Other People's Stories

I feel like my thoughts are on mute a lot lately. I am on the outside, looking in. Remaining quiet. Holding onto confidentiality. Protecting the privacy of others. Silent.

Every once in a while, I feel the need to talk to someone who doesn't know any of the characters in my story. I just need to hear my words outside my own head so they stop churning around and around. So many words but in reality, very few lucid "thoughts".

I remember feeling this way throughout Mom's last year. "This is not my story" I would tell myself again and again. I was playing a supporting role and thankfully I shared the part with others. We would talk among ourselves, each knowing the part well. We supported, we listened, we had an opportunity to "be real" with each other. We could lean in and be vulnerable, knowing someone had our back. We weren't alone.

Once again, I am cast in a supporting role. This time is different. I don't share the part. I have no other cast mates walking the walk with me. I have strong support systems but I walk this particular walk alone.

I write these words and my thoughts go back to Mom, as they often do.

Throughout Mom's last year, she still played the role of "mom" very well. Strong, as strong as she could be. Fiercely independent, as much as possible. She was still very much a mother. She cast our worries aside, as (I believe) the last thing she wanted was pity. She didn't enjoy conversations that revolved around anyone's ill health, let alone her own. Yet she was dying. She knew this. She spoke of it in a manner of fact way. She didn't like words that veiled the truth. Palliative care. Passing away. Just say what it is. "I'm dying".

She said the words, yet I never felt her falter. She was my mom until the end. 

Though we were there at her side as much as we could be and she would allow, she walked that walk alone. No one knew what it felt like to be her. As much as we tried, we didn't know.

I well remember the look she shot me when I tried to guess what she may be feeling. If she didn't say the words, her eyes certainly did. "Don't tell me what I'm feeling..."

We didn't know. 

We don't know what others are dealing with. Ever. We can try and put ourselves in their shoes. But no on really knows.

As we walk through our days, if we spread kindness, extend grace to those who may be fighting a battle we are unaware of, do what we can, when we can ... if we do our best (and our "best" may change by the minute, hour or day), take the lessons learned along the way and simply keep waking up to the next day and doing it all over again ... it is enough.