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How do we say, “I love you,” without words? How do we communicate that we care? How do we show each other that we see each other, or at least that we’re willing to try? This morning, I woke up gushing blood, as many of us with uteruses often do at least once a month. Nothing to be alarmed about - I’ve done this for just about 3 decades now. And yet, no matter how many times I’m greeted with the familiar sensation that I’ve become accustomed to, which can best be described as a grapefruit spoon scraping the insides of my uterus or as my uterus attempting to claw its way out of my body, sometimes it’s just… a lot to deal with. This morning it was a lot to deal with, maybe even bordering on too much, and as I gingerly made my way through my morning routine, prepping oats and berries, an egg and greens, and tending to restless kitties, I looked up as my partner rose from the couch to go to the bathroom. She walked across the room, picked up the seat cushion I use for back support from the office chair and tossed it on the empty space on the couch where I typically sit to eat breakfast (pictured above), then continued on to the bathroom without saying a word. I nearly cried into my oats over this simple, yet profound act of service, of love and care - this act of seeing and knowing. My partner knows what it feels like to be gushing blood, fatigued, in pain, and hungry, and they chose to make my morning just a bit easier by walking the extra ten steps, grabbing the seat cushion, and setting it down for me while I was making breakfast. When she returned from the bathroom, I said, “I love you. I see what you did there with the cushion. Thank you.” “I love you,” they replied. “I know how much effort it is to walk those ten extra steps while gushing blood.” Simple and thoughtful acts of kindness, of love, can go a long way.
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