Honouring Dr. W. Gifford-Jones

It’s been a year since my father bid us adieu on the first of July as Canada Day fireworks lit up the Toronto harbour. So, I want to share a special column with you this week, a reflection on how I feel. There are so many thoughts that come to mind, but one word rises above all others, and this is gratitude. I am grateful for my father, yes, but it is also you, the readers of this column that I wish to thank. I want you to know how much you all meant to my father, and now how much you mean to me.

My father had a passion for writing. He penned his first column in October 1974, in which he wrote, “Let me show you how having too little or too much faith in the doctor can get you into trouble.” Weekly thereafter, that is exactly what he did. I remember bundles of letters from readers that came weekly to our home. That is what inspired him. He loved being a doctor, but it was the connection with readers that had him utterly addicted to being a medical journalist.

What would he say now? He would remind us that not every reader was a fan. He would give us an update regarding his intended prayer at the Pearly Gates that St Peter would grant him admission, and ownership of all newspapers, such that he could publish what he really wanted to say!

I am convinced that it was all your letters over many years, those in favour, but also those against his views, that bolstered his vitality. Now I am on the receiving end of the same dynamic, and I feel the inspiration.

This time last year, so many of you wrote a note of condolence. I thank you very much, as it helped a great deal. I have enjoyed getting to know who is at the other end of the Gifford-Jones column.

In as much as today’s readers are advancing in age like my father, I am also thinking about those who have departed, those who traveled with my father through the 1950s and his early medical practice, the 1960s and 1970s during his pioneering days for women’s health, the 1980s and his campaign for better pain management, and then the last decades of his life when he fought against big pharma’s grip on the medical establishment. You are missed.

While my father had a few choice words for the editors who fired him, I have nothing but gratitude for those that have kept me on! I have thanks, too, for all the people in the natural health community who provided my father with an enormous extended family; from retailers coast to coast to health-conscious consumers who continue to prove that Mother Nature is a healing force like no other.

My father was a Harvard-trained medical doctor and surgeon who did not like being told lies as the answers to challenging questions. This made his controversial stands on modern medicine well worth observing. Whereas I am better described as a connector of people and ideas. What often amazes me is how narrow-minded people can be, readily jumping to conclusions on very little information.

If I have my father’s luck and determination, there will be another 43 years ahead of me until I write my final column, like he did a year ago. I am looking forward and trust a good many of you are too. Please keep your letters coming, and again, my deepest thanks.

Join me at 5PM Eastern on July 2^nd for recollections of Dr. W. Gifford-Jones. Contact me for the link. diana@docgiff.com

This column offers opinions on health and wellness, not personal medical advice.