Grooming was once a ritual, each time the same. I brushed and brushed, pulling golden hair out of bristles delicately placed in a pile next to us. You watched unbothered as I squished the pile in my hands to see how small it could become. To no response I said, “You could make a puppy out of this,” my own private joke as I discarded the hair into the trash. A diagnosis later, our ritual starts the same, but there are no more jokes of puppies, only silence. What was once excess is now finite, so, I take your golden hair and place it in a plastic bag, unable to bear parting with any piece of you.
A place for stories about chronic illness, disability, mental health, and neurodivergence.
