My mom died from complications of leukemia in the fall of 2025. During the previous few years, we’d spent a lot of time together while my step-dad and I supported her through treatment and a stem cell transplant. As we went through those years, my relationship with mom moved to one of deep caring, compassion, and emotional trust. The situation was unimaginable, and our closeness was the gift within it. I treasure those days.
As we experienced many weeks in the hospital during those few years, I had relied on one of my favorite self-compassion practices, looking at myself – eye to eye – in the bathroom mirror and checking in. “How’s it going kid?” is a favorite question I ask myself with this practice. On the nights I slept in the hospital, and there were many, I would walk down the hallway to the bathroom and stand at the mirror just breathing – being present to whatever emotions bubbled up. Exhaustion. Worry. Grief. And I would bring my hand to my heart and just stay there until I felt back in my body. I would walk back to my mom’s room, often stopping at the small kitchen to get some of the really good ice they had, fill my cup with water, and quietly sneak back into my bed on the vinyl couch while she slept.
During the last few weeks her life, my mom developed an eye infection that meant we had to change from our family decision to support her through hospice at home and move back into the palliative care unit at the hospital that had been treating her leukemia.
This story isn’t about that decision but to set the scene for what we were experiencing as a family. The leukemia had made my otherwise very healthy mother ill, but this eye infection was causing a level of physical, emotional, and mental distress that was unexpected to everyone, even her doctors.
The first evening we were in the hospital, a young female eye doctor came in to do the initial exam to try to understand what was going on. I was alone with my mom. The doctor asked me to help her, and without going into too much detail, I needed to help my mom keep her eyes open for the exam. It was a gut-wrenching experience for both of us. My mom trusted me though, and I whispered to her, keeping her calm. When the doctor was gone, I lowered the lights in the room and sat with my mom as she fell back to sleep.
Later that night, as I turned from side to side on the vinyl couch in her room trying to sleep myself, I couldn’t stop thinking about that exam and the pain my mom was in that it felt like I had helped cause.
This is the part where I remind you that we can hold multiple feelings at once. I was angry and scared. Uncertain and full of grief. Grateful and exhausted. I was glad we were inside this hospital we trusted and furious that the doctor had put me in a position to, by default, cause my mom pain. I also appreciated the kind voice she had used with my mom during the exam since my mom couldn’t see her very well and hearing her was important. And I wondered if that young doctor saw me as more of a mom than a daughter when she walked into the room because I probably was old enough to be her mom.
I walked down the hallway to the bathroom, unable to sleep, wishing I had told the doctor no. I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror, splashed water in my face, and reminded myself that I was always making the best decisions in the moment. That of course I said yes. That of course I was living in the moment beside my mom. That of course the grief felt all-consuming. That of course I was angry and sad.
I walked back down the hall and back into what became very intense days of caregiving and decision-making. Although I did think about that moment from the first night, I was also focused on what was present as each day unfolded.
When the doctor from the first night came back a few days later, I followed her out of my mom’s room and asked to speak with her. And here’s how I handled it:
I thanked her for her gentle voice and the way they were all caring for my mom. I told her how much I appreciated how she came right away that first evening and then called on the other consulting eye doctor to weigh in on things. Then I shared with her that when she asked me to help with my mom’s exam, not only do I wish I would have said no, but I wish she hadn’t put me in that situation. “This is my mom. And I’m always going to be her daughter when I’m in that room, even when I’m also a strong, confident caregiver.” She nodded and whispered almost to herself, “Right, because you should get to just be the daughter.” “Yes.”
As I walked back into my mom’s room, my shoulders relaxed. Compassion for myself that was then extended toward the doctor, all while speaking up and asking for an awareness of what is and is not okay in a setting like this.
We experience many unexpected moments in our lives. We make choices about the tools we carry with us and choices about practicing them. We also make choices about how we interact with others when they let us down or put us in challenging and unintentionally harmful moments. Using the mirror to literally look at myself when I’m deep in these moments helps me stay centered and remember who I want to be.
Through those unimaginable days at my mom’s side, compassion and clarity, courage and kindness were companions. They gave me actionable ways to interact with others while holding self-compassion like a compass.
“Self-kindness involves more than merely stopping self-judgment. It involves actively comforting ourselves, responding just as we would to a dear friend in need. It means we allow ourselves to be emotionally moved by our own pain, stopping to say, ‘This is really difficult right now. How can I care for and comfort myself in this moment?’ With self-kindness, we soothe and calm our troubled minds.”
– Kristin Neff