Today was a little heavy.

I got a call about my brother over the weekend, one of my two brothers who are mentally handicapped and there is a situation that has been escalating for a few months now.

He cannot make rational decisions the way you or I can. He does not understand consequences and I have been feeling like I am the only one fighting for him, trying to parent my brothers and parent my parents at the same time about why this matters and why we need to have his back.

So I called my dad.

And we were not seeing eye to eye.

He kept making excuses and acting like it was not that serious.

I could feel myself getting more and more heated... that place where the emotions take over the conversation and you stop being able to hear each other at all.

So I hung up on him.

I hate when people do that to me and I did it anyway. Because in that moment my emotions were driving and I did not have the wheel.

I took some time to cool off. Then I called him back.

I apologized for hanging up. Told him it was not okay, that I should have handled it better and then I tried again.

Somewhere in the middle of trying to explain the situation with my brother, other things just started coming out. Things I did not even realize had been sitting there waiting.

I told him that since we lost my older brother Jesse, it has felt like he shut down emotionally.

Not just to himself... to me, to my brothers, to all of us. That we were so close growing up, working on cars together, all of it and that I felt like he has been physically there but emotionally somewhere else for years.

That even as adults we still need him. Especially my brothers who do not fully understand why things feel the way they feel.

I did not plan to say any of that.

It just came out.

He did not say much. Just "okay, is that it? Do you feel better?"

I think he needed time to process because I genuinely threw a lot at him. We talked about some normal everyday stuff and then ended the call.

I do not know what he did with all of it. I do not know what comes next.

But here is what I know: I was not trying to hurt him.

I just could not keep carrying it anymore and the things I said were things I felt like he needed to hear, even if the timing was messy and the delivery was imperfect.

This is what the work actually looks like in real life.

Not clean, perfectly regulated or the version where you handle everything with grace the first time.

Sometimes it looks like hanging up because your emotions got there before your awareness did.

Sometimes it looks like calling back anyway to apologize and try again. Saying the true thing even when your voice is shaking and you are not sure how it will land.

I am still learning how to regulate in real time especially in conversations where I feel this much passion and this much heat. That is honest and where I am.

But I showed back up and I said what needed to be said.

That is the work too.

Here is the thing about today in the middle of all of that, I also got some really exciting news. Big news. The kind I cannot wait to share with you soon.

It hit me that life does not wait for you to be ready. The heavy and the hopeful land on the same day.

The hard conversation and the exciting news show up together. Your job is not to avoid one for the other.

It is to hold both.

If you have been carrying something you have not said yet to a parent, a sibling, anyone you are not broken.

You are human and maybe it is time to stop carrying it alone.

Even if it comes out messy and even if you have to call back and start over.

That still counts.

PROUD OF YOU 💙

Walking with you,

Leasha

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