Bonus: Relief, rest, recovery

I've been thinking about healing...

I had such a wonderful weekend at Verb Festival – I was part of three beautiful events and it was just so cup-filling and affirming and inspiring. I learned so much and felt like I really reconnected with my writing roots.

I was meant to write my third book last year and this year. I didn’t. Life just got in the way. I’ve been reflecting on just how much Eddie’s diabetes diagnosis shattered us. Sometimes I forget what we have been through as a family. It’s Diabetes Awareness Month and Eddie has been answering questions on Instagram and Facebook about type one. It was his idea to talk about it all – it seems to empower him and he feels called to support other kids with health challenges. I am wildly proud of both my children.

Eddie has been asked about his diagnosis story a lot. His answers are usually something like: “I got tired, I threw up, I fell asleep and then when I woke up, I had type one diabetes”.

When he first said it, I felt like I was falling. I was transported back, standing in the kitchen worried, watching him on the couch. He was so pale. We’d taken him to the doctors and they’d said there wasn’t anything wrong - but we knew. We knew our baby boy was not OK. It happened so fast. I was suddenly leaning against the wall in the emergency ward and I couldn’t see.

My husband’s face was a silent horror. I’ve seen that face before. And I’d always hoped I’d never see it again. And yet here we were, in this fucking place again, unable to see the future without our baby Eddie.

I can’t remember that time well. I can’t remember where Ronnie was when Eddie was rushed to hospital. I remember calling my sister and I remember her helping me breathe down the phone – I couldn’t even get the words out.

I remember when he was finally stable and was transferred to the ward. I remember asking how you get rid of diabetes – “How do we fix it?” And I remember the doctor, as if she had so many hands to hold us all. She was sure, she said, that we would be OK.

And I remember that. And I remember the screaming as we held him down for his injections. And I remember the appalling awfulness of it all. And I remember thinking how can a mother do this to her child? And I remember his pleading with me, ‘please don’t hurt me mama, please you’re hurting me, don’t hurt me’.

And I remember my husband, like a ghost, tears always shining in his eyes. And I remember us injecting each other and saying, or maybe just thinking: ‘My God, it hurts so much, how can we do this to him?’ And I remember us practicing with saline, our own bodies bruised, the best way to do it. We wanted to make it hurt less. We wanted to take his place. And I remember vomiting. And I remember my X-ray on my hand after Eddie kicked me as I tried to inject him. I remember how he was afraid of us. And I remember how we were so afraid.

I remember him saying sorry and crying for my hand. And I said sorry to him for everything. For every single fucking thing in the world.

But I don’t remember these things every day anymore. I don’t remember these things as he snuggles into my arms. And I don’t remember these things as he reads to his brother. And I don’t remember these things as he rides his bike, and wrestles with his friends, and dances and sings and plays. I don’t remember them all the time now and maybe that means we’re all healing.

And maybe that means it’s time to write again. To write a new story.

Roxane Gay said there was hope in testemony. She said she wrote herself towards a stronger version of herself.

I like that.

More hope, more healing.

I've thought of that as I've watched the US election. Among the celebrations has been the inevitable backlash on social media against the joy and dancing in the street. Biden is a war criminal, Biden is the same as Trump, Biden is a more acceptable version of racism for a broken nation. It's not that I disagree - It's just that I feel it comes from a place of privilege to want to stamp out delight as if it slows us down.

It's as if we feel if we rejoice, our jubilation will render us incapable of fighting. How wrong that is. We cannot do the work needed to create a fairer world for all if we are broken. It's the absence of light, of hope, that wears us out. It brutalises an already bruised soul.

So, let there be joy. Sigh with relief. Let that relief turn to rest. Rest and prepare and if you don't need that rest then please protect the joyous as they rest. They have worked so hard.

Don't police this moment, those exalting are policed by the world, they don't need you to join in.

"May our sigh of relief build on itself until it is a tornado tearing through every structure of hate in this country" - Sonya Renee Taylor

For now, rest.

Angélica Becerra: Queer Chicana Artivist. Read more about her here.