Rose and I had been talking lately about me starting writing again. We talked about how their nickname Rose didn’t feel right since they came out as non binary and starting using they/ them pronouns earlier this year. We talked about my sense of unfinished business since Jay, and what I would need to do to feel like I could draw a line in the sand and start again. We talked about how I’m running a business now and sharing deeply personal things could have unintended effects on staff, clients and colleagues. And we discussed my love of writing and my sadness at losing the blog and feeling cut off from it.

This was not how I planned to start sharing again. I don’t have a new nickname for Rose. I don’t have resolution or answers. But I’m being asked how I am every day and I don’t have words for that I can say without screaming.

Dearest Rose is sedated and ventilated in ICU, battling MRSA ‘golden staf’ that has chronically infected their knee following a routine surgery, and since spread to their lungs in a virulent pneumonia. Four days ago they merely had a bad knee and a slight cough. It has moved extremely quickly and taken over both lungs.

I’m exhausted and distraught. I want to cry, scream, vomit, and violently attack something. I visit every day and help wash them, rub their hands and feet, read to them. Then I go out to my car and cry hysterically. Then I come home to Poppy and try to be her connected and safe person. My community are tired, 2020 has been unkind to many of us, but they are also rallying. Poppy has a small crew of people she feels safe with this time, which is buffering her. She tells me she misses Mama’s squeezy hugs and asks me when she herself will die. I feel so depleted. I was struggling with exhaustion and depression following all the other surgeries and stress this year already. It feels like my reserves are exhausted.

There’s so much noise around me. I’m still writing to Rose so they can catch up on messages when they wake. I’m so scared and so sad. Everyone wants to help and I can hardly speak. Rose’s hands and feet are chilled cold. Poppy paints herself and runs whooping with her friends under the peppercorn tree. So many people care. I go back to bed to nap. Don’t let this be my new normal, please. I have to find ways to keep breathing even when I can’t be near them. Guilt, fear, regret engulf me. Before they went under I told them it’s okay to be scared, but I want you to focus on the love. You are so loved. I’m trying to do the same. I’m so scared. There’s so much love here.