It is said that there is a fine line between right and wrong, love and hate. I think the same holds true with sane/insane, crazy/not crazy.

I get up each day and face the reality that I cannot call my daughters and talk. I cannot share something that happened the day before. I cannot share a funny antidote. I cannot share memories. I cannot ask how they are doing.

I cannot ask them about my grandchildren. I cannot say, “Hey! Why don’t we meet for lunch?” I cannot call to simply say I love you. I cannot call to say I was thinking of you today.

Each morning as I open my eyes and greet a new day, my reality hits me like a train going 90 miles an hour. It crushes my chest and my heart hurts. On a bad day, I barely exist. On a good day, I spend my days asking God for forgiveness.

Forgiveness because I was so broken. Forgiveness because I didn’t know how to fight. Forgiveness because my daughters were so easily manipulated into thinking I abandoned them. Forgiveness for not being stronger for them.

I ask forgiveness for shrinking from confrontation. Forgiveness for only being present in body and not mind. Forgiveness for decisions I made in my brokenness. Forgiveness for not forgiving.

I ask forgiveness for hating. Forgiveness for anger. Forgiveness for being human.

We all pretend to have people in our lives that we say fulfill those empty places – “You’re like a mom to me.” or “You’re like a daughter to me.” or “You are my family.” It is only a figment of our imagination, a story we tell ourselves to fill the void, to pretend that everything is okay; but in the end, the heart will triumph because it knows the buried truth. What we really want is our own mother, our own children. A do-gooder, a pretend, cannot fill the void; it can only be filled with the person whose place it rightfully belongs.

It is a fine line between sane and insane. I know. There are days when I am not sure which side of the line I am walking.