There’s a kind of grief that doesn’t come from death but from disappearance — your own. You don’t mean to lose yourself; it just happens in the chaos of caregiving. You start to speak in “we” instead of “I.” You forget what it feels like to move through a day without calculating someone else’s needs first. You tell yourself you’ll make time for you when things calm down, but things never really do.

And yet, beneath the exhaustion, something sacred is unfolding. The self that remains isn’t the one that existed before; it’s wiser, stronger, and yes, a little worn at the edges — but also more compassionate. Caretaking forces you to strip away pretense. You learn that identity isn’t fixed; it’s fluid, constantly reshaped by love, hardship, and survival. Finding yourself again doesn’t mean leaving the caretaker behind — it means acknowledging that both can coexist, and both deserve gentleness.