"WHEN YOU LOSE A CHILD, YOU DIE INSIDE" Sanda Rašković Ivić’s Life Story About Her Childhood in Šibenik, Her Politician Father, War, Death of Her Son and Husban

My earliest childhood memories are connected to Dalmatia, to my nona’s (grandmother’s, in Italian) house by the waterfront, where we lived. I remember there being so much light, so much liveliness... I recall the ships docking, my father holding me at the window, telling me where those ships were coming from and where they were going, telling me stories about people and distant places...

Born in Zagreb

I moved to Šibenik to live when I was not yet three years old. I was born in Zagreb, where my parents were studying medicine, and I was born during their final year of studies. We lived with my grandfather and grandmother, the Rašković family, in Palmotićeva Street in central Zagreb. When my parents graduated and completed their internship, the regulations at the time required them to move to the provinces to work. Since my mother was from Šibenik, it was only natural for them to go there, as both of them had the opportunity to specialise in their chosen fields—my mother in internal medicine, my father in neuropsychiatry.

My mother’s mother, my nona, was an Italian from Trieste. My mother and nona would speak Italian whenever the topic of conversation was not suitable for children's ears. That is how I gradually learned Italian. In summer, nona’s relatives would visit us, and the atmosphere was like something from a Fellini film—everyone speaking at once, while nona’s elderly uncle eyed the young maid who was bending over beside him, holding a tray full of grilled fish. Everyone would suddenly start shouting, insults would fly—he was a "dirty old goat" and a disgrace to the family. Two minutes later, everything would calm down, lunch would continue, and the conversation would flow as if nothing had happened.

I Didn't Like Physics and Mathematics

I was a very responsible child, and school went well for me. I didn’t particularly like mathematics and physics, and my mother patiently helped me practise them, but I enjoyed learning other subjects. "Study—knowledge is beautiful," my mother used to tell me, and I truly loved learning. I loved to read. At home, my parents were often absorbed in books—whether medical literature or fiction. In the evenings, my father would read to us aloud. I loved it when he read poems by Yesenin, Dučić, Rakić, Ujević, and Vojislav Ilić. I never imagined that I would one day marry Ilić’s great-grandson, Aleksandar Ivić. We would also read passages from the Bible, which served as my religious education.

Studying Medicine
When you grow up in a household with two doctors, and when you add to that the fact that my uncle Srđan was also a doctor, medicine is ever-present, and you can’t help but love it. As a little girl, I was fascinated by archaeology and even went on excavations with a group of archaeologists. I also loved the sea and the underwater world—diving and discovering the hidden world beneath the vast blue expanse. I was mesmerised by Jacques Cousteau’s documentaries on underwater exploration. In the end, I chose medicine and successfully passed the entrance exam for the Medical Faculty in Zagreb. I lived in Zagreb with my aunt Vjera’s family—my father’s sister—which gave me a sense of security during my first time away from my parents, something I both wanted and feared. I was already familiar with Zagreb; my parents had studied there, and I felt a sense of continuity and closeness. I quickly adapted to university life, but in Zagreb, for the first time, I encountered open admiration for figures such as, "My uncle was a Ustaša captain." I was shocked.

First Insults

In Zagreb, I experienced emotional and professional fulfilment. I loved studying medicine, especially when we started clinical practice with patients. I was always more interested in practical medicine than in fundamental sciences. I had two children, completed my specialisation, and earned my master’s degree. By 1990, the atmosphere had changed drastically. Open hostility towards Serbs began to emerge—insults, demands to sign loyalty statements (which I, of course, refused as a humiliation), and eventually, even a physical attack convinced me that I had to leave my native Zagreb. I had the opportunity to go to Trieste, as I had collaborated with Triestine psychotherapists, but I chose Belgrade. I felt I should go where my people were and share their fate, whatever it might be. In Trieste, I would have been a foreigner—after all, I had already experienced being treated as a foreigner in Zagreb, the city where I was born, and the most extreme elements even saw me as an enemy.

A New Love

I was warmly received in Belgrade. I found work at Dr Laza Lazarević hospital and made lifelong friends there. I earned my doctorate at the Medical Faculty, fell in love again, remarried happily, and had my son Jovan. I also had a respectable but demanding political career after the democratic changes in 2000..

Life in Italy

The period I spent as ambassador to Italy was filled with the beauty of the country and its people. Our only open issue with Italy was Kosovo and Metohija. Italy was a country where NATO’s bombing of the FR Yugoslavia became a domestic political issue. We marked the tenth anniversary of the bombing with a major event at the Serbian Embassy, where prominent figures from Italian culture, politics, and the media spoke. But even beyond that, in three different locations in Italy, Italians themselves organised commemorations in opposition to the bombing of our country.

Italians have a unique way of working and behaving—you think nothing will turn out as it should, but in the end, everything falls into place perfectly. As an ambassador, in addition to my regular duties, I connected with the academic community, and together we organised several important events related to Serbian history, culture, and art. I wanted Serbia and the Serbian people to be associated with more than just "Milošević, Mladić, Srebrenica"—but also with our medieval monasteries, our ties with Italy, Dositej Obradović, who spent part of his life there, our Nobel laureate and diplomat Ivo Andrić, and poets and ambassadors like Dučić and Rakić, our Garibaldians on the Drina...

Tragedy

In recent years, I have suffered two tragedies. My husband passed away. And my son passed away. My husband had been ill for a long time, and in the end, he suffered greatly. My rational mind told me I had had enough time to prepare for his passing. Yet, I wasn’t ready. Just before he slipped into agony, which lasted several hours, he told me: "I love you." And those were the last words he spoke.

He passed away in his bed, at home, in the arms of his son and me. I called his daughters. Together, we prepared him for his journey into eternity and lit a candle for him. Only later did I realise how much I had refused to accept the end—because I didn’t have a candle ready and, all of a sudden, I couldn’t remember where I kept them. It happened on the 27th of December at three o’clock in the morning. Once we had prepared and dressed my husband, we embraced and wept—my son, my two stepdaughters, and I. Then the children withdrew into another room, leaving just the two of us—my husband and me—alone.

At first, I sat on a chair, and then I lay down next to Aleksandar, who was dressed in a shirt and suit. I took his hand—it was still warm. A thought came to my mind, one spoken by the Stoics of ancient Greece: "We are here, death is not. Death is here, we are no more." I was there, and death was between Aleksandar and me, in the room.

Aleksandar’s funeral was on the 30th of December, on a damp, cold, and gloomy day. The coronavirus prevented many of his colleagues and our friends from attending. As we walked in procession behind his coffin, holding my arm, our son Jovan recited a poem by his great-great-grandfather, Vojislav Ilić: "Grey, dreary sky... From the old fences, long ago, / The withered bindweed has sorrowfully lowered its tendrils, / And below, broken by the wind, twigs lie scattered on the ground; / All has been darkened by autumn, / And everything is desolate and dim, / Everything is without life. / It seems as though death grips the weary nature, / And she quietly dies... / And along the muddy road, immersed in solemn sorrow, / A poor funeral procession moves. / A skinny, little nag / Slowly pulls the cart, its long neck stretched forward, / And the rain drizzles relentlessly, / As the procession passes, / Piously and slowly."

And indeed, in the time after Sanja’s funeral, when the guests had left after the meal of remembrance, and our home once again became silent, it seemed to me that my life was passing exactly like the funeral in Vojislav’s poem—that it was passing, piously and slowly.

The Loss of Parents

With the death of our parents, a chapter of our lives closes—the chapter in which we were someone’s child, grown-up, even old, but still a child. My father, Jovan Rašković, was a neuropsychiatrist and the leader of the Serbs in Croatia. Although he had never been involved in politics before 1990, for as long as I could remember, he had been interested in socio-political developments in Yugoslavia. He attended the famous Korčula Summer School, and as a little girl, I met Professor Dragoljub Mićunović, Academician Ljubomir Tadić, and other philosophers and Praxis intellectuals there. He regularly attended the "Science and Society" conferences in Dubrovnik. My mother and I would join him during the informal parts of these gatherings.

Even as a child, I was present during brilliant discussions held on the terrace of our house. Today, I can see how all those people were completely free of any thirst for power, how sincerely and with conviction they fought for the common good, and how they saw the role of an intellectual as that of someone who must not remain silent and who should have an almost Enlightenment-like role in society.

Visitors to Our Home

Writers such as Dobrica Ćosić and Momo Kapor, poets Matija Bećković and Tanasije Mladenović, journalist and writer Igor Mandić, General Gojko Nikoliš, Academician Ljubomir Tadić, director Arsa Jovanović, and the famous Borislav Mihajlović Mihiz would visit and stay at our home. Looking back on those conversations today, I realise how well-meaning and kind-hearted they all were, almost naïve. My father had an open and generous spirit, and he loved to socialise and correspond with people who held different views. He had a lively exchange of letters with Herbert Marcuse, the left-wing philosopher, and even exchanged a few letters with Erich Fromm. I regret that these letters were destroyed when our house was bombed in 1992. That is why I have no photographs from my childhood.

My late son, Jovan, who physically and spiritually resembled my father greatly and bore his name, was in Zagreb at a gathering in 2021. There, he met students from Šibenik who told him that their elders had spoken of what a good doctor Jovan Rašković had been.

My father believed that by actively engaging in politics, he could contribute to the protection of the national and social interests of Serbs in Croatia. He was drawn into politics by the wave of great Serbian discontent and fear—fear caused by the revival of neo-Ustaša ideology in Croatia, along with open displays of hostility, and at times, even hatred towards the Serbian people. Matija Bećković once said of my father that he "remained a Serb even after completing the highest levels of education." And indeed, he never lost touch with his people…

In Belgrade, he attended the founding assembly of the Democratic Party, but since "crossing republican borders" was not allowed, the party he founded in Croatia on the 17th of February 1990 was the Serbian Democratic Party (SDS). In February 1990, the HDZ held a large rally in Zagreb, where Tuđman received a frenzied ovation for declaring that "the NDH (Independent State of Croatia) was the age-old aspiration of the Croatian people." Given that, the designation "Serbian" for the SDS was certainly necessary. The party was founded on democratic principles, as national identity was not synonymous with nationalism in the chauvinistic sense.

Politics Brings Many Worries

My father always emphasised that it was better to negotiate for 100 years than to go to war for a single day. With that stance, he sought maximum rights for Serbs—but without war. His famous statement when asked for weapons was: "I can lead you in peace, but I will not lead you into war." Soon after, Milan Babić, with the help of Slobodan Milošević, staged a coup within the SDS and took over its leadership. The coup took place while my father was in the United States, raising funds for RTV Knin. When he later attempted to speak on Radio Knin, he was physically thrown out by Babić’s followers—grabbing him by the lapels and forcing him out. The fear that his words might influence people was too great. The mainstream policy of the SDS began to diverge drastically from my father’s vision and from the policies the party had been founded upon.

Politics brought my father nothing but hardship and worry, hostility and hatred from the environment in which he had lived and worked for decades, and also envy from Belgrade’s Milošević regime. He experienced exactly what the great Meša Selimović wrote: "If you rise above others, prepare yourself for hatred." Some envied him for his status as a distinguished neuropsychiatrist in Yugoslavia, some disliked him because he was beloved by the people, and certain politicians feared his popularity.

I saw my father cry twice—once when his mother passed away, and the second time when he received the news of the death of his friend and colleague, psychiatrist Srba Stojiljković. It was very difficult for him to leave Šibenik, though he lived more peacefully in Belgrade. The last time I saw my father alive was on a July evening in 1992, when he drove my daughter and me to the bus that was leaving for Ferihegy Airport in Budapest, from where I was travelling to visit my friend Ana Ćosić and her family. We talked along the way and while waiting at the station for the bus to arrive. I remember us sitting on a bench, eating ice cream. My father spoke about the disastrous state policies, about the sanctions, and the hardships they would bring us. He passed away two days later, after being informed that a court case had been launched against him, accusing him of working to dismantle the constitutional order of the Republic of Croatia. He was to be tried in absentia, as he was "in hiding," and he faced a sentence of 15 years of strict imprisonment. That day, he had been working in his office at Sveti Sava Hospital, and afterward, he went to NIN magazine to submit what I would call his testamentary response to that accusation.

My Mother

My mother passed away at the age of 90. Until the very end, she remained clear-minded, neat, composed—a true lady. In the end, she no longer wanted to live. The death of my son, her grandson Jovan, affected her so deeply that every day she wished to leave this world and join her two Jovans. Today, in her absence, I remember my mother as a young woman—tall, upright, always the most beautiful at parents’ meetings. She was gentle yet strict, devoted yet independent. My mother was an authority.

My Jovan

There is no event more devastating to the human soul than the loss of a child. No one should have to walk behind their child’s coffin, sending them to their eternal rest.
My son Jovan was born on the 6th of March 1997, the same date as his father, who was born in 1949. After the caesarean section, I couldn't fully wake up immediately, so the midwife pressed Jovan’s little cheek against mine. Even now, I can recall the touch of that soft and delicate skin on my tiny son's face. I immediately came to my senses and woke up. I remember that the first thing I saw was a chubby little face, fine, fluffy, tousled hair, and a tiny pink palm that, as he stretched, seemed to want to caress me. From that first touch to the last embrace, I am grateful for every moment spent with him.

Jovan kept the same irresistible smile and kind gaze that he had in childhood right until the end. Alongside that, he retained the ease and simplicity in helping others. When he was involved in the activities of the organisation Roof Over Your Head, he would get up early without hesitation to take over his watch in front of the home of a Roma family facing eviction, or any other vulnerable individuals. This was the same Jovan who had always been a night owl, whom I had to call and drag out of bed multiple times to get him to school or university on time. He passionately defended people’s right to the inviolability and security of their home. At first, my husband and I thought he was merely playing at activism, and only later did we realise his dedication to fighting for the oppressed, as he put it.

I remember his voice—he loved to talk, and he knew how to. My golden-tongued boy! I recall how, on our journey to the sea in Montenegro, he would speak about the landscapes and people of the regions we passed through, how he recited Njegoš and Dante in Italian. How deeply moved he was in Prebilovci, at the Church of the Resurrection of Christ, in Jasenovac, where we found some Rašković’s and Ivić’s among the names. How he rejoiced in Dalmatia, which he saw as the mythical land of his ancestors, and in the Krka Monastery. How he delighted in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, the Impressionist Museum in Paris, how his eyes sparkled on the Acropolis, and how he was left breathless at the foot of the pyramids in Giza...

I found the strength to write the book Life Goes On, published by Vukotić Media. I left nothing unsaid. It was created as a tribute to my son Jovan and dedicated to my grandchildren, Mirko, Slavko, and Žarko.

New Strength

After my failure in the elections, I decided to withdraw from politics. Today, students have restored my faith that the submissive mentality has not completely taken hold in our people and that the fight for justice and freedom is the essence of youth. My family and those small moments of happiness help me immensely in overcoming the great losses in my life. The gratitude I feel for having once had the people I loved beside me, for the fortune of having shared life and many joyful moments with them, gives me the strength to move forward. When you lose a child, you die inside, though outwardly you remain alive. And that life must be given meaning. Its meaning lies precisely in those shared moments of happiness and love—the love we must pass on to those we love and who are still here. In this way, we keep those who are gone present and alive.

What kind of grandmother I am is for my daughter and my three grandsons to judge. They are the meaning of my life, and I cherish every moment spent with them, even when they are mischievous. I am grateful that I can be part of their lives and watch them grow from babies into boys. I would love to live to see them become young men—men in the truest sense of the word—and then peacefully close my eyes.

A Message to Conclude

It is difficult to speak of life satisfaction when you have experienced profound and painful losses, when death has been your companion for a long time. And yet, life must be appreciated in its entirety. When I look at it in this way, I can see and feel how much love and joy I have had in my life, and how much love and joy my grandchildren, my children, my extended family, and my friends continue to give me. I have no regrets, because even my wrong choices have helped me grow and enriched me with experience.

My son Jovan loved to read historical and philosophical literature. Through him, I read Pascal’s Pensées, a classic work for all those searching for meaning and who believe that philosophy should provide guidance on how to live. And I have come to understand that the meaning of life is life itself—and the love we receive and give. We must live, and we must love.