On an afternoon in early April, while New York City was in the throes of what would be the deadliest days of the coronavirus pandemic, Dr. Lorna M. Breen found herself alone in the still of her apartment in Manhattan.

She picked up her phone and dialed her younger sister, Jennifer Feist.

The two were just 22 months apart and had the kind of bond that comes from growing up sharing a bedroom and wearing matching outfits. Ms. Feist, a lawyer in Charlottesville, Va., was accustomed to hearing from her sister nearly every day.

Lately, their conversations had been bleak.

 

Dr. Breen worked at NewYork-Presbyterian Allen Hospital in Upper Manhattan, where she supervised the emergency department. The unit had become a brutal battleground, with supplies depleting at a distressing rate and doctors and nurses falling ill. The waiting room was perpetually overcrowded. The sick were dying unnoticed.

Ms. Feist had taken to sleeping next to her phone in case her sister needed her after a late shift.

When Dr. Breen called this time, she sounded odd. Her voice was distant, as if she was in shock.

“I don’t know what to do,” she said. “I can’t get out of the chair.”

Dr. Breen was a consummate overachiever, one who directed her life with assurance.

When she graduated from medical school, she insisted on studying both emergency and internal medicine, although it meant a longer residency. She took up snowboarding, cello and salsa dancing as an adult. Once, after she had difficulty breathing at the beginning of a half-marathon, she finished the race, then headed to a hospital and diagnosed herself with pulmonary emboli — blood clots in the lungs that can be fatal.

In addition to managing a busy emergency department, she was in a dual degree master’s program at Cornell University.

Dr. Breen was gifted, confident, clever. Unflappable.

But the woman speaking to Ms. Feist that day was hesitant and confused.

Ms. Feist quickly arranged for her sister to be picked up by two friends who would ferry her to Baltimore, where Ms. Feist could meet them to take her to family in Virginia. When Dr. Breen finally climbed into Ms. Feist’s car that night, she was nearly catatonic, unable to answer simple questions. Her brain, her sister said, seemed broken.

Editors’ Picks

A Glimpse Into My Son’s Magnificent Mind

Oliver Stone Thinks Hollywood Has Gone Crazy

Brave New Arrivals

Continue reading the main story

They drove together for a few hours, heading to the University of Virginia Medical Center. When they arrived, Dr. Breen checked into the psychiatric ward.

Dr. Breen, 49, had missed work in the past for torn knee ligaments and the pulmonary emboli. But this absence felt like a shameful fall from grace. She had suffered a breakdown when the city was desperate for heroes. And she was certain her career would not survive it.

Her family members tried to convince her otherwise. After all, she had no apparent history of mental health problems, and the past month had been one of extremes for everyone.

Dr. Breen was doubtful. An insidious stigma about mental health persisted within the medical community.

“Lorna kept saying, ‘I think everybody knows I’m struggling,’” Ms. Feist said. “She was so embarrassed.”

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/11/nyregion/lorna-breen-suicide-coronavirus.html