#83 | Just Breathe: Lessons in Love, Loss, and Resilience from One Family's Journey (Parenting LGBTQ Teens, Grief, Courage & Healing)

Welcome to Just Breathe Parenting Your LGBTQ Teen, the podcast transforming the conversation around loving and raising an LGBTQ child. My name is Heather Hester, and I am so grateful you are here. I want you to take a deep breath and know that for the time we are together, you are in the safety of the Just Breathe nest. Whether today's show is an amazing guest or me sharing stories, resources, strategies, or lessons I've learned along our journey, I want you to feel like we're just hanging out at a coffee shop having a cozy chat. Most of all, I want you to remember that that wherever you are on this journey, right now, in this moment in time, you are not alone.

Welcome back, my friends, and welcome if you are listening for the first time. I am both happy and honored to be part of your day. Today I am circling all the way back to the beginning of our story, almost 6 years ago to the day, and I'm going to share another layer of the chaos that I've been pretty, pretty quiet about up until now. Changes, growth, tragedy, celebration, sadness. Pain, joy can all happen at once. Life doesn't happen in a vacuum, and that is why I want to share this part of our story with you. Other than brief appearances here and there, I have rarely talked about any of our family members on Steve's side or on mine, other than the 6 of us, other than myself and Steve and Connor. And Isabel and Grace and Rowan. And there are many, many reasons for that, but today I am going to talk about my sister. Koren is 5 years younger than me, and we are different in almost every possible way. Our looks, our temperament, our interests, our loves of people, places, and things. As the oldest and the youngest in the family, we adhered pretty strictly to those roles well into middle adulthood. Corinne lit up every room she walked into. She loved to travel, she loved her work, and she loved her friends. And even though our life paths were quite different, She loved me, Steve, and her little nieces and nephews. She was my ally and I hers in our family dynamics. As the youngest, she saw the truth and reality of things way before I did. Her coping mechanisms were to cut people off and keep people at a distance, keep moving forward. Whereas mine were those of the peacemaker and creating mental narratives that allowed me to remain in the system. She was not warm and fuzzy, and she used her sharp tongue and intelligence as a weapon when she felt wronged. She was guarded and let very few people in. But oh my goodness, She had the best laugh. She had a silly, quirky sense of humor, and she could debate anyone for days. She has stayed with me for weeks, sometimes months, throughout our adulthood. She spent holidays and birthdays and regular days hanging out with my growing little family. She even insisted on being in the delivery room for Grace's birth, which in hindsight was probably not the best idea, given that it ended in an emergency C-section. We've had knock-down, drag-out screaming matches, as most sisters do, and we've had moments of silent acknowledgement of pain. When Connor came out as gay to Steve and me in February of 2017, I did not tell Corinne. Her sharp tongue had been teetering the line of cruelty in days, weeks, really months preceding that. And she'd become increasingly unpredictable in the way she would respond. And so I had set a pretty strong boundary with her. As you know, from hearing our story, my focus, our focus became 150% on the ever-changing and scary dynamics of Connor's coming out., as well as the energy needed to support Isabel and Grace and Rowan, I had nothing left for anyone else. And something inside of me kept me from sharing any of this with Corinne. When I finally shared what had been going on, her response was cold and quite confusing, actually. And so the boundary became stronger. We talked less and less, and even when we did, there were often long moments of silence. A few months before Connor was set to return home from the therapeutic boarding school in the spring of 2018, it became clear that something was very, very wrong with Corinne. Strange behavior during a well check snowballed into Steve and me driving into the city to pick her up from her apartment that rivaled Hoarders, the TV show, which then rolled into a hospital stay, a battery of tests, and confirmation that was going on— what was going on with her had nothing to do with substance use or abuse. But something far more concerning. Something was going on with her brain. I will never forget the look on her face that night that I brought her to my house. I could just see something was off as she answered every question I asked with a singular "yes" and with an expression that was mixed with relief and trust and fear.

She knew that she was safe with me and in our home.

Since Steve and I were preparing to bring Connor home though, having her live with us was not an option. So my parents, our parents, came up and moved her out of her apartment and took her back to Ohio with them. 10 months later, at the age of 42, my sister was diagnosed with FTD, frontotemporal dementia.

Over the past 4 years, we have watched as she has slowly lost her ability to speak and then to smile or make any facial expressions, and now completely unable to move or do anything on her own. The Corinne we all knew is gone. My mom has cared for her through it all, and I have incredible compassion for the sadness, the anger, the grief that she feels on a daily basis, as well as the physical strength Corinne's care requires. I miss my sister. Our relationship was a perfect example of 'and.' She was difficult and self-involved, and she was loyal and had a good heart, and we were there for one another. I am sad that she has missed her nieces and nephews growing up. She would have been I am so proud of each one of them. I have carefully considered over time how I would share this little snippet of Corinne with you. It is very personal and extremely painful. But I decided to do so today because it is life. Like I said at the beginning, changes, growth, tragedy, celebration, sadness and joy, they can all happen at once, simultaneously, intertwined. Life doesn't happen in a vacuum. If you have multiple crises or difficulties going on, I know it can feel so big, so incredibly overwhelming, so never-ending. And I want you to remember when you are in those spaces that you are not alone. Remember that you are strong and brave and loving. That you will make it through. Be kind to yourself. You are human. And be kind to others and remember their humanness as well. Thank you for being here today, for listening to my short episode with a very big message. Remember, you can always find additional resources on my website, and please share Just Breathe with others.

Until next time.

Thanks so much for joining me today. If you enjoyed today's episode, I would be so grateful for a rating or a review. Click on the link in the show notes or go to my website, chrysalismama.com, to stay up to date on my latest resources as well as to learn how you can work with me. Please share this podcast with anyone who needs to know that they are not alone, and remember to just Breathe. Until next time.