“Although the trauma I assumed he came from may indeed be factual, I was called to admit that Dad, too, was just a product of systemic failures. One day, you might get to go back to your world, back to your people. Back to your Daddy, with whom you belong.”
“I knew I was dying. I was a shell of the woman who had had a baby 7 months prior. The tumor had grown to take over half of my breast and the pain was unbearable.”
“He made a fist and cocked it back. I could feel his fury. I remember reaching over, just an hour after surgery, and snatching his hand as he started to strike. It hurt like heck in my abdomen, but I couldn’t let him do what I wanted to do myself… hit that physician.”
“I didn’t her every memory to be of me tipsy with a drink in my hand. Feeling grief without alcohol was the hardest thing I’ve had to do, but I had to walk through it and I’m proud of that.”
“You refilled my heart with a certain kind of magic. You may have been last to find your way to my heart and arms, but my goodness, how much you were worth waiting for.”
“To be invited into their world is a privilege.”
“I remembered all the times I heard, ‘When it’s all too much and you’re feeling like you could hurt yourself or your baby, put them in a safe place and walk away.’ I remember thinking it will never happen to me, then crying when I realized it was happening in that very moment. I had hit my breaking point.”
“I thought once my kids were older I’d have all sorts of time. And yet somehow I sit here, exhausted to my core. Still no time, still tired. Still wouldn’t have it any other way.”
“I felt like I had been hit with a bag of bricks. I was sad, angry, and felt very defeated. When you care for someone with Alzheimer’s, it’s a constant grieving process. You grieve at the diagnosis, you grieve at every ‘milestone.’ I was dealing with grief even though my dad is still alive.”
“Here we were in a tiny town, in the middle of nowhere with very little support, a child with a new and scary diagnosis, and a baby who never stopped screaming. Just to be funny, I took a pregnancy test. It was positive.”
