My son Seamus died ten years ago today. This is the last photo of him - snapped on a flip phone by my husband at our neighborhood park, 2 hrs before they were struck by a careless driver in a crosswalk. He sent it w/ a text that said, "He knows 'uphill' and 'downhill' now!" 1/8 I got the call around 11am. I remember sprinting through the parking lot to the ER in a blind panic. Seeing people standing in line, calmly filling out paperwork, I burst through a set of double doors marked "do not enter" and a nurse said, "This must be mom." 2/8

In 2010, I had good union health insurance. Obamacare was the law of the land. In November that yr my 1yo son was struck by a careless driver in a crosswalk. After two surgeries and a night in intensive care, he died. Before we knew the outcome, I sat at his bedside, his tiny stitched-together body hooked to a million incessantly beeping machines, straining to recall what our deductibles were. I worried I wouldn't be able to keep working during what could be a long hospital stay.