Your Shoulder

My wife has been put through the ringer recently and yesterday it finally caught up with her.

People think that she is a strong-willed and tough.  She can be, but she is also as fragile as anyone I know.  She can be reduced to a blubbering mess just like anyone else.  She doesn't have thick skin like some people think.  In fact quite the opposite is true.  She feels everything and oftentimes wears her emotions on her sleeve.  Hurtful words or sadness can cut her heart like a knife.

This sadness and hurt finally broke the dam and came out in wave of tears and incomprehensible grumbles last night.  She kept saying how broken she was.  How she worries about what everyone thinks about her.  How she misses her family and wishes she could spend more time with friends.  She is filled with so much regret because of poor decisions she's made, and she wants to be better for her daughters.

And I did all a husband can do in this situation, I held her and I told her it would be okay.  I told her I love her.  I told her she is a wonderful wife, a fantastic best friend and the best mom Grace and Ana could ever have.  I told her the people she's touched were better for having her in their lives.  That I'd be hard pressed to find a more compassionate and understanding and giving individual.

And she wept.

And I held her.

And even if she didn't believe me in that moment, I knew every word I said was true.  I knew that at some point she would know it was true too.

Sometimes you just need to cry.  I'll always be your shoulder.