He was wrong too.
Because rebuilding on incomplete truth is not really rebuilding.
There is always something missing underneath.
I have often wondered what I would have done if Carl had told me.
If, three days after Emily’s funeral, he had sat at that kitchen table and said:
“I have Parkinson’s. It will get worse. I’m scared I’ll become a burden. But I’m telling you because you deserve to decide what happens next too.”
I would have been terrified.
I would have been overwhelmed.
I would have cried.
And I would have stayed.
I know that now with absolute certainty.
That is the saddest part.
Not only the years we lost.
Not only the illness.
Not only the grief.
Carl did not trust me with the choice.
He loved me so much that he tried to wrap that love around me like protection.
And in the process, he nearly suffocated both of us inside it.
