As I closed my computer, the tears came, quietly at first, then in deep, aching sobs. I cried for that young girl––the child who grew up and endured so much pain, fear, and suffering. I cried for her loneliness, her desperate need for love and safety, and for all the times she was told she wasn’t good enough and could never become a nurse.
I don’t know where that little girl found the strength to keep moving forward to adulthood. To push through the darkness and keep searching for a better life, a life filled with peace, without fear. Maybe it was sheer determination, or maybe it was something more.
As I sit here reflecting on the journey I’ve written about, I realize how many angels have touched my life along the way. Some appeared only for brief moments, a kind stranger, a gentle word of encouragement, a quiet act of kindness. Others stayed, becoming steady lights in my life.
They gave me hope when I had none. They gave me strength when I was ready to give up.
And the truth is, my angels had no idea what I was enduring. They didn’t know the horrors I was living through or had lived through. I’ve kept it a secret, secrets I thought I would carry with me to my final day. But their kindness mattered. They kept me going. They helped me survive. And for that I’m eternally grateful.
Writing this memoir has been excruciating. There were many sleepless nights when the memories consumed me, and I wanted nothing more than to shut my computer and walk away. There were days when I told myself This is too painful, stop writing! But something deep inside kept pushing me forward.
And that something was the angels in my life, the people I’ve shared small pieces of my story with over the years, who urged me to keep going. “You have to tell your story,” they’d say. “Your story will help others.” Their word echoed in my mind on the days I wanted to give up.
And in the process of writing my memoir, I’ve come to realize how my own story shaped the nurse I became.
I see now I wasn’t just caring for patients––I was giving them what I so desperately longed for myself: hope, comfort, and peace. I’ve lost count of the hands I’ve held as my patients weredying or just in need of comfort, but I remember their faces, their stories, and the moments we shared.
And in those moments, I would often say to them: “I’m so glad I got to meet you.”
Now, looking back, I realize that each of those moments was a reminder I had found my purpose. I had taken the pain and trauma of my past and transformed it into compassion.
The compassion that was once given to me by my angels, I was now able to give to others. With every hand I held, every word of comfort I offered, I gave the gift of compassion.
The knowledge that they mattered. That someone saw them, heard them, and cared about them.
And that makes every painful moment of this memoir worth it.
If my story can offer even one person hope, courage, or the strength to believe they deserve more, then every sleepless night, every tear shed, and every painful memory relived has served its purpose.
No one should ever have to live in fear.
