Joanna explained that she had been exhausted for months. Since Eli was born, she had been waking around three in the morning with her heart racing, terrified something was wrong. She went to work at the credit union, smiled at customers, returned home, and tried to keep everything together for her children. She had been afraid to ask for help because she didn’t know how to admit she needed it. Instead, she had created a plan that made it seem as though she was offering me a place to stay, when what she really wanted was her mother nearby.
Then I noticed another page on the legal pad. It was a half-finished letter addressed to me. It began, “Mom, I do not know how to say this. I need you. Not as a renter. As my mother.” Beneath it were several crossed-out attempts to finish the sentence. I understood that my daughter had struggled for weeks to say something she could have told me in five simple words.
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