Today, while visiting the hospital for what feels like the however-manyth time in the past two months, a strange and familiar thought crept in: I’ve done this before.
Not this exactly, but something very close. Years ago, I used to visit a boyfriend in jail. And while the locations couldn’t be more different on paper—one sterile and fluorescent, the other concrete and cold—the emotional landscape was almost identical.
Neither visit was ever fun. But both came with the same sharp edge of anticipation: the excitement of seeing “my person,” mixed with the dread of everything else.
Hospitals, like jails, demand a kind of submission. You go through a metal detector. You get searched. You sign in and you sign out. You’re on someone else’s schedule. Someone else’s territory. You’re monitored. Limited. Reduced to a visitor badge.
And in both places, you watch the clock. You do that dance where there’s too much to say, yet everything that needs saying gets stuck in your throat. You try to make it light, or deep, or meaningful, or normal—but it’s all just an attempt to outrun the grief sitting between you.
Because no matter how long you stay, you always leave the same way: hollow. Empty. Walking out alone.
I stopped to see my Nana after that—at the old person’s home, which honestly wasn’t any less depressing. She can barely mumble a coherent sentence. Her eyes still light up when she sees me, though, but the words aren’t there anymore. Just fragments. Glimpses. A shell of the sharp, vibrant woman I grew up with.
I did hear “I love you,” and she managed to ask my daughter how her grades were, which is Classic Nana.
But again, I left the same way: heavy-hearted, aching, and quietly wondering if that was the last real visit.
The pain isn’t loud in these places. It’s quiet. Tucked behind your eyes, masked by tired jokes, forced smiles, or awkward silences. But it’s there. Lingering in the fluorescent lights, the echo of heavy doors, the final glance before goodbye.
Three visits. Three different places. Same damn feeling.
Some days, being the one who stays strong feels like a slow unraveling. But there’s strength in showing up, even when it’s hard. Especially when it’s hard.