Nurse practitioner tells her story of 9/11

uring the first six months after September 11, Cathy Peters collected a nation's words. And in a therapeutic act, she reconstructed those words--headlines taken from newspapers and magazines--arranging and pasting them into a collage. "It was my way to make sense of an incomprehensible event," says Peters.

The lives and voices that tell the story of September 11 became more than headlines to Peters when the assistant professor of clinical nursing traveled to ground zero in November 2001 as part of the Red Cross disaster relief team. She provided mental health counseling to survivors, eyewitnesses, and friends and families of those lost.

"Working with the Red Cross to provide help to those in need was a great privilege," says Peters. "The experience challenged me to use my years of professional training and clinical experience to help others."

After returning to Rochester, Peters says, it took a while to process what she had seen and heard. She describes her memories of working in New York as both poignant and inspiring.

"It was touching to visit the firehouses and pay tribute to the sacrifices made and to listen to people's personal stories of loss and survival," says Peters. "But the people of New York remain powerful and resilient. There are signs of hope everywhere--in houses of worship, on the streets, in the workplace, reflected in gestures both large and small."

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