I continue to give back precisely because I will
never forget what it was like to feel as though we were completely alone, because even the patient advocacy group that our physician told us about was saying that we must be hysterical, that we COULDN'T really have those needs, etc.
It was the most lonely and isolating experience I've ever had. I don't say that lightly, by the way. In comparison, it was MORE isolating that living with T1D, being a family member of a terminally ill loved one, living in a nuclear family with a person suffering from florid psychosis, and living in a highly abusive, dysfunctional home as a child. MORE isolating. MORE disheartening. As noted, I do
not say that lightly.
I've never forgotten what that felt like to me as a parent. Despair-- that's what it felt like. I would chew off a limb before I would turn my head away and know that by reaching out a hand or just whispering "You're not alone-- it gets better," I could lessen the
emotional toll.
This is what
family is
supposed to do for us-- and it's what so few FA parents
do experience with their families. Being an outsider to EVERY human interaction is so incredibly difficult a journey-- and made more so when you also get the label of "choosing" to be that way, rather than any understanding that you really
don't have a choice.