The caregiver’s shadow self: Who I am becoming in the margins
He is not the person I planned to be, but he is the person who is here
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I catch glimpses of him in the bathroom mirror at 3 a.m.
He is thinner than I remember. His eyes look older, even though the face is mine. He stands there brushing his teeth while I stand there thinking about tomorrow’s medication schedule.
The man in the mirror is the one who used to stay up late reading novels or watching the latest blockbuster movies. Now he stays up late reading side-effect lists or searching for updates and the latest research news.
This shadow self lives in the margins of my days.
Still getting to know him
He is the version of me who quietly canceled the evening writing class I once loved. He is the one who smiles at my mum and says, “I’m fine,” while he hides how worn out he feels and how his own back aches from too many nights on the couch.
He is the friend who used to call people back the same day, but now lets messages sit unanswered for a week.
He is the one who hides the fact that he is a caregiver to his mum. He is also the same person who doesn’t reveal to friends and neighbors that his mum is suffering from myeloma.
In the past, he tried to explain the rare cancer, but many who heard it could not understand. Soon, his mum said there wasn’t any need to explain, and he agreed. What was more important was to survive this ailment.
This is why he is quiet about her myeloma. He tries to smile as much as possible, even when he has to constantly observe. He does not complain. He simply appears in small, silent ways.
Sometimes I miss the old me so sharply it surprises me. I find an old photograph on my phone — me laughing at a wedding, wearing a tuxedo suit, with darker and longer hair, eyes lighter and not bespectacled — and I feel a small twist in my chest. That person feels like someone I used to know. The new me has learned to move more slowly, to listen more carefully, and to measure strength in teaspoons rather than liters. He has quieter ambitions now.
Yet something unexpected has grown in the margins, too.
This shadow self has developed a gentleness I never had before. He notices the exact way my mum’s hand relaxes when I rub her back. He has learned to sit in silence without rushing to fill it.
He has discovered that some kinds of love ask you to become smaller in the world so that someone else can stay a little longer. He has also learned that, as a caregiver, it is all right to remain unseen, that to be recognized by the world as a caregiver is a gift on its own.
I am still getting to know him.
Some nights, I look in the mirror and whisper a quiet hello to the man looking back at me. He is not the person I planned to be, but he is the person who is here, handling all the admin work, still showing up, still learning how to carry both the old dreams and the new weight with the same careful hands.
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