency when he passed away. My mother and I went to his funeral at the Cathedral of Mary Our Queen in Baltimore, as did almost five hundred Little People he had cared for. At the end of the service, they carried his casket down the aisle, at which time—without any announcement or planning—all his patients came into the aisle and held hands, sobbing as we saw him off. He was a miracle worker to thousands, truly thousands. There are countless LPs who could not walk until they met Dr. Kopits, or who had been disabled because of botched surgeries by other surgeons who did not understand the nuances and complications of skeletal dysplasias. He healed them with love and dedication as well as with surgery. Doctors like him, with surgical dexterity, brilliant inventiveness, and a bedside manner too kind for words to describe, are nearly impossible to find. I work with many wonderful doctors every day, but have never met anyone like him. There will never be another doctor in the world like Dr. Kopits. If anyone is up in heaven with the saints and angels, I know Dr. Kopits is!