Some days just stop you in your tracks.
Today was one of those days, the kind that pulls you right back into the center of your grief without warning. No time to prepare. No heads-up. Just… here we are again.
It was a dark, snowy Monday morning, the kind where most people probably wanted to stay curled up in bed. I know I did. But I had an early pre-op appointment that couldn’t be missed, so we braved the cold and the slick roads and made our way to the doctor’s office.
As we navigated through the icy conditions, my mind wandered. My upcoming surgery crept into my thoughts. Strangely, I wasn’t nervous, at least not yet. It was more of a quiet awareness that something hard was coming, but I wasn’t quite at the panic stage.
Once we arrived, a nurse brought me back into an exam room. The usual routine was followed: questions, vitals, and a few tests. When she left the room, I sat there alone for a few minutes, and that familiar ripple of anxiety started to rise. Nothing unmanageable, just the usual undercurrent that comes with moments like these.
A few minutes later, the nurse practitioner came in to continue the evaluation. We went through the standard list of medical history questions, and thankfully, most of my answers were “no.” Then she asked about my parents, another “yes” and “no” moment. And then came the question that knocked the wind out of me.
“Do you have any brothers or sisters?”
I froze.
It’s such a simple question. Such a routine part of a medical intake. But it hit me like a freight train. Maybe it was the first time I’d been asked that since losing my brother, or at least, the first time it caught me so off guard.
I apologized to her. I told her I was sorry, but that question rattled me. I explained that I had lost my brother a few years ago, and suddenly, I wasn’t sure how to answer.
Do I say have? Do I say had? Is there another way?
I talk about my brother often. I can usually say his name and share his story without falling apart. But something about being asked directly if I have a sibling brought the grief rushing back in a way I wasn’t expecting.
In that small, sterile exam room, I was no longer just a patient getting ready for surgery. I was a grieving sibling. I was an only child. And the weight of that realization stayed with me for the rest of the day.
I hated that the nurse practitioner felt bad. She was just doing her job. How could she have known? But still, there it was, this big invisible wound that neither of us saw coming.
Grief is strange like that. Sometimes it hums quietly in the background, like an open tab on your computer; you know it’s there, but you can still go about your day. Other times it’s loud and all-consuming, filling up every corner of your heart. And then there are days like today, when grief catches you off guard and punches you right in the gut. No warning. No chance to brace yourself.
So, do I have a brother?
Yes.
I will always have a brother.