This Brutiful Life

January 2023:

I have a story to share that includes some of the most brutal and beautiful (“brutiful”) moments of my life. If you are here, I hope that sharing my story helps you in some way.

For many years, I have been dealing with some health challenges. With the hopes of helping others, I planned on sharing my story once I had more answers, but then 3 things happened that changed my perspective and helped me decide to begin sharing now.

For about a year, one of my former doctors urged me to share my story with others. I always shrugged it off, because I didn’t think I had much to share with the world yet. I am nowhere near figuring out this thing called life, and shouldn’t I share my story when I have more of it figured out? He would always say, “We will never have life figured out. Life is a never-ending path of lessons and learning.” I kept the conversation in the back of my mind, but I still hadn’t made any plans on sharing.

Then, at the end of 2022, our therapist gave us the title of an Audible Original audiobook, Here I Are, by Alex Belth and Emily J. Shapiro, who are two people who seemed to have a similar story to us. Our therapist recommended that we at least look into it further. Well, that led to both me and my wonderful husband listening to the short audiobook in less than 48 hours. Alex and Emily did not have all of the answers, but they decided to share their story in order to try to help others. My story is not exactly the same as theirs, but there are a lot of similarities. Maybe my story, as bumpy and unrefined as it may be, will help someone, too.

A few days after finishing the audiobook, I listened to a podcast episode by Glennon Doyle. She had been waiting to share some struggles she has been facing until she had a “Tada” moment — a moment when she felt like she had it closer to being figured out. Her therapist told her that we, as a whole, usually only share things once they are tidy and refined, and that maybe it would be better if we shared our struggles when we were in the “messy middle” of them. Maybe others would benefit from hearing about real life instead of the tidy version of life we usually share with others. [Side note: Glennon is also who first introduced me to the term brutiful. Thanks, Glennon!]

Okay. Fine. I get the point. Maybe we should all share more of our “messy middle” for the sake of authentic connection and helping others feel less alone. This is me trying to show up and do that. If sharing my story before it is tidy and refined helps others, then it will be worth it.

As you would expect, I am nervous about putting parts of my story out there. I am not even sure if people blog much anymore, but writing is the easiest way for me to communicate, so here I go.

In case you want to be extra supportive (yes, please), I have listed a few concrete examples of things you could say that feel supportive to me:

• “I am here for you. What does support look like for you?”
• “I wish I knew what to say. I love you and am thinking about you.”
• “You look/sound so good, but how are you really feeling today?”
• “It must be difficult to have an invisible illness and to be in pain all the time.”
• “I see you and know how hard you are trying.”

And then a few concrete examples of what is not super helpful to me:

• Doing your own research and providing unsolicited advice about what I should do.
• Turning the conversation around and making it all about you.
• Telling me about someone you know who has it much worse than I do. (Suffering is not a competition. There is room for everyone to feel the “sucky-ness” of their own situations.)

What I know for sure is that no one is perfect, and we are all doing our best to show up in this life with the skills we have. Thank you for your support!


April 2024:

Update: I still hope that sharing my story in the messy middle is helping others feel less alone. In addition, I continue to hope that being more authentic, vulnerable, open, and honest will bring about more authentic connections with others.

Even though neither of those may be happening, I will continue (for now) sharing my story in the messy middle so that I don’t have to repeat myself to my family, friends, our therapist, and some of my medical practitioners. Repeating myself is a waste of my time and drains my energy. I would much rather skip the basic conversations about what is happening and move on to deeper conversations with the people in my life. The deep stuff is what makes life worth living. ❤️

(Plus, I have a feeling this blog is helping people more than they realize and/or are able to put into words. Just a hunch. 🙂)

This has been just another day of . . . This Brutiful Life: The Brutal & Beautiful Moments of My Life.