Washington Lawyer - September/October 2024 - 9

TOWARD WELL-BEING
When Judges Break
the Silence on Stress
By Denise Perme
W
hen you are a judge
attending a dinner
party, people sometimes
ask, " What
was your toughest case? " Judge
Gregory E. Mize, who took the trial
bench in 1990, says most judges
have thought about that question
and have a ready answer.
Mize, now a senior judge, presided over hundreds
of civil and criminal jury trials in the Superior
Court of the District of Columbia. There are
many cases he could talk about, but one in particular
still haunts him. Mize's hardest case was
of a mother with Munchausen syndrome by
proxy who was sickening her six-year-old daughter,
" Jenny, " by causing life-threatening infections.
The duty to do what is in the best interest
of the child required Mize to give sole custody
to Jenny's father and to deny maternal visitation,
repeatedly, for more than three years. The case
required a series of agonizing decisions for Mize,
and he couldn't help but wonder whether Jenny
would suffer the absence of her mother in the
future, in ways he couldn't foresee.
About a year later, he read in the morning paper
that Jenny's mother drowned after leaping into
the Chesapeake Bay at night. This brought a
fresh wave of disturbing questions for Mize. " Was
she despairing of never being able to see her
daughter again? Did I contribute to a suicide? "
Mize knows rationally that he did not cause the
tragedy, but it was a harsh blow after so many
years of involvement with Jenny and her family.
" I felt so connected to it, " he told me recently,
" and that's why it was my toughest case. "
Judges have many job stressors that take their
toll. Heavy dockets, long hours, unprepared
lawyers, pro se litigants, vitriolic proceedings,
insufficient staff support, and contentious families
are just some of the occupational hazards
affecting their well-being. However, findings
from the 2020 ABA report Stress and Resiliency in
the U.S. Judiciary indicate that the weight and
responsibility of decision-making is the number
one source of stress for judges. And that stress
causes a range of issues, from anxiety and fatigue
to sleep disturbance and even physical
health problems.
Furthermore, surveyed judges reported a sense
of isolation, partly because they feel like they
can't ask for support or show vulnerability. The
image of judges sitting emotionless above the
proceedings, like a robot, could not be further
from the truth. Judges care about people, not
just the law. It is precisely because they do have
emotional reactions, both to the facts and to
the people involved, that the process of decision-making
is so hard. " I think people see
judges as sitting high up there on the bench
and being impartial and non-feeling. That is
damaging to judges to have that expectation
that we are not supposed to feel, " Mize says.
Mize and two other D.C. Superior Court judges,
Russell F. Canan and Frederick H. Weisberg,
found themselves talking about their most difficult
decisions. " We had a number of informal
meetings, one of them on a tennis court, where
we talked about our toughest cases, " Mize says.
" The exchanges were powerful. We heard each
other's stories. It was amazing. "
The three judges realized that others might
benefit, so they compiled their stories, along
with those of 10 other trial judges, into the 2018
book Tough Cases: Judges Tell the Stories of Some
of the Hardest Decisions They've Ever Made. Writing
about their burdensome cases proved healing
for the contributing jurists. " I did not go
into this project looking for catharsis or relief
from the stress of presiding over the case, but
writing about my experience presiding over
that trial helped me appreciate the loneliness
I was experiencing at the time, " Weisberg
shared with me. " It helped me understand the
stress and isolation inherent in the job and,
hopefully, find more constructive ways of dealing
with it. "
At the book launch party, the authors cemented
bonds that had formed as Tough Cases was
developed. Like graduates swapping yearbooks,
they wrote notes in each other's copies
about how meaningful the experience was.
New York State Supreme Court Justice Lizbeth
Gonzáles, whose chapter describes an excruciating
landlord-tenant case that ended in tragedy,
hoped that her effort would ultimately be
therapeutic. " Writing this chapter, " she noted in
Mize's copy of the book, " opened a window
that I try to keep closed. Maybe the window
now will stay open. "
Recommendations in the ABA report on judicial
stress emphasize the importance of building
connections. One suggestion for judicial associations
is to offer " roundtables " at conferences to
" reduce isolation, allow for sharing of common
experiences, and normalize some of the stress
responses experienced by participant jurists. "
Compiling Tough Cases provided these benefits,
as Canan attests. " Writing the chapter helped
me share the experience of confronting a challenge
in a tough case - doing justice or following
an unjust law, " he says. " The support
and wisdom of colleagues will aid when demanding
cases arise in the future. " The connection
and community they found were a balm
to the isolation inherent in judicial service.
Denise Perme is associate director of the D.C. Bar
Lawyer Assistance Program.
If you would like free, confidential help
managing job stress, please email lap@dcbar.
org. For additional information about how to
combat isolation, check out the Bar's Toward
Well-Being podcast.
SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2024 * WASHINGTON LAWYER 9
Washington Lawyer - September/October 2024

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