Hospital Days, Heavy Hearts, and What It Feels Like to Be a Parent

I spent eight hours in the hospital the other day, watching my son flinch with every twitch of his broken arm, his face twisting as if the pain itself were gnawing at him from the inside. I swallowed my own tears, forcing myself to stay strong, to be his armor while mine cracked invisibly beneath the weight.

Last year, it was my other son—his body convulsing in a seizure, his breath caught in a terrifying silence that stretched on like an eternity. I remember the way the air seemed to rot in my lungs as I begged him to breathe. Hospitals have become our lifeline, yes, but also our torment—rooms where hope and dread claw each other in the shadows.

We’re not there every day, but far too often, more than any parent should have to endure. A few visits a year might sound small, but when each one carves sleepless nights into your bones, when each one leaves scars you can’t see, it feels endless.

These aren’t the journeys I want to take. I dream of warm beaches, of far-off places where the sun leaves nothing but tan lines and laughter behind. But instead, the only trips we can afford are the ones our bodies demand, the ones that leave us bruised, bandaged, and broken.

Waiting. That’s all we did.

From the entrance line to the triage room—wait.

He was examined, moved to another room—wait.

Administration processed us—wait.

The nurse’s station—wait.

X-rays—wait.

Back to the nurse’s station—wait.

Then back to the waiting room—wait again.

Finally, they called his name and led us to the last room. We waited there too, until the doctor arrived, examined him, and told us what I had feared all along: his arm was broken. They wrapped it in a cast, and we waited again—for it to dry, for the discharge papers, for permission to go home.

And now, even outside those hospital walls, the waiting isn’t over. Two weeks until they change the cast. Another two to four weeks until it’s healed.

Still waiting. Always waiting.

There’s a strange kind of loneliness in these moments, even when the room is crowded. The nurses are kind, the doctors efficient, but none of them carry the suffocating weight that claws inside my chest. The fear is mine alone, a thick, choking, a parasite feeding on my calm. The helplessness drips through me like blood from an open wound, and the guilt gnaws at my bones with teeth I can’t dull. The what ifs crawl like maggots through my thoughts, writhing, multiplying, feeding on every shred of peace I try to salvage. The heaviness of it is indescribable—like being gutted from the inside out, forced to keep walking, breathing, and smiling while something devours you whole.

The what ifs don’t disappear when you leave the hospital. They follow you home, lurking in the corners of your daydreams and tearing apart your sleep. The memory of the hospital festers, a relentless parasite that crawls over my skin, searching for a way to burrow itself inside. It makes me question myself; my motherhood, my abilities and whispers that I am not enough. It infiltrates my mind like a sickness, laying poisonous eggs that hatch doubt and fear, each one working to unravel my sanity from the inside out.

Every time I leave the hospital, I carry its stench with me like a sour mist that clings to my skin, seeping into my clothes, rotting quietly in the corners of my memory. It forces me to confront my life, to strip it down to the marrow and ask what really matters. And every time, I arrive at the same conclusion: the dream I chase, the grind of the 9–5, the endless clawing at success—it’s all hollow. The truth is more brutal. Health is the only currency that matters. Without it, nothing else holds value. When everything is boiled down and all the excess flesh is carved away, being alive and unbroken is the only gift left to clutch. If only that were enough to pay the bills. Or maybe the irony is that the bills only get paid because I am still healthy enough to drag myself to work.

The darkness creeps in when my focus strays, when I let myself be swallowed by illusions that don’t matter. That’s when the rot sets in, when the thoughts turn septic. Maybe what I need isn’t more chasing, but a reset. A reboot. A chance to scrape away the decay and start again.

I have been rotting in the sour aftermath of the hospital for days now, my energy leeched dry. The darkness has sunk its claws into me, a parasite I can no longer tolerate. I’ve recognized its hold, felt it burrow deeper with every passing hour, and I’ve had enough. It’s time to purge, to rip the leech from my skin and cleanse what’s left of me, no matter how raw the process, no matter how much it bleeds.

Maybe the lesson isn’t about finding answers. Maybe it’s about showing up, day after day, even when the weight of fear, exhaustion, and worry gnaws at your bones like unseen vermin. It’s about letting yourself feel it all; the anxiety, the grief, the love, all while still dragging yourself forward through the filth of chaos. Holding hands through trembling fingers, cracking jokes to stave off the shadows, tending scraped knees that bleed, wiping tears that taste of salt and despair, and finding tiny sparks of joy amid the decay. Even when the world feels like it’s tearing you apart from the inside, those small acts are what keep you alive and healthy.