Delaney Gobel is a former content curator for Love What Matters. She is currently pursuing a dual-degree in Media & Communication and Public Relations & Advertising from DePaul University. On any given day she can be found exploring coffee shops around Chicago, playing with her beloved cat, or scouring Pinterest for new vegan recipes to try!
“We sat outside on a cement bench for what felt like another hour before making the impossible decision to go home. Home without our first child, our sweet baby boy. Home with only a plastic bag representing our time with him.”
“My eyes still swell when I think about how I will never get to hear her laugh or see her smile. I will never get to put a band-aid on her knee and have magical mommy kisses.”
“The doctor said he didn’t believe in a Hashimoto’s diagnosis and it was all in my head. I walked out of his office with tears streaming down my face. I knew deep down I wasn’t crazy and this was not the life I was meant to live.”
“I did a google search for ‘symptoms of alcohol withdrawal.’ It was like I had the winning lottery numbers. I just kept checking box after box. Still I drank.”
“I poured everything into my salon and my family as a way to avoid my pain. My clients would compliment me on my ‘beautiful smile.’ My thoughts were, ‘If they only knew what was inside my head.’”
“I began to have dreams viewing life in my absence, being forced to watch my son struggle to make sense of his alcoholic mother. A mother who could never get sober. Those dreams changed something inside of me.”
“My face was in the toilet for the entire day. I was crying to any god out there to hear me, anyone at all. ‘Take it away or kill me. Either way I can’t do it anymore.'”
“Will they be okay adjusting to sharing us? Will my kids be okay if we have to say goodbye? We aren’t special. We aren’t brave. We just proceed with love every day and take the days one at a time.”
“‘Joie, are you sitting down?’ My heart knew the gusts of strong wind and rainbows I had seen everywhere over the last several days were warnings the next few minutes would teach me the meaning of anguish.”
“It was an unlikely love story, if only because neither of us had ever dreamed of any other life than the one we’d each had as straight, married, small-town, hockey moms.”
