when my body won’t hold me anymore and it finally lets me free, will I be ready? when my feet won’t walk another mile and my lips give their last kiss goodbye, will my hands be steady? when I lay down my fears, my hopes, and my doubts, the rings on my fingers, and the keys to my house, with no hard feelings…
Four years ago, I wrote this post. Reading it again made me sad, but I felt pulled back to it because of something that happened yesterday. Lately, every time I think I’ve seen the worst of things emotionally, life is like “HA! Girl, yea right!” Another rabbit out of the hat. Another gut punch that knocks the wind out of me. So let’s talk about it.
Since my last post, when I felt this tiny flicker of hope because I was beginning to understand what healing actually looks like for me, things have gotten so much fucking worse. Worse in a way that almost feels absurd. Life looked at my progress and said “Ok, now let’s go deeper.” I get it. I do. I needed this part. I needed to uncover even more of what I’ve been carrying, so that I could clearly see the shit I won’t be carrying with me into 2026.
The truth is that even though this post is 4 years old, I remember that girl. She hadn’t completely fallen apart yet. She was a nervous wreck, yes. Too hard on herself while carrying the whole fucking world on her back, but still intact. She had no idea what was coming. And while I still see pieces of her in me, I am not that girl anymore. Honestly, I’m not even the person who started 2025 back in January. I don’t remember who that person was. The last month has completely destroyed me and all I can do now is sift through the rubble and try to rebuild from here.
At this point we are all familiar with the fact that I don’t sleep. And I didn’t think it was possible, but in the last month it somehow got worse. I’ve been running on fumes. My nervous system was in shambles. My body never gets a break. Even in the few hours that I do sleep, there is no rest. I wake up already behind, already emotionally depleted. Yesterday, I woke up feeling completely empty. I was in tears, feeling like everything was crashing down around me.
I did the laundry and took a shower, hoping to create some sense of normalcy. Eventually, I laid down on the couch and tried to relax when the phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number, but something in my body said, “pick up the phone.” I’m so glad I did. It was someone from the VA calling to actually help me resolve all of the nonsense that I’ve been trying to make sense of for the last 2 years. He could hear my anxiety over the phone and told me to breathe. He told me exactly what he needed from me and reassured me that he would absolutely help. He needed a form signed by my grandmother to get the ball rolling.
I got everything ready, heated up some pasta for dinner for her. Bundled up and took a walk over to her. My body needed to move, to inhale the cold air. I put in my earbuds and told my thoughts to shut the fuck up and let me have this walk to myself.
When I got to her floor, she was sitting in the common area with the other residents. I walked up to her and said, “Hi Beauty!” like I always do. She looked confused. I told her it was me. She told me to take her to her room. We wheeled down the hallway. I told her it snowed and asked if she had seen it. She said she had, through the window. When she pointed to a door and said “I think this is my room,” I told her she was right and we went in. I told her I had a form from the Veterans for her to sign, and that I brought her some pasta for dinner. We got the business out of the way. And then came the crushing blow I never saw coming…
She said “you look like someone I know.” I said, “it’s me Gram.” She looked confused. She kept asking if the person with my name had made the pasta. I kept telling her that it was me, that it was my name she was saying. She grew agitated. She said again that I looked familiar, but she didn’t know who I was. We made a little small talk, but I could feel her discomfort. I handed her the pasta, and I told her I would bring her back to the common area before dinner.
I want to be clear about some things. I know that I am dealing with a 102 year old woman. I know that it was after 3 PM and she has a tendency to “sun-down”. But this was different. She has been confused before, but she has never not known me.
I was destroyed. My main concern at that moment was making sure that she felt comfortable. And I realized, in that moment… comfort was not found in me like it usually was. Our goodbye was awkward. I told her I loved her and I would talk to her later. I got in the elevator with one of the nurses and held my breath until I could get back outside to the ice-cold air.
The walk home was quiet. I thought about the day I’d had, looked up at the sky filled with puffy white clouds and tried not to break my neck on the icy sidewalks. I took a detour to the corner store to pick up something for dinner. Before I arrived, a song shuffled in my earbuds and stopped me in my tracks. Hot tears poured out of my eyes. I gave myself a moment to cry and then collect myself, so I didn’t look like a mess when I walked into the store. I let myself sob on the long block home and pulled myself together before I walked through my door.
The rest of the evening continued peacefully, and I decided that after the day I’d had, I desperately needed sleep. I took Xanax and slept for 7 straight hours.
This post from 2021 was flashing like a neon sign as I walked to work this morning. 4 years ago, I wondered what all of this was for. It felt like nothing had changed. Here I am, still wondering what all of this is for. This is not what I ever wanted for her. And as good as she’s been, I forget how fragile all of this is. How quickly it can unravel, how easily it might just keep getting worse.
I know yesterday was one moment, and the next time I see her, it might not be like that. It might not happen again for a while. But it happened. And so, I want to reflect on a few things that have been going through my mind because this is important.
Reading that 2021 post again, I can see the fear I was carrying. Fear of loss, fear of what might happen if I couldn’t keep her safe. Yesterday, that fear was replaced with grief. Pure, aching grief. For so long, my life has revolved around her. Every thought, every action, every part of my day somehow has been in service to her comfort, her needs, her safety. And in the process, I lost myself. Pieces of me that weren’t even tied to her slowly disappeared, and I didn’t even notice. And that’s why a moment like yesterday hit me like a freight train.
Watching her not recognize me, even for a few minutes, somehow loops me back through all of it. The fear from back then. The years of putting her before myself. The part of my identity I built entirely around her presence in my life. It all comes rushing back at once.
Not just yesterday, not just the fear I carried in 2021, but the parts of myself I’ve lost over the years. The pieces tied to who I thought I was, who I’ve been for others, and who I’ve been trying to hold onto. I think back to this summer, to the losses I wrote about in my post in September: losing the dance studio, losing my father, and realizing how much of my life has been built around roles and responsibilities that defined me externally.
Yesterday somehow it all clicked. The identity I built around caring for others, the self I misplaced, the grief I shoved into corners of my mind, and a false happiness I’ve clung to, thinking that helping others could fill the parts of me that I lost. Her not recognizing me reminded me in a brutal, visceral way that I’ve been living so much outside of myself, and that now I need to begin rebuilding an identity that is exclusively mine, even though I have no idea where to start. Some of the main pieces of who I was were ripped away this year, and it’s not lost on me that it’s for a reason, whether I like it or not.
Every time another thing happened this year, I reminded myself “it’s not happening TO you, it’s happening FOR you.” I’ve said it countless times, but I don’t think I really believed it. It was just something I said to ground myself in reality. It’s all very clear to me now.
The truth is that lately, it has felt like my constant empathy, the thing that has defined so much of who I am, sometimes feels like it has turned to apathy. Maybe I’ve just been too exhausted, and my last bit of patience has been non-existent, I don’t know. My fuse is short and I shut down quickly. I don’t feel like the person I’ve known my whole life, and somehow, that’s ok. I’m scared to death and uncomfortable as hell, but I know that figuring out where to go from here is essential for my health. I can’t rebuild just to do it all over again. I need to rebuild carefully, in a way that protects me while also honoring the parts of myself that I’ve lost, and finally allows me to live my own life, not just in service to everyone else’s.
I was shaken awake in 2023, and for the years that followed, I wandered around in a foggy haze until a month ago. Refusing to give in. Believing that change wasn’t possible for me, or that I didn’t even really want anything to change. That I didn’t deserve dreams. Ignoring all the signs. Distracting myself with things that only detoured me for a little while. But in the last month, it’s felt like someone stood behind me, hands firmly on my shoulders, forcing me in front of the mirror that I’ve been running from. Forced me to stay there until I finally saw what I was avoiding. Watched me scream for mercy, beg to let me go and to let me run, until I exhausted myself and finally looked at the reflection.
I thought I lost myself so many times before, but 2025 was the year I finally had no choice but to fall apart. I’m still so scared. I still can’t fully accept joy, and there is still so much I need to learn before I can trust. My nervous system is still learning how to regulate while being so fucking uncomfortable that even one more minute of sitting in it feels unbearable. But I’m sitting here now, in the aftermath of every one of those unbearable moments, telling you about it. Proof that I prevail, in spite of myself.
At the beginning of this year I rolled my eyes at the thought of “taking my power back” because I didn’t know what it meant. I get it now. Life ebbs and flows whether you like it or not. What matters is how you show up in the middle of it. When the chaos hits, when the grief comes, when nothing feels steady. Showing up, even when it’s uncomfortable, is where the power lives. And I’m finally learning to stand in it without apology.
I don’t make resolutions anymore. This year won’t be any different. What I will do is recognize, finally, how far I’ve come. I will carry with me the clarity that I am stronger than I thought, that I can survive heartbreak and chaos, and that light can return even after the darkest days. I am not too much. I am me. And I am done resisting myself. I have sacrificed so much to get here, there’s no turning back now.
And so, I step into whatever comes next fully aware, fully present, and fully myself. No fear, no shame, just the quiet steady force of everything I’ve survived and everything I’m willing to fight for.
Tonight, I will breathe, knowing I’m here and ready to move forward. As always, thanks for reading. I’m always here if you need me…
under the curving sky, I’m finally learning why, it matters for me and you, to say it and mean it too, for life and its loveliness, and all of its ugliness, good as it’s been to me, I have no enemies…
Song name: NO HARD FEELINGS/ Artist: THE AVETT BROTHERS/ Year: 2016
TALKING ON EGGSHELLS 