A Voice Memo to a Blog Post

One of my best friend’s mom is sick right now, and my friend, being the incredible soul that she is, has stepped in in a major way. She texted me this week:

“I am forever in awe of your positivity, faith, hope and endurance throughout all of the doctor’s appointments you spent the last 3 years going to. You are truly an angel on Earth and a blessing not only to Renato, but for everyone who knew him. You were / are the force that kept him going and positive through the pain. Thank you, sweet one.”

I really, really needed that reminder this week. On the other side, her message made me realize she needed encouragement. She’s experiencing a similar pain and helplessness of watching a loved one go through sickness. I wish I could take the pain from her, but I can’t, but I do have some wisdom. Two years of illness and eight months of grief reminded me I could offer her some advice. I wrote it as a voice memo because I didn’t want to type, and she’s encouraging me to share it. So, maybe you need to hear it too:

“I just want to say thank you very much for that message. it’s been a minute since I’ve had that clear, focused reminder and it is so easy for me to get down on myself and just wonder “truly where did it all go, where did all that love go, like where did all of that work and and all of that pain? It’s like I feel it at times and then sometimes I just wonder ‘What was it all for. Like I don’t know why, why did we have to go through all that? Why did he get sick? Of course I mean why did Renato get sick? But pain is so hard. Renato was the picture perfect patient and it he made it pretty easy to follow his lead. Other than the fact that I was his partner… I chose to never belittle him, or make him feel like I saw him as a sick person. He was so good at being strong and hopeful and optimistic and it just took me following his lead. I think sickness reveals a lot of who you are. Not to say that if you’re a difficult person in sickness your a difficult person it’s just that those things just get magnified. So, I was really lucky that the goodness, and a bit of the stubbornness, but mostly just goodness of Renato was what came through.

I didn’t know that it was going to be two years after that first doctors appointment at the oncologist, and I would’ve done it another twenty or thirty years. I was really tired and it was really hard, even when I was just following his lead, because it wasn’t the life that either of us wanted but I wonder if the milestones…

So if you’re sitting there thinking ‘How the hell am I gonna get through six months?’ I would encourage you to just focus on today, focus on the present, the strength that you need for today will get you through today.

When you wake up tomorrow, you’ll have the strength that you’ll need for tomorrow and I believe God nudges us along and he gives us the strength everyday. and the way that we can feel overwhelmed easiest is to bring in the past and the present into today. It’s human and it’s so normal. There were enough days and moments that were touch and go that it really forced me to be in the present and appreciate what I had TODAY. Now, that’s why I overspend money. Because shit, what are you actually saving for? It isn’t the best advice for always, but for this situation, I think You have plans and God has a bigger plan and doctors have plans and it could be something different. If holding on to a set date in the calendar brings you peace I’m all for it, but you know, you can release it to God and God’s plans and know that your strength will be renewed every day and you don’t need strength for two weeks or six months, you just need it for today, that’s all you need.”