Save My Baby

Wade turned in his resignation that day. Couldn’t do it anymore. Some experiences change the way we see the world. And our role in it.

Wade said, “I was NOT a born leader. Never felt like I had to be the one in charge! But I was an encourager. Always.”

He grew up in a small rural town in North Dakota. His mom was a big servant leader. She was a stay at home mom. Her title and resume might not get everyone’s attention, but what she did, how she showed up, her example – they certainly changed the way Wade saw the world and his role in it.

When one of their neighbors died because of a medical emergency, mom decided that something needed to be done and that she would do it. That neighbor needed oxygen urgently and there was no structure to get it there in time. So mom started a 1st responder group, essentially a volunteer ambulance service.

Fast forward a few years and Wade became a paramedic. That’s when he quit his job. They were too late.

There was nothing Wade or his paramedic team could do to bring this child back to life and they knew it. As a paramedic, this was not his first brush with death. Somewhere along the line, Wade began wrestling with this topic. Not a one and done wrestling match. This was hard. This was real.

What is compassion? What does it mean to have compassion? Wade slowly and painfully arrived at a revelation: Empathy is the ability to feel, compassion is the ability to suffer with. Not just the ability, but the choice. The practice of. You can never really serve people unless you choose to suffer with them.

Wade stood there that day, suffering with this mother, suffering with a parent bearing the unimaginable. And that’s the day Wade handed in his resignation. Couldn’t do it anymore.

One of his hardest visits as a paramedic was responding to a suicide. On one of these calls, a teenager had taken his life and the family found him. In this horrific situation, the paramedic’s job is declare death and go home. Wade was about to do just that but he knew there was more.

Suffer with. To suffer with demands more. Wade and his partner on the paramedic team decided to stay and help family. They cleaned up the unspeakable mess. Made some of the calls that had to be made. They decided to be there in a family’s deepest and darkest times.

25 years later, Wade still get calls from that family expressing how much their help meant in those darkest hours.

Today, Wade is a CEO of a multi-thousand person healthcare organization. I think he’d be the first to admit that walking with people is more of a practice than a lesson. It’s not something you learn once or do once. Building it into your life doesn’t happen accidentally.

Sharing genuine gratitude with people might be the most powerful, practical and challenging piece of Wade’s approach. One part of his Friday routine: every Friday, Wade writes 7 thank you notes to people he’s grateful for.

Is it easy? Once you’ve made that decision to walk with, suffer with, celebrate with, share gratitude with people… does it get easier? Wade’s youngest daughter, nine-year-old Rylee, recently had a spine surgery and suffered a spinal cord stroke during the surgery. She lost all neural signals to her extremities.

Wade: “As a dad, it’s been so hard. So difficult to see her in the struggle. But, Rylee is strong and in good spirits... Needless to say, servant leadership has taken a deeper perspective for me.”

You and I were built to love people. Will loving people flood your life with energy? Certainly. Will it, at times, overwhelm you with sadness? Yes. Will you overflow with an abundant joy? Yes, at least Wade seems to! Will you be tired at times? Yes, but good tired.

“It’s one thing to be tired. Totally different to be tired doing what you were built for!”

~ Wade Mitzel, CEO, UofL Physicians

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What did Wade's story make you realize about your own leadership journey?