I Was in a Coma After a Crash When My Greedy Family

I Was in a Coma After a Crash When My Greedy Family Tried to Sell My House and End My Care, but the Argument at My Bedside Got So Serious It Exposed the Secret Safeguard My Mom Left for Me

If you ever want to know who really loves you, almost dying is a brutal way to find out.

When the truck hit me, I didn’t see my life flash before my eyes. There was just the screech of metal, the sour smell of burnt rubber, and then a hard, ugly silence.

Later, they told me it was a miracle I survived.

At the time, it didn’t feel miraculous. It felt like floating in dark water while voices passed overhead, muffled and far away.

What I didn’t know, drifting in that darkness, was that while I was fighting for my life in the hospital, my greedy and cruel husband and his mother were fighting for something else:

My house.

My money.

And, if they’d gotten their way, the right to decide whether I lived or died.

The house was my mother’s before it was mine.

A little blue place on the corner of Maple and 7th, with peeling white trim and a porch that sagged just enough to give it “character,” according to the realtor.

Mom bought it when I was ten, after leaving my dad.

She stood in the empty living room, hands on her hips, hair pulled back, and said, “This is ours, Em. No one is ever going to have the power to turn this key on us again, you hear me?”

I heard her.

She worked two jobs to keep that promise. Office manager by day, waitress by night. I helped where I could—sweeping floors, folding laundry, learning how to make boxed macaroni taste like something more than cheese-flavored paste.

She died when I was twenty-four. Heart failure. Genetic, they said. One minute she was yelling at the TV during a football game; the next I was holding her hand in a hospital bed that smelled like disinfectant and regret.

She left me the house.

Paid off.

Free and clear.

“With this,” the lawyer said, sliding over the papers, “your mom made sure you’ll always have a place to land.”

What the lawyer didn’t tell me—what I wouldn’t learn until three years later—was that she left me something else too. Something hidden behind a little paragraph of legal language that would blow up my marriage and save my life at the same time.

I met Nate at a friend’s barbecue, on one of those too-hot June evenings when the air feels like soup.

He was charming. That’s the first thing everyone says about him.

Tall, easy smile, the kind of guy who could start a conversation with a tree and walk away with its phone number.

He brought a big bowl of store-bought potato salad and put it in a glass dish so it looked homemade. When I called him out on it, he laughed and said, “You caught me. I can’t cook, but I can read a room.”

I should’ve paid more attention to that sentence.

We talked all night. About everything and nothing.

He asked questions. Lots of them. About my job (paralegal), my hobbies (reading, running, baking when I had time), my family.

When I mentioned the house, his eyes lit up just a little.

“You own?” he asked. “Like, own own?”

“Yeah,” I said. “It was my mom’s. She left it to me.”

“That’s incredible,” he said. “You must feel so… secure.”

I did. Or I had, until that moment, when I suddenly felt like I’d put something on the table I hadn’t meant to.

But he didn’t press.

He just said, “You’re one of the good ones, huh?” and changed the subject.

Six months later, he moved in.

A year after that, we got married.

My friends said we were cute together.

He made me laugh. He made good coffee. He rubbed my feet at the end of long days.

He also quit jobs as soon as they stopped being fun.

“It’s toxic,” he’d say. “I need to protect my peace.”

At first, I admired his confidence. His refusal to stay where he wasn’t appreciated.

Then I realized “toxic” sometimes meant “they expect me to show up on time,” and “protecting his peace” meant “I don’t like being told what to do.”

But by then, we had joint accounts and shared routines and inside jokes. It was easier to pick up more hours at my firm than to pick apart our life.

“We’re a team,” I told myself, paying the mortgage Mom had already paid, picking up the groceries, covering the surprise expenses that “popped up” whenever he “needed a break” between gigs.

If I noticed that his spending on gadgets and nights out and “networking events” didn’t slow down when his income did, I called it a rough patch.

He called it “living in the moment.”

I thought we’d grow out of it.

We did, sort of.

Just not in the way I expected.

The accident happened on a Wednesday.

Work Wednesdays are predictable. I get up, run if it’s not raining, grab a sad granola bar, and drive from our little blue house to the law office downtown.

That morning, Nate and I had a stupid argument before I left.

About money, of course.

“I just think, if we’re being honest,” he said, leaning against the counter, “it’s kind of unromantic that the house is only in your name.”

“It was my mom’s,” I said. “She left it to me. You knew that when you married me.”

“Yeah, when I thought someday we’d build something together,” he said. “But it’s been three years, Em. Three. Don’t you trust me?”

“I trust you,” I said. “This isn’t about trust. It’s about respecting that this house is the one thing I have from her. It’s… complicated.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” he said. “We put my name on the deed, that’s it. It’s symbolic.”

“It’s legal,” I corrected. “And there are tax implications and—”

“Oh my goodness,” he groaned. “Spare me the paralegal speech. I’m not trying to steal your precious house. I just don’t want to feel like a guest in my own home.”

“You’re not a guest,” I said. “You’re my husband.”

“Then treat me like one,” he shot back. “An equal. Not some… tenant.”

We went back and forth until it was time for me to leave.

“Can we talk about this later?” I asked, grabbing my keys. “I’m going to be late.”

“Yeah, run off to your important job,” he said. “We’ll talk when you decide I matter.”

It stung.

I left anyway.

I shouldn’t have.

Not like that.

But you never think, This might be the last thing I say before my car crumples like a soda can.

It was raining harder than the forecast had predicted. The sky was that flat gray that makes everything look like a black-and-white movie.

I turned onto the highway, wiped the fog from the windshield with the back of my hand, and that’s when my phone buzzed in the cup holder.

A text from Nate.

Maybe it’s good mom was the one who left you the house. You’re just like her. Stubborn. Think you’re better than everyone.

I took my eyes off the road for half a second to read it.

Half a second is all it takes.

When I looked up, the truck in front of me had slammed on its brakes.

I had time to think, This is going to hurt, and jerk the wheel.

The world spun.

Metal screamed.

Glass shattered.

Then nothing.

I woke up to the sound of beeping.

A steady, measured beep that drilled into my skull.

My mouth felt like sandpaper. My body felt… wrong. Heavy. Distant.

I tried to open my eyes.

The light was too bright.

“Emily? Can you hear me?”

A woman’s voice, close to my ear.

If this were a movie, I’d have turned my head dramatically and whispered something witty.

In reality, I managed a small groan.

“Good,” the voice said. “That’s good.”

I drifted.

Time got weird.

I’d surface for snippets—voices, footsteps, the rustle of fabric—then sink back under.

Somewhere in there, I realized I was in a hospital.

Somewhere in there, I realized I might die.

The funny thing about being barely conscious is that you hear more than people think you do.

They talk around you like you’re furniture.

Doctors. Nurses. Family.

You can’t move, but you can listen.

And what you hear can change everything.

The first voice I recognized was my sister’s.

Julia.

Three years younger, louder by nature and louder still since Mom died.

“Her name is Emily Carter,” she said, her voice shaking. “She was in a car accident. They called me from her phone. Is she—”

“She’s in critical condition,” another voice said. A man. Doctor. “But she’s stable for now. She has a head injury, internal bleeding we had to address surgically, several broken ribs. We’re monitoring her closely.”

“Is she—she’s going to wake up, right?” Julia asked.

“We hope so,” the doctor said. “But the next seventy-two hours are important.”

Julia sniffled.

“She hates hospitals,” she said. “She’s going to be so mad at you.”

The doctor chuckled softly.

“We’ll try not to take it personally,” he said.

I wanted to laugh too.

Couldn’t.

Couldn’t do anything.

Later, another voice joined hers.

Nate.

“How bad is it?” he asked.

He didn’t sound hysterical.

He sounded… annoyed.

Like the accident had interrupted something important.

“She almost died, Nate,” Julia snapped. “How do you think it is?”

“I’m just asking for information,” he said. “I have to make decisions.”

“You don’t have to make anything except coffee,” Julia said. “The doctors are doing their jobs.”

“You’re not even her husband,” he shot back. “I am.”

The air in the room shifted.

“She’s my sister,” Julia said, low and dangerous. “And you haven’t even asked what you did to help put her here.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” he asked.

“Read your last text to her,” she said. “Out loud. I dare you.”

Silence.

The monitor beeped on.

I wanted to scream.

I wanted to tell them both to stop, that my head hurt, that I loved them but I couldn’t take the noise.

Instead, I lay there, eyes closed, heart rate ticking on the screen like a metronome.

“You don’t get to put this on me,” Nate said eventually. “She was driving. She looked at her phone. That’s not my fault.”

“You pushed her,” Julia said. “You knew she was leaving for work. You picked a fight anyway. You threw a grenade and walked away.”

“I didn’t make a truck hit her,” he said. “The world doesn’t revolve around my texts.”

“Maybe not,” she said. “But if you’d sent something supportive instead of… that, maybe she wouldn’t have looked down.”

“That’s crazy,” he said. “You’re being dramatic.”

“Someone has to be,” she muttered.

Their footsteps faded as they moved toward the door.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“To call David,” she said.

“The lawyer?” he scoffed. “Why? Looking for a payout already?”

“You’re unbelievable,” she said. “Mom made him executor of some stuff when she died. If something happens to Em, we need to know what to do.”

“If something happens to her, I decide,” he said. “I’m her husband.”

“You’re also the reason she was upset when she left the house,” she said. “You don’t get to act like the hero now.”

They left.

The room quieted.

I floated.

Over the next two days, I heard more.

Bits and pieces.

A nurse talking about my blood pressure.

A janitor humming along to a song on the radio.

A doctor explaining to someone—my father, maybe, though I hadn’t heard from him in months—that “no, she can’t just be moved to a cheaper facility right now.”

And then, finally, the conversation that started everything.

The serious argument.

My husband.

My sister.

My mother-in-law.

And David.

All in one room.

All at my bedside.

“You need to be realistic,” my mother-in-law said, her voice sharp in that way only someone who has never heard “no” enough times can be.

Her name is Carol. She wears pearls to the grocery store and calls waiters “sweetie” in that tone that isn’t sweet.

“I am being realistic,” Julia said. “The doctor said she’s improving.”

“He said she’s stable,” Nate cut in. “That’s not the same as improving.”

“Don’t twist his words,” Julia snapped.

“I’m not twisting anything,” he said. “I’m thinking about the future. The bills. The house. The fact that she might not come out of this, and if she does, she might not be the same.”

“Even if she’s not, she’s still Emily,” Julia said. “She’s still my sister.”

“And my daughter-in-law,” Carol added, “but I’m not going to pretend I didn’t see this coming.”

“See what coming?” Julia demanded.

“The accident, obviously,” Carol said. “She drives too fast, she works too hard, she’s always running around like she has the weight of the world on her shoulders. Something had to give.”

“The truck gave,” Julia said. “Into her car.”

“You know what I mean,” Carol said. “She makes things harder than they have to be. Including this.”

There was a pause.

“This,” Julia said slowly, “meaning her being in a coma after a drunk driver hit her?”

“Her not having her paperwork in order,” Carol said. “Her not putting Nate on the deed to the house. Her keeping everything separate like she’s single.”

My heart rate sped up.

Beep-beep-beep, faster now.

“What does the house have to do with anything?” Julia asked.

“Everything,” Nate said. “If she… doesn’t make it, it needs to be sold. We can’t afford the taxes and the upkeep on just my income. We’d have to get a smaller place. Or an apartment.”

“So sell it,” Julia said. “Use the money to pay her medical bills. Put the rest in a trust for her care, or for… whatever else she’d want.”

“That’s not how this works,” Carol said. “The house is an asset. It should go to Nate. He’s her husband. That’s what happens in a marriage. Things become shared.”

“Funny,” Julia said. “Because the mortgage payment has been shared mostly between Emily and Emily.”

“That’s unfair,” Nate said. “I’ve contributed.”

“In spirit?” she shot back.

“Okay,” David’s voice cut in, calm but firm. “Enough. This isn’t the time.”

“On the contrary,” Carol said. “This is exactly the time. We need to make decisions before hospitals and banks start making them for us.”

“The only decisions that matter right now are medical,” Julia said. “And the doctors say she needs time.”

“Time costs money,” Nate muttered.

There it was.

The sentence that said way too much.

“Excuse me?” Julia said.

“You heard me,” he said. “We’re already getting statements. The insurance won’t cover everything. I’ve talked to the clerk. They’re going to start asking questions about long-term care, about ‘prognosis.’ We need to think about quality of life.”

“Quality of life?” Julia repeated. “She’s been here for four days. You’re already deciding she has none?”

“I’m being practical,” he said. “If she’s not going to wake up, it’s cruel to keep her hooked up to machines. For her and for us.”

“For us,” Julia echoed. “There it is. This is hard on you.”

“It’s hard on everyone,” he said. “I’m not trying to be the bad guy here.”

“Then stop auditioning,” she said.

“Enough,” Carol snapped. “This bickering helps no one. Nate, honey, you have rights. You’re her spouse. You need to assert them before other people—” she shot a pointed glance at Julia, “—start making choices for you.”

“No one is trying to make choices for me,” Nate said. “I’m just trying to figure out what Emily would want.”

“She would want a chance,” Julia said. “She would want to fight. She’d want you by her side, not shopping for real estate.”

My chest hurt.

Beep-beep-beep.

“We don’t even know if she can hear us,” Carol said. “For all we know, she’s already gone. We’re just keeping a shell breathing.”

“Stop,” Julia said. “Just stop.”

“Look,” Nate said, shifting his weight. I could picture him running a hand through his hair like he always did when he wanted to look stressed and thoughtful. “The doctor said that if she doesn’t show significant improvement in the next few days, we should start talking about… options.”

He lowered his voice.

“About maybe signing a DNR. About not keeping her on life support.”

My heart rate spiked.

The monitor blared.

“See?” Julia said. “She hears you, you idiot.”

“Her heart is responding to stimuli,” a new voice said. The doctor. “That’s actually a good sign.”

He moved closer; I felt his hand on my arm.

“Emily, if you can hear me, try to take a deep breath,” he said.

I tried.

The machine registered a slight change.

“Good,” he said. “Good.”

I focused everything on that breath.

On not sliding back under.

“A DNR is not something we rush into,” the doctor said. “Especially when the patient is young and showing responses. Right now, we’re cautiously optimistic.”

“That’s doctor for ‘we don’t know’,” Carol said.

“That’s doctor for ‘we need more time’,” he replied.

“The thing is, doctor,” Nate said, “I’m her husband. If it comes to that, I need to be prepared to make a call. I want to know what my options are.”

“You won’t,” David said calmly.

Silence.

“Excuse me?” Nate said.

“You won’t be making that call,” David repeated. “Not alone.”

“And why is that?” Carol snapped. “Last I checked, you’re not family.”

“I’m the executor of Anna Carter’s estate,” he said. “And the trustee of the Carter House Trust. Which, as you may remember, holds this hospital’s mortgage and a few other things. Including the Carter home.”

“The Carter—” Nate started, then stopped. “What are you talking about?”

Julia exhaled sharply. “Here we go,” she murmured.

“Your mother-in-law was a very careful woman,” David said. “When she died, she didn’t just leave the house to Emily outright. She put it in a trust, with a set of instructions. For situations exactly like this.”

“What kind of instructions?” Nate demanded.

“The kind that make sure one person’s panic doesn’t override everyone else’s judgment,” David said. “The trust names Emily as the primary beneficiary and me as trustee. It also specifies that if Emily is ever incapacitated, major decisions about her care and the house are to be made jointly by the trustee and her designated medical proxy.”

“Her proxy?” Carol said. “She never mentioned that.”

“She did,” Julia said. “Just not to you.”

“Who?” Nate asked, voice tight. “Who did she pick?”

Julia’s chair scraped closer to the bed.

Her hand wrapped around mine.

“Hi, Em,” she whispered. “It’s Jules. I’m your proxy. Surprise.”

If I could have squeezed her hand, I would have.

“Legally,” David continued, “you’re her spouse. You have rights. No one is disputing that. But you don’t have the only say. Especially not about end-of-life decisions. The trust makes that very clear.”

“So you’re telling me,” Nate said slowly, “that my wife’s care is up to her kid sister and a lawyer instead of me?”

“I’m telling you,” David said, “that her mom didn’t want any one person to have the power to decide she should die. Not you. Not Julia. Not me. That’s why she set up a system that requires agreement. And right now, the doctor is telling us we have no reason to discuss anything like a DNR.”

“This is ridiculous,” Carol snapped. “You can’t sideline her husband like this.”

“Her husband,” Julia said, “left unfinished job applications on the kitchen table and an empty pantry. My sister is literally why the mortgage is paid. Mom knew who she could trust to think clearly under pressure.”

“I have thought clearly,” Nate said. “I’m thinking about our future. The debt. The fact that she might need round-the-clock care. I’m not made of money.”

“You’re not made of much, from where I’m standing,” Julia muttered.

“Enough,” the doctor said. “We’re not going to have a shouting match over a critically ill patient. Not in this room.”

The monitor beeped in agreement.

“If you want to discuss finances,” the doctor continued, “do it in the hallway. Right now, my recommendation is that we give Emily time to heal. She’s young. Her body is responding. We’d be doing her a disservice to give up now.”

“You heard the man,” Julia said. “We’re not signing anything. Not today. Not in five days. Not unless there’s absolutely no hope, and even then, we talk about it together.”

Nate exhaled sharply.

“So what, I’m just supposed to wait?” he said. “Watch bills pile up while she lies here not knowing I’m even in the room?”

“If that’s too much for you,” Julia said, “you can always leave. Again.”

His footsteps moved toward the door.

“I’m going to get some air,” he said. “Think.”

“Take your time,” Julia said. “We’re not going anywhere.”

The door opened.

Closed.

Carol huffed.

“You’re being selfish,” she said to Julia. “You’re prolonging her suffering.”

“I’m preserving her options,” Julia said. “There’s a difference.”

“You always did think you knew everything,” Carol said. “Just like your mother.”

“Thank you,” Julia said.

The doctor chuckled under his breath.

“Alright,” he said. “Let’s give Emily some quiet.”

They left.

The room settled.

For the first time since the accident, I felt something other than fear or confusion.

I felt… safe.

Angry.

Determined.

I wasn’t ready to leave.

Not just because Nate had already penciled me out of his life.

But because Mom had trusted me enough to give me tools, even if she hadn’t told me all the details.

I owed it to her—to myself—to use them.

Recovery wasn’t a straight line.

There were good days and bad days.

Days when I woke up clear-headed, able to move my fingers and toes, answer questions, remember my name and the date (mostly).

Days when my head hurt so badly I wanted to sink back into the dark and not come up.

But I fought.

I thought about Julia, sitting by my bed reading gossip magazines aloud.

I thought about Mom, pushing through double shifts to keep the lights on.

I thought about Nate’s words—“Time costs money”—and let the anger be fuel.

I learned to talk again without slurring.

I learned to walk again, one shaky step at a time, gripping a physical therapist’s arm.

I learned, slowly, to look at my own reflection without flinching at the scar near my hairline.

Nate visited less and less.

At first, he came every day.

Brought flowers.

Sat in the chair, scrolling on his phone, occasionally looking up when the nurse did something new.

“Hey,” he’d say when I opened my eyes. “You look better.”

Sometimes he held my hand.

Sometimes he didn’t.

He always left early.

“I have to get to work,” he’d say. “Covering extra shifts.”

I didn’t ask what shifts.

I didn’t have the energy.

Later, Julia told me he’d started staying with his “friend” a lot more.

She didn’t say which friend.

She didn’t have to.

One afternoon, about two months into my recovery, I found the strength to say what I’d been thinking.

We were alone. Julia had gone to get coffee.

Nate was half-watching the TV in the corner.

“I heard you,” I said.

He looked up.

“What?” he asked.

“In the room,” I said. My voice was still rough, the words slow. “When I was in the coma. You and your mom. Talking about selling the house. Signing… papers.”

His face went pale.

“You were unconscious,” he said.

“But not deaf,” I said.

He swallowed.

“I was scared,” he said. “I didn’t know what to do. I panicked.”

“You thought about pulling the plug,” I said. “To save money.”

“That’s not fair,” he said. “I was thinking about quality of life. Yours. Mine. Ours.”

“You were thinking about getting out,” I said. “With as little responsibility as possible.”

He stood up, agitation rolling off him.

“I can’t win with you,” he said. “I sit here every day, I bring you things, and it’s still not enough.”

“It’s not about that,” I said, gripping the blanket. “It’s about knowing that if the doctor had said I wasn’t going to wake up, you would’ve been okay with me dying. Maybe even… relieved.”

“That’s not true,” he said. “Don’t put that on me.”

“I heard you,” I said. “Time costs money. You said that.”

He looked away.

“That was taken out of context,” he muttered.

“There is no context where that sounds good,” I said.

We stared at each other.

“I can’t do this right now,” he said. “You’re not in your right mind. You’re hurt. You’re—”

“Don’t finish that sentence,” Julia said from the doorway.

She walked in, holding two coffees, eyes blazing.

“I knew I shouldn’t have left you alone with her,” she said. “Not yet.”

“I’m her husband,” he said. “I have a right—”

“You have the right to leave,” she said. “And you’ve been exercising that a lot.”

He flinched.

“Maybe I should,” he said. “Maybe we both need space.”

He grabbed his jacket.

“Emily,” he said, looking at me. “I’m glad you’re alive. I am. But everything feels different now. You feel different. I feel different.”

“I almost died,” I said. “Of course things are different.”

“Exactly,” he said. “And I don’t know if I can be the man you need anymore.”

“I needed you when I was unconscious,” I said. “You were… elsewhere.”

He didn’t deny it.

“I’ll… call you,” he said.

He didn’t.

Not for a while.

The separation papers came later.

This time, I was the one signing.

David sat by my hospital bed, sliding the folder closer.

“I’m not going to tell you what to do,” he said. “That’s not my job. But you should know: your mom left instructions not just for the house, but for you.”

“Instructions?” I asked.

“When she set up the trust,” he said, “she added a clause. If you were ever in a situation where your spouse acted in bad faith regarding your health or assets—trying to rush end-of-life decisions, say, or attempting to gain control of the house for themselves—you’d have grounds to remove them as a beneficiary.”

I blinked.

“She thought of all that?” I asked.

“She knew people,” he said. “And she watched too many crime shows.”

Despite everything, I smiled.

“She couldn’t protect you from everything,” he continued. “She knew that. But she wanted to make sure you had options. You don’t have to use them. But they’re there.”

“What happens if I do?” I asked.

“You stay in control,” he said. “Of the house. Of your care. Of your money. If you divorce, he has no claim on the trust assets. He’d walk away with what’s in your joint accounts, maybe the car you bought together, but not the house. Not her legacy.”

I looked at the papers.

At my name.

At the empty line waiting for my signature.

“Do you think she’d be disappointed?” I asked softly. “If I ended my marriage?”

“I think she’d be proud of you for choosing yourself,” he said. “For surviving twice.”

I picked up the pen.

My hands were still shaky.

But I signed.

By the time I left the hospital, three months after the accident, Nate had moved out of the house and into a small apartment across town.

He’d texted me twice.

Once to ask about a box of shoes he’d left in the hall closet.

Once to say, “We should talk about us.”

“We did,” I replied. “You talked about quality of life. I listened. I made a choice.”

He didn’t respond.

Our divorce was finalized six months later.

No dramatic courtroom scene.

Just two signatures on two different days.

When the judge stamped the paperwork, I felt something uncoil in my chest.

Not joy.

Not exactly.

Relief.

Like taking off a coat that had gotten too heavy, too soaked with rain, but that I’d kept wearing because someone told me I’d freeze without it.

I didn’t.

I found other ways to stay warm.

These days, I still live in the little blue house on the corner.

The porch sags a little more now.

The white trim needs repainting.

I keep meaning to do it.

Life gets in the way.

There are new photos on the walls.

Not of vacations I paid for and smiles I later questioned.

Of my niece on her first day of school, gap-toothed grin and all.

Of me and Julia at a charity 5K, both sweaty and triumphant.

Of my physical therapist holding up a “SHE DID IT!” sign the day I ran a mile without stopping.

I still have scars.

Some you can see—a line at my hairline, a slight limp on rainy days.

Some you can’t.

I flinch when someone I love leaves without saying where they’re going.

I double-check my seatbelt and never, ever look at my phone while driving.

I still wake up sometimes to the phantom sound of a heart monitor.

But I also laugh.

A lot.

I learned to bake the way Mom always wanted to teach me. My kitchen constantly smells like cinnamon and sugar and something just about to burn.

I go to therapy.

My therapist says I’ve been through “a significant trauma compounded by betrayal,” which is fancy talk for “you’ve had a really rough couple of years, but you’re doing the work.”

She asks me, every session, “What do you want your life to feel like now?”

I tell her:

Safe.

Honest.

Mine.

I also tell her I’m scared sometimes.

Scared of trusting again.

Scared of missing red flags.

Scared of being that person lying in a hospital bed while people argue over her head.

She says that makes sense.

“Fear won’t go away overnight,” she says. “But you can teach it new stories.”

So I do.

One choice at a time.

People ask me sometimes if I regret marrying Nate.

If I wish I could go back and warn my younger self at that barbecue.

“Hey, the guy with the potato salad? He’s going to try to sell your house out from under you and nearly sign off on your life support. Maybe… sit this one out.”

I don’t know what I’d say to her.

She loved him.

For a while, he loved her too.

He showed me what I didn’t want.

More importantly, he showed me what I did.

A partner who doesn’t flinch at the hard parts.

Who doesn’t see you as a burden when you’re not convenient.

Who doesn’t measure your worth in assets and “quality of life” spreadsheets.

I haven’t found that partner yet.

But I have hope.

And I have more than that.

I have me.