Boston Marathon bombing survivor Meghan Zipin says her children, poetry helped her heal
BOSTON - Trying, it's something that became a method of survival for Meghan Zipin. Zipin was crossing the finish line in 2013 when the first explosion happened.
"When the second one happened, that's when my brain dropped into this space of this is not normal," Zipin explained what was going on in her mind in that moment. "Something is not OK. Is this going to happen again? And oh my god the girls."
The girls being two of her closest friends, who just moments before were blowing her kisses on the sidewalk cheering her on at the finish.
"You know how antifreeze has that neon color? That's what the air looked like... It was a smoky, neony, like haze," said Zipin. "I knew they were on the sidewalk. I knew they were in the smoke, but I couldn't see them."
What was a day of excitement and celebration turned into a nightmare. Her two friends suffered life threatening injuries that day. While Zipin didn't have any major physical injuries, her life was changed forever.
"A doctor who'd been working at the medical tent at the finish started running to me and started patting me down," Zipin said. "I didn't really know what she was doing or why, but it was almost like she was checking my parts."
Since that moment she's struggled with survivor's guilt, PTSD, and severe anxiety.
"If you talk about survivor's guilt, it's that there were just more people around me to absorb the injuries before they got to me," Zipin said. "That can be really hard."
Hard being an understatement. Zipin suffered from near daily panic attacks after the bombings, searching for a path forward.
"When the sidewalk blows up that you're walking on, it's hard to walk on the sidewalk and think that it's not going to blow up again," Zipin said.
The first step in her healing process was delivering a victim impact statement at Dzhokhar Tsarnaev's trial.
"I didn't like the idea in my mind of this mystery person who took so much from us, so many things we couldn't name that he took from us. So, it was important for me to see him," said Zipin.
She says having to face Tsarnaev wasn't empowering, but scary and nerve-wracking.
"One of the things during the trial that I said to the bomber is that one day my husband and I will be a better mother and a better father because we're going to show our kids all that is good in the world," she said.
That's exactly what the Zipin family has done welcoming three boys into the world. She says they focus on the little moments and enjoying the good in life. Like the messy art projects, jumping in puddles and sledding down the hill outside their Hampton Falls home in New Hampshire.
"I have a different flavor of joy than I had before the events," Zipin said.
Zipin has been back to the finish line twice. She even re-ran the marathon a year later in 2014.
Being there she says is still too difficult. For the past decade now, she's offered her marathon number from the Boston Athletic Association to her loved ones.
"I always tell them you're not running for me you're running for yourself," said Zipin. "The Boston Marathon is the most magical experience."
"It has not lost the magic," Zipin continued. "I can still feel the magic in my body."
In the last 10 years she's turned her pain into poetry.
"Survivors write love letters, we grow bigger hearts, we feel deeper gratitude..." read Zipin from her new book "First Light".
The book serves as a guide from the time of the bombing to her life with PTSD, her healing, and her journey through motherhood.
"Over the course of seven or eight years on my phone at night, I would make little notes," she said.
Notes that became not just poems but a source of comfort and therapy when her PTSD manifested at night.
"My hope is that a parent or a new mom, or someone going into a trial, or somebody who's endured something challenging can pick it up and kind of have that moment I was looking for, someone to say, 'me too,'" Zipin said.
Zipin said she will one day tell her boys about how the bombings changed her.
"That's the biggest question right, Milo is 5, Percy is almost 4, and Pim is one. They are these wild and free super curly haired guys, and they believe the world is actually good," Zipin said. "One day I will tell them that they are the magic that helped turn their mama around and their joy is my joy now. I thank God for them."
Her boys are a reminder of life's greatest blessings, giving Zipin the push she needed to be present. "I'm not going anywhere I am here," said Zipin.
Zipin reads another excerpt from a poem in her book inspired by her son.
"Mama, the weather is so nice today. No clouds, mama. It's beau-ful. I love wind. See the trees in the forest - they blowing, it's beau-ful. Mama, you are my best mama."
"First Light" comes out on the 10th anniversary of the bombings on April 15, 2023.
