To suffer with means this

To suffer with means this

a note on connecting through the struggle

She pulled out the seat next to mine from the long, gray table and sat down.

I had just lost someone I knew to addiction and talked about it at the meeting in tears.

The woman next to me was quiet.

I talked about my grief, how I was struggling with the addiction loss, and why it happens. As I shared, there were nods. There was an enveloping silence.

After the meeting, the woman turned to me and took my hands in hers.

I looked down and noticed that they were rough like a farmer’s hands. Veins reached up her wrists like roots. As she pressed my hand with increasing firmness, they jutted out even more and reminded me of a maze of rivers on an old map. She had silver rings with faux gems and bracelets with tiny trinkets that jangled.

She searched me with wise eyes and began repeating the same phrase:

Both sons.

I started to cry and then she pulled me into her soft chest that smelled like drugstore perfume. I inhaled everything that she was so selflessly giving me.

Compassion.

Suffering with.

Together we stood there, sharing a moment of the pain of addiction loss together. I forgot about my own pain as I tried to imagine, but could not even come close, to what she was feeling.

Even then, before I was a mother, I could not even fathom the loss of a child—let alone both children.

The woman and I, we both walked to our cars after some time. She lit a cigarette and I wish I had one right then. I waited as she got into her car, waved gently, and drove away.

I’ve never seen this woman again, but she comes to mind when I think about compassion.

When I think about the small gestures that remind us, we aren’t alone in our suffering.

An embrace.

A brush of a hand.

Eyes that nod in recognition.

I write about addiction and mental health recovery because this is what I know. Some women like the mom whose children were stolen by addiction know the ache of loss and the connection in sharing this emptiness with others.

She may not know how she impacted me that day, how her grief covered my own in a blanket of love that smelled (comfortingly) like cigarette smoke.

Friends, how can we all show up today with the warmth of understanding?

How can we extend our own stories to help someone else heal?

read more at Circle of Chairs

cover photo Photo by Rebecca Peterson-Hall on Unsplash