On Being Judged

I would like to start by saying I am far from perfect, and have made my fair share of mistakes in life that people can judge me for. In fact, I always thought it amusing when people who were doing something untoward would yell at you not to judge them. If they knew they'd come up wanting, why still do the very thing they didn't want to get criticized for?

At any rate, when I was younger and perhaps before I'd made many mistakes myself, I held a very strong moral compass and didn't put up with a lot of deviation from it in my friends. I guess it is easy to be like that when you are rather innocent and see the world in the black and white terms that are appropriate to a child. But, my mother quickly noticed I was going through friends too quickly. HA! God bless her: she held a sit down with me and talked to me about becoming more understanding of others because no one is perfect and I soon wouldn't have any friends left at all. She was right.

That lesson my mother tried to impart all those years ago has stuck with me and so I have tried, perhaps too hard at times, to heed her words. I always felt like if I could understand WHY someone was doing what they were doing, it would be harder for me to stay mad at them or judge them. And for the most part, this has proven true and has allowed me to forgive a lot and build some great and long-lasting friendships. (And I appreciate that my friends perhaps already more naturally held such tolerance in their hearts for me!).

I certainly never thought I'd lose one of my longest-held friendships over losing my daughter. That I would lose this friendship for being judged in the black and white terms I viewed others through when I was in middle school. Now, normally I never air my fights with friends or family on Facebook or social media, whether via direct or indirectly passive aggressive posts. But this time, I want to speak my heart in an earnest way. Because believe it or not, I have heard from others and it doesn't seem uncommon to lose friendships over the loss of a loved one. I've talked to at least three other people who have experienced the same. So maybe this is another lesson to learn in my journey with Hailey.

I lost my friend because she did not agree with our decision to let Hailey be at peace. My friend works in the medical field and through our months in the hospital, she helped me navigate Hailey's healthcare to ensure she was getting the right tests, etc. I appreciated having my friend as a sounding board --- she helped me to feel like I was doing everything I could for my daughter in terms of asking the medical staff all the right questions. My friend was our champion for our months in the hospital, even though she lives far away and had never met Hailey. She loved her that much. At least, that is what I told myself when I called to tell this friend when we decided to let Hailey be at peace.

Hailey's heart was failing rapidly, her suffering and fear were clear to me, and we were relatively confident she had a multisystem and terminal genetic disorder. We were just waiting for the tests to officially confirm it. But I couldn't watch my daughter suffer anymore just for a test that might take another month to come back (we'd already been waiting 1.5 months) and was mainly for my peace of mind --- my heart already knew. She had every single symptom of the disorder. I knew the machines couldn't even keep her alive long enough for the tests to come back, and I didn't want to put my daughter through the trauma of a heart surgery I didn't believe she could survive. Especially if tests showed she did have the genetic disorder --- she would die soon after anyway. I've written about all of this in my previous blog posts. I love my daughter madly. Achingly. But --- no BECAUSE of this immense love --- I had to set her free from her suffering.

When I called my friend, crying, to tell her the news, she raised her voice to me. She told me I couldn't do it. That I would regret it for the rest of my life. That I couldn't take it back. Not ever. That I could handle this medical battle...that I was strong and had come through worse, and I could do this. As if I were letting my daughter go because I wasn't up to the challenge. It was all so wrong, and so incredibly hurtful. I sat there, in shock, as I listened to her. I started crying harder. Those who were in my daughter's hospital room with me at the time looked on in horrified shock themselves as they heard how my side of the conversation was going and watched me begin to cry harder. Sobbing, I told my friend I couldn't listen anymore and had to go. I felt like I'd been punched in the heart. One of my best friends thought I was killing my child. Her words devastated my world beyond the shambles it was already in.

By the next day, I collected myself and surprised my family by reaching out to this friend to mend fences. I think everyone expected that she should call me to apologize, but I knew she wouldn't. It is not in her nature. And, even though she had hurt me terribly and I thought she was incredibly out of line, I didn't want to have a fight with a friend hanging over my head as I watched my daughter die. So I made the call. I told my friend I appreciated her right to voice her opinion, and asked that even if she didn't agree with it, to respect mine and my husband's decision for our daughter and to love us through it anyway. I told her I understood that she thought she knew a lot of the medical picture, but she wasn't there in person, and didn't know everything, and we were doing the best we could. She said she could love us through it. She didn't make it up for Hailey's burial, but she did send a card and made a donation to Ronald McDonald House in Hailey's memory, as did other members of her family.

Ironically, it was the day after we buried Hailey that my husband and I finally received the results of the genetic testing. It confirmed that our daughter did have the terminal, multisystem genetic disorder we had suspected. It confirmed that we released her from her suffering in the most gentle and loving way possible. It confirmed my mother's instinct.

I reached out to my friend that same day via text to share the news with her. I thought it might give her some comfort, and maybe ease the thought in her head that I'd given up on my child or killed her, when really I'd listened to what her body was telling me. It was January 8. My friend immediately replied to me, "I can't talk to you about this anymore. I am grieving and need to heal too and focus on me."

Once again, I felt like she had taken an axe to my chest. WHAT?! I was hurt that she would shut me down like that. Confused and infuriated at the implication that her grief could possibly be any greater than mine. That in the worst moments of my life, she needed to focus on herself. And after I'd already overlooked how she had treated me about letting Hailey go...that I'd had to reach out to her to mend that fence, and that she had said she could respect my decision and love me through it. To end up like that. Her blunt words weren't even prefaced with an apology. Stunned, all I wrote back was "okay", and gave myself time to cool down. Gave my friend time to go "do her". I considered my mother's lesson from childhood once again, and asked myself how much was too much? At what point was I justified in letting a lifetime friendship go? As the weeks passed, I struggled to imagine a way our friendship could survive all of this.

And then this morning, February 6, while I was feeding my son breakfast and preparing to take him to school, a new text message popped up from my friend. I hadn't talked to her since replying "okay" to her last message almost a month ago. She wanted to acknowledge that we hadn't talked in a while, but she was still "in the process of healing", that Hailey's death was "very hard for her", and that she was "not prepared to talk to me for a while".

Hurt and rage flooded through me like never before. I'd left her alone. I was enjoying a peaceful morning with my son and BAM. For the THIRD time, she took an axe to my chest --- once again reminding me of her disdain for our decision for Hailey. Once again implying her grief and healing were such an important process compared to mine. That SHE wasn't ready to talk to ME. How cruel could she be? Now she was proactively hurting me.

I'd had enough. I boiled over. The friendship was done and I knew it. I knew if I told her how I truly felt, it would officially be over because she never apologizes and never backs down. I sent a long text back to her. I didn't cuss and spoke as politely as I could but let my outrage be known. As if anyone could ever know or love Hailey more than I did. As if I wouldn't put her life above my own. As if I didn't try to make that bargain with God. As if I don't suffer. As if anyone has the right to speak to me as my "friend" did. I told her that I was trying to understand her behavior but it baffled me and I could no longer see a way forward for our friendship. That I wished her the best, and hope that some day she is blessed with healthy children because although I wished someday she would experience some enlightenment about our situation, I wouldn't wish ANYONE to go through what we suffered with Hailey in order to learn some compassion.

As expected, my now ex-friend doubled down on her standpoint, took no responsibility for how she has hurt me and insisted she has been an amazing friend and has a right to disagree with me and express her decision. Sure. Maybe if we were talking about politics and she had expressed herself respectfully. Not when you yell at me as I sit by my daughter's death bed and imply I didn't love my daughter enough and that I gave up on her and let her die. So I concluded by telling her I found her lack of self-awareness astounding and said goodbye.

So folks, just when you think life can't get uglier, it sometimes does and in the most surprising ways. I was so hurt, I (uncharacteristically) posted to Facebook about the fight and said simply that I couldn't believe I was losing a friend over losing my daughter. But you know what? Then something beautiful happened. Friends from all walks of life, both old and new, reached out to me both publicly and privately to offer their support. To send love, to lift me up, to just let me know they are there. That they are praying for us and thinking about us. All of these friends helped ease the ache in my heart. They helped me to calm down and see the love and joy all around me.

I will never be friends with my old friend again. I forgive her because I don't know what path she is walking, but I do know ours no longer intersect and I can make peace with that. I maintain that I wish her well. I decided to share this story not to be spiteful, but as I said before, rather after hearing from others that they'd experienced similar. If I am sharing the journey of my life with and then losing Hailey, this is part of it. You unexpectedly and painfully lose some friends, but you gain so many new and wonderful ones that you wonder how so many people can love you this much and you hope to hang on to it for all of your days. I truly feel so blessed for all of you and am slowly trying to balance my grief with writing thank you cards to all of you for all you have given us. Which is a somewhat silly endeavor because words can never do justice to the gratitude in my heart, but I will give it the old college try! With love.