Snapshot of My Beloved

Normally, I write fiction. This prompt, however, aligns with the timing of a momentous life event too perfectly to be coincidental. This is the story that is directing my fingertips over the keyboard; this is the story that I need to tell. I cannot write anything else—nor do I have any desire to do so.

This week, my life partner defended his doctoral dissertation.

Over the last six years, four of which I’ve spent beside him, he has studied the material properties of the human heart to extend the current understanding of tricuspid valve regurgitation (TV) and to maximize the efficacy of screenings that inform treatment plans for infants born with hypoplastic left heart syndrome (HLHS), among other things.

His Master’s degree thesis on TV was so valuable that he was nominated for and awarded the National Science Foundation’s Graduate Research Fellowship (NRFP), which entirely covered the cost of pursuing his PhD.

During the three following years, his research developed into an analysis of existing methods for informing surgical plans and introduced the roots of an improved system that will provide more pinpointed patient data with reduced time and energy costs.

Now, the reason this snapshot of my beloved is demanding to be told is his repeated use of this phrase: “It’s really not anything special.”

I'll give a bit of backstory to introduce the journey that has been a focal point of the last few years, and I'm definitely not just using this as an excuse to gush about the man I love.

We met in the summer of 2019 after matching on a dating app. We were early-twenties students at the same university and had a mutual love for emo, pop-punk, and metal music. My bio included something along the lines of, "Ask me about intersectional feminism," and he did; we ended up having a very engaging conversation about it. He liked my hair, I liked his tattoos. Three years and ten months have gone by since that day and we have never gone without talking for longer than eight hours at a time.

After about two weeks of texting nonstop and nightly phone calls, our first date was magical in the most comfortable way. There is an art gallery downtown that we visited that afternoon, and I will forever remember the way the room looked when we first touched–I leaned back against his chest while we were looking at a painting in the collection focused on rural life. I get emotional any time we go into that gallery to this day. Our last destination was the patio of a casual bar on Main Street, and despite me accidentally dumping my Long Island iced tea on him, he agreed to meet again in a few days. We stayed out late into the evening, and ended with the most incredible first kiss.

As a woman of certain experiences, I did my due diligence in researching him before going over to his apartment for our second date; no criminal record came up when I searched his name in the state court records–not even a speeding ticket. Instead, the search defaulted to Google Scholar and I found an impressive portfolio of peer-reviewed scientific articles published in various journals. Fourteen, to be exact.

I mentioned previously that we were both in our early twenties; he had turned 21 two months prior to our match. I did, admittedly, feel a little bit ashamed of my own comparative academic journey, but primarily I was nothing short of starstruck.

Our first year together endured his accelerated master's degree program. I spent a lot of my time there with him, doing my own schoolwork while he wrote or graded undergrads' homework. I listened to him complain about the incompetence of his lab colleagues and looked over his research presentation and meeting slides when he asked. That's where I first encountered his significant talent for taking an extremely complex concept and making it accessible to a wide range of people from various backgrounds without truncating the informational value of the presentation or paper. Let me remind you that he was studying the properties and behaviors of the human heart, specifically the tricuspid valve and its heartstrings, and that I had a comparatively profound lack of scientific training on account of failing the only science course I had attempted in the preceding four years.

He competed and placed in the top ten in our university's 3 Minute Thesis competition in February of 2020, and a faculty member on his thesis defense committee nominated him for the NRFP; he asked me to proofread and help him edit his application essay in which he expressed his passion for science and using it to improve medical treatment strategies and equipment. Evidently, the administrators of the program valued his thoughts and motivators, as he was awarded the fellowship and set on the path to earning a PhD in mechanical engineering.

The rest of 2020 was spent, well, surviving in those "unprecedented times." He kept writing, researching, experimenting, and mentoring. I kept working at a bookstore, writing occasionally, and looking at him in complete awe. Our relationship thrived despite the pressure of living through a global pandemic, national unrest, and graduate school. Aside from the addition of a dog to our lives, 2021 followed a similar track as far as our daily lives went. We each took on further responsibilities at work and leaned on each other for support and advice. 

In October of 2022, we attended a benefit walk for the Children's Heart Foundation. The organizer of the event had reached out to him and asked if he'd be willing to give a brief talk on his research and its potential applications. He didn’t say it to the faces of the parents who approached him with tearful eyes at a gathering honoring the little heart warriors whose lives are endangered or were tragically cut short by congenital heart defects, but he said it to me in the car on our way home. He told me that it made him incredibly uncomfortable and that he believed their appreciation was laughably misplaced. I understand not wanting people to confuse him for a surgeon whose hands will directly mend the hearts of children, but most of the people at that event are unfortunately familiar enough with congenital heart diseases to know that the miracles of medicine are deeply layered. 

He doesn’t tack it onto conversations in a way that could even come close to sounding like false humility. You would be more likely to hear him give an elevator pitch version of his research followed by profusely claiming, “My role in it isn’t a huge deal, though,” as though he wasn’t the primary author on multiple peer-reviewed and published articles.

Many times over the last few years I’ve watched him work over his shoulder, a slight smile spreading over my face.

“I’m immensely proud of you,” I’ve said, over and over again. "This is just so impressive."

“Why? All I’m doing is writing code and clicking pictures. This isn't groundbreaking.”

Ignoring the mild resentment tied to a literal graduate-degree-holding scientist saying his job is “easy” to someone whose social work and writing backgrounds lend absolutely no benefit to understanding his work, my foremost response to this was to remind him that everything spectacular has a foundation that is a key determiner of whatever degree of success that spectacularity reaches.

Somebody, somewhere, at some point in deep time, was the first person to create and control fire. That first firebringer was more than likely shocked, awed, and terrified of their experience, but after a few years they probably got used to the improved quality of life. Controlling fire seems like an incredibly basic thing for us today, but it is one of the most crucial scientific developments our species has ever reached. Lifespans expanded and humanity spread wide across the globe as that one very basic skill allowed for survival in colder climates, served as a tool for making food safer and easier to digest, and was the first method of intentional land-clearing once our ancestors transitioned to agricultural life. If I asked you to look at the items around you and consider which of them wouldn't exist if it weren't for the evolution of fire, you'd be hard pressed to find something that would.

The trajectory of fire's relationship with humankind can be viewed as a blueprint–or perhaps a proof of–for the scientific process as a whole. It does not matter how greatly or directly your invention affects a certain end; someone before you did something small that was crucial to your success, many times over. The person that lifted the first torch and discovered its most immediate uses had no inkling of what the future would hold in a similar grip.

Therefore, I did my best to make him understand that his work may seem monotonous and small right now, but someone's life in the future will absolutely be affected by its having been done.

Imposter syndrome has haunted him profoundly. "I feel like a fraud," was a very common sentiment over the last four years. I've wanted to tell him that he's not a good enough liar to fool all of the highly intelligent individuals who have made the decisions to mentor him, delegate to him, employ him and fund his research; however, telling a man he isn't good at something isn't necessarily the best call in most cases, even if the downfall in consideration is his poor performance in the art of deception.

"They'll know I'm a fraud," he said after dozens of job applications. "This feels like a waste of time because my application is just going to be deleted immediately."

"These other researchers already did something similar to my project and they did it better," he said, raking fingers through his hair during a long night of literature review.

"I'm not good enough."

"I don't deserve this."

"This is all bullshit. If I can achieve this degree, that's proof that the program is worthless."

I crossed my arms and lifted an eyebrow at him, silently asking, "Are you being serious right now?"

This spring, his stress level has grown exponentially, as one might expect in the final semester of a doctoral candidacy. He's been applying to and interviewing for careers all across the country, dealing with an already-difficult mentor whose entire grad student cohort will graduate this year, and finishing his own dissertation chapter by chapter. He has also been working out, developing a strong talent for cooking, consistently spending time on hobbies, and spending quality time with loved ones–including traveling hours away to see family for anywhere from an hour to two days at a time. The idea that his work wasn't valuable or that his own skills were underdeveloped kept coming up occasionally, of course, but more and more I heard a different tune; I heard him speak with more confidence in his capabilities, more hope for the future, and acceptance of the frustrating circumstances within his program that he didn't have control over.

This week, after so much hard work and having generated highly valuable outcomes, I sat in a conference room with his family, best friend, colleagues, and dissertation defense committee. Less than two hours later, his mentor walked out of the final discussion and announced congratulations to his parents on account of their son having officially achieved a PhD. (I know, I thought this order of interactions was a bit odd, but also kinda cute.)

The last few days, the conversation has flipped.

"It's just such a surreal feeling. I'm actually a doctor," he says. Sometimes the corners of his mouth are tilting up and other times he stares at his computer monitor with a look of derision on his face.

"Of philosophy," I add with a smirk. Sometimes I squeeze his hand and other times I run my fingers through his hair before I kiss the crown of his head.

"No, no, I wanna be that asshole on an airplane. I can't get into the routine of making the clarification."

So, because I know you'll read this, my love: I am so, so proud of you, and I'll keep telling you that forever. I appreciate you.

For anyone else who does: Thanks for reading this tiny glimpse of the man who encourages me to write, makes me eat vegetables when I forget to, and serves as the muse for a great deal of my creative output. I hope you have a love in your life that affects you like this and that you tell them the things that make your heart squeeze with joy, appreciation, and pride.