Lights Will Guide You Home

Tears have streamed down my face more times than I can count. Quiet ones, the kind that slip silently into my pillow in the middle of the night. Angry ones, when the weight of everything we’ve lost felt like it would crush me. And aching ones—the most painful of all—when I think about the people who walked away. The ones who were supposed to stay.

When Tim’s seizures began, so did the unraveling of everything we thought was certain. Life as we knew it changed in an instant. The person I love—the man who used to move through the world with such steadiness—now fights a battle every day that few can understand. PNES may not leave scars you can see, but the wounds are deep. And they ripple outward, touching everything.

I didn’t just lose predictability. I lost a sense of safety. I lost connection with people I thought would stand beside us no matter what. Family. Siblings. Children. I watched them walk away—not always with cruelty, but with indifference. As if this season of hardship made us disposable. As if our pain was inconvenient.

How do you explain to someone that illness changes more than bodies? That it tests marriages, friendships, and faith? That it exposes what’s real—and what was only ever conditional?

There are no perfect words for that kind of grief. Only the knowledge that I carry it every day, like a stone in my chest. Because some things you cannot replace—relationships that once defined you, trust that once anchored you, love that should have been unconditional.

And yet… lights will guide you home.

I hold onto that line like a prayer. Because somewhere deep inside, I still believe in hope. I still believe that love—true love—doesn’t abandon you in your weakest moment. I believe that even in the silence, even in the betrayals, there is a path that leads home. Maybe not the home we once knew. But a home built from what remains. A home we’re building—Tim and I—brick by brick, tear by tear, hand in hand.

Sometimes, home isn’t where everyone is. It’s where the truth is. Where grace is. Where someone chooses to stay, no matter how hard the storm hits. And in this life that has broken us in places we never expected, we are still here. Still choosing each other. Still lighting candles in the dark.

And maybe that’s what matters most. Not who left, but who stayed. Not what we lost, but what we’re learning to build in its place.

Tears may fall. Hearts may break. But love—real love—will always find its way.

And the lights… they will guide us home.