Balancing Grief & Hope During a Health Crisis
On December 26, 2026, Patrick, my daughter, and I were getting ready for a simple post holiday day. A museum visit to see the Keith Haring exhibit, followed by lunch downtown at the newly opened open air food court. Nothing elaborate. Just one of those easy plans that feel good to look forward to.
As we were about to leave, Patrick mentioned he wasn’t feeling well and had a headache.
To rewind for a moment, Patrick has experienced two TIAs, mini strokes, in the year and a half we’ve been together. So whether it was intuition, experience, or simply love paying closer attention, I shifted into a familiar mode. I walked him through the same exercises I’d seen doctors do before. Squeeze my hands. Raise your arms. Stick out your tongue. I didn’t notice facial paralysis or mobility issues, but when I asked memory questions, something didn’t feel right.
He could pretty much answer long term memories, but struggled with short term recall. He knew it was Christmas, but thought he had spent the day at home instead of also with his family. He couldn’t remember the gifts he had received.
I pulled my daughter aside in the other room, apologizing through the weight of the moment, and told her I needed to take him to the hospital.
I grabbed what I could in case he was admitted. Charge cords. A few healthy snacks. His iPad. The things you gather when your nervous system already knows more than your mind wants to accept.
The emergency room was packed. A long line just to check in. To add to the intensity, there was a man in a wheelchair ahead of us yelling and arguing with staff. I understand that fear often comes out sideways when people don’t feel well, but in that moment all I could focus on was holding it together for both of us and shielding our energy as best I could, hoping I had enough strength for two.
Because of the concern for a stroke, we were taken back fairly quickly. A CT scan was ordered first and, like before, it showed nothing. An MRI followed.
Before the doctors officially came in to explain the results, Patrick already knew. Being who he is, always researching, always wanting to understand what his body is doing, he had accessed his charts online, hoping to find clarity before anyone said the words out loud. He carried that knowing quietly for a moment, alone with it, before it was confirmed.
The MRI showed a new stroke, this time on the opposite side of his brain.
The ER was especially busy that day. Traumas everywhere. People crying out in pain down the hallways. And suddenly I found myself seeing the world through a different lens, one I imagine doctors and nurses live in every single day. How quickly life can change from one moment to the next. And at the same time, how deeply grateful I felt for the people who choose this work. Their steadiness. Their kindness. Their ability to bring calm into spaces that feel anything but.
He was admitted around 6pm. At first, it was described as a precautionary measure to monitor him closely. Soon after, it became clear that this was about more than observation. The focus shifted to trying to understand why this keeps happening. The cause is still unknown, and test after test has followed. Specialists. Long pauses. Waiting for answers that have not yet revealed themselves.
Patrick, being who he is, spent much of the day apologizing to me. Thanking me over and over. Tears welling in his eyes as he worried about my time, about my daughter, about his boys, about me sitting next to him when he felt I should be home relaxing with our cats.
These feelings are still unfamiliar to me with a partner I’ve only had the privilege of loving for a year and a half. But what I knew with certainty was this. I wasn’t going anywhere. This man has turned my world upside down in the best possible way. With kindness. With compassion. With a depth of love I had not known before.
I am doing my best to stay strong for him and, to be honest, for myself as well. To be present. Hopeful. In the quiet moments, the possibility of losing him would sneak in, just briefly, and then I would gently place it back down. Not out of denial, but out of care. Sometimes strength looks like choosing where your attention rests.
As a medium, I don’t really fear death. I say ish, because we are still human. We understand the shared fate of this lifetime, that our souls are infinite and yet we all wish for more time with the people we love here. More moments. More memories. More ordinary days that turn out to be everything.
I don’t know how much time Patrick and I have together as we wait for answers. When crisis arrives, you hope for more time. You want to take away his fear, and quietly, your own too. You want to wrap life in a protective bubble that carries you into old age and beyond.
At four in the morning, unable to sleep, the question that keeps returning is how to balance grief and hope when they sit on opposite shoulders.
I don’t know what the future will bring. But I do know I am meant to be here now. I am meant to stand beside this incredible human so he doesn’t walk through this alone. I don’t question a love that feels this real, this grounding, this alive.
And as a medium, one thing I do not do for myself or my clients is play god. I don’t look at fates on a timeline. A mentor once said it simply. We are not here to override the human experience, but to live it fully.
So I do what I know how to do.
I stay present as best as I can. I love deeply. And, I ask for his angels and divine source (God) to surround him with peace, healing, and clarity. I allow the moment to be what it is without borrowing worry from tomorrow.
Writing this helps. And when I can, I will share an update.
For now, I wait. I love. And we live in this moment as fully as we can.
If you are reading this while holding your own mix of grief and hope, know this. You do not have to choose between them. They are allowed to exist together.
Sometimes life is not about getting the answers when we want them, but more about remaining open when life asks us to feel everything at once. Deep breath!
And that, too, is a kind of faith.