Dr. John Bulette

“If you are comfortable with everything in your memory, there’s a phrase for that… Peace of Mind.” — Dr. John L. Bulette

Peace of Mind is when you are not scanning forward in time, looking for something to be worried about… and you are not scanning backward in time, thinking about something to regret. You are perfectly content, right here in the present.

Peace of Mind is hard to achieve, particularly when your memory contains trauma for which you haven’t yet found the words. Helping people to find words for the memories we fear the most was the life’s work of Dr. John Lawrence Bulette.

He referred to anyone he met as a “fellow sufferer,” because we all struggle to describe difficult feelings out loud, as if keeping them secreted inside somehow prevents them from being real. When you keep feelings inside without using words to express them, they will find their way out anyhow, in the form of self-destructive actions that are otherwise hard to understand.

However, when you do describe a difficult feeling out loud – like, I feel guilty about picking my nose and wiping it under the desk when I was in 2nd grade (a real life, humorous example he liked to use) – a miraculous thing happens:

You overcome the fear of the emotion that’s been troubling you, and in its place, you feel relief. You control this process. The self-knowledge that results is the gift his legacy bestows.

Now, the Doctor didn’t always practice what he preached. He was human, a fellow sufferer. As a veteran of the Vietnam War, where he served in the Coast Guard as a Medical Officer, John was exposed to horrific trauma. He described free fire zones, where his own ship shelled villages indiscriminately, and it was his job to go onshore and to treat the innocent people who were wounded or killed.

John suffered with these memories for the rest of his life, struggling to find the words. He was a first-hand observer of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, which was probably why he spent his career seeking to care for others in the same boat.

But right next to that pain was a profound capacity to express and to accept love. He had a phrase for the exchange of loving feelings that grow like an Echinacea flower between two people in a relationship. He would say, “That’s as good as it gets.” To put it another way, being in a loving relationship is the best life has to offer for human beings.

Once again, he was speaking from experience. On May 18th of this year, John celebrated his 57th year of marriage to his beloved bride, Jane Kneeland Bulette. She was his partner in love, and in life. Together they raised a son, Jonathan Fisk Bulette, and a daughter, Emilie Topham Bulette. John would later welcome the arrival of his grandson, Rex Ralph Bulette, and granddaughter, Polina Jane Bulette.

John passed away on May 30th, 2025 at 10:12pm. Our family grieves him every day, “having feelings,” as he would say, of sadness, and gratitude, depending on the hour.

John was born in Waterbury, Connecticut, to Lawrence “Lefty” Bulette, and Thelma Topham Bulette, in 1936. He remembered listening to the radio as the bombing of Pearl Harbor was announced. John was joined by eldest sister Carol, brother Rick, and younger sister Amy.

The family moved to a farm near the banks of the Delaware River, in Hilltown, Pennsylvania. John learned to love cultivating plants, and animals. He even kept a photo album of his cows. Each one had a name.

After Graduating from Easton High School, John attended Delaware Valley College, where he supported himself by running a dairy farm. Thanks to encouragement from his treasured Aunt Sara, and an open-minded professor, John applied to Temple Medical School in Philadelphia. As a medical student, John worked with residents of Skid Row, beginning a lifetime of care with compassion and no judgement.

John took an internship with the United States Public Health Service in San Francisco. To get out there, he plunged into the Atlantic Ocean at Long Beach Island, drove west in his Triumph sports car without resting until he saw Redwoods, and dove straight into the Pacific Ocean at Muir Beach.

At the Public Health Service Hospital in the Presidio – in an elevator – John met a blond, blue-eyed nurse from Wellesley, Massachusetts, named Jane. He said she was a knockout. It was love at first sight.

During their courtship, John was drafted to serve in Vietnam. Despite an opportunity to take a deferment, John chose to serve, reasoning that someone else would just have to take his place.

In 1968, Jane and John were married in Wellesley, and then John immediately set sail for Vietnam. The war changed his life. Much later, John said that he wished he could go back, to find any Vietnamese person who would listen, and apologize.

After his service, John retuned to a residency at the Medical College of Pennsylvania, where he became a board-certified Psychiatrist – with guidance from his dear mentor, Dr. Leo Madow.

As a psychiatrist, John saw each patient as an individual, not a diagnostic category. He frequently said that “Patients cure themselves. They’re the experts, and they do the work.”

In 1994, John and his family moved to the Eastern Shore of Virginia, where he became Medical Director of the Community Service Board, and Medical Director of the Shore Memorial Hospital Mental Health Unit.

John fell in love with the beauty of the Eastern Shore. The morning sun rising through the mist of a salt marsh unchanged since the tribes of the Pungoteague and the Accomac dug oysters centuries ago. The call of thousands of migratory Brants carrying for miles across open water as they shelter in Metompkin Bay.

John fell in love with the people of the Eastern Shore, too. He took the boat to Tangier to treat watermen. He showed up at his patient’s funerals when they passed. If you couldn’t afford to pay, he looked the other way. Don’t tell the insurance companies.

But he is a comehere, so you’ll have to forgive him for that. He chose this place, and he chose these people. He found a community in need, he spent his life trying to service that need, and he valued the opportunity to do so.

John practiced until the day before his heart fell ill. Just two weeks ago, at age 88, he described the deep satisfaction, the privilege, the elation, the thrill, of being in the room with someone when they make a discovery about how their mind works.

“Some people think that other people cause their feelings,” he would say. “But what you can learn, is that no matter what happens, you are always in control of how you feel.”

John believed that no two addicts are the same. He believed in honoring the legacy of people of color on the Shore. He believed that the two keys to happiness are becoming comfortable with everything in your memory and enjoying loving relationships.

Every conversation with John ended in the same way. He used a phrase that came from his mentor, Dr. Leo Madow. It’s a suggestion, I think, about how to approach the world. But also, about how to approach that inner voice that’s always talking to you. You know the one. It can get you down. But you don’t have to let it. The phrase is: “Keep up the good.”

There will be a public service to honor the memory of Dr. John Bulette in the Chapel at the YMCA Camp Silver Beach on Saturday, June 14th at 2pm.

Note: We all know the Doc was quirky. His memorial will be too. Bring a story, or a memory, or a feeling to share. We’ll pass the mic so anyone can speak, in the tradition of a Pennsylvania Quaker Service.

Instead of flowers, please consider making a tribute gift to a fund we are establishing to support ongoing counseling services on the Shore. Gifts can be mailed to Riverside Shore Memorial Hospital, PO Box 430, Onancock VA 23417, c/o Sally Schreiber or online at riversideonline.com/foundation. If using the online portal: Tap “Make a Gift,” Select “Riverside Shore Memorial Hospital Make a Difference Fund,” (from the drop-down menu), In the gift options field at the bottom, enter “In Memory of Dr. Bulette.”

To read more about Dr. Bulette, to share pictures, or to leave a comment about your experiences with him, kindly visit this website: http://drjohnbulette.com.

Arrangements by the Williams-Onancock Funeral Home.