The Comfort of my Weakness

Working in care professions puts the world in oxymoron. I work to improve the lives of others, and in this see not so much their weaknesses but my own. Each day is a lesson in humility, a reminder of my inabilities, but in this I find comfort.

I was reminded of this powerful lesson on Thursday as I waited with one resident to go to an appointment. As my coworker retrieved the car, I sat with Sabine on the couch. She removed her beanie and began yanking out clumps of hair, quietly repeating phrases. Sabine is typically very quiet, a woman who has the ability to calm you just by sitting in her presence. As groupmates yell and raise ruckus, she sits still, looks at you with her dome eyes and whispers something more to herself than anyone. She looks like she has deep thoughts revolving in her head, like she holds a valuable life lesson within. So to see her pulling her hair out was more jarring than if it’d been another resident.

I know people, dear loved ones, who have struggled with the same symptom. It is not something I judge or look at with perplexed eyes, but something I empathize with. It was different, though, to witness her self-abuse. People with developmental disabilities often carry the gift of honesty. Many never formed the social inhibitions that cause us to hide our flaws or emotions at all costs. It is a quality I have grown to admire in my work with people with disabilities because I think most of us could use a lesson in the value of true honesty, not about lying but about letting ourselves and our emotions truly be known. Sabine did not hide her anxiety from me, but let it exist as a fact of her current state.

Though I knew it came from somewhere deep, I tried to talk to her, to ask her to stop and tell me what she was thinking about. It wasn’t that I expected it to work, but that I didn’t feel that I could just sit there quietly letting it happen. I had no power in the situation, no control, no logical way to help. I could only be with her, and that is what I did. I reached out my hands and laid them gently on her scalp, then listened and whispered words of comfort.

Perhaps I did not help her through her day or her anxiety, but she helped me, with her raw emotional honesty, through mine. I had no power in the situation; I was as meek as she. But my power came in acknowledging this and simply being present. She reminded me what we are called to do, that we are called to be with one another and walk together. It doesn’t mean that we can always help the way we want to, but that being aware of our common humanity, we can live in communion. In this, I find comfort.

Love, Bryce