Getting help from your support system makes you stronger

I read a blog post yesterday about accepting help. Farah's perspective is as a mother with an auto-immune disease (lupus) who has young children. It's imperative for her to accept help when she needs it for her health as well as the health of her children.

I empathize with her. I know what it's like to be a mom of young ones and to struggle to do and be all to them. I know what it's like to feel like you shouldn't/can't ask for the help you need because why can't you do it on your own? Isn't this what you wanted?

I get it.

I chose to be a mother. I chose to divorce Monty. I chose to move three states away from my entire support system. Isn't this what I wanted? Then I should be the one to make it happen.

The interesting part of coming across this blog post this week is that this is something Yvaine has brought up with me, as well. For a long time, I've had to be the one to do it. (It being pretty much everything.) When it comes to stuff around the house, especially, I just get up and do it. Yvaine wants to help and to be involved in those ordinary day-to-day things that make up a life.

I'm realizing that asking for help is not about relying on others to do what you can't (whether or not you should be able to do it on your own), but about relying on the right people in your life to make you stronger. It doesn't matter whether or not I can do it on my own because I have people in my life who care about me and want to do what they can to let me know they care, and to help make me a stronger person through their words and actions.

So I'm working on asking for help. It's going to be hard for a while. (It was difficult for me to sit and watch Yvaine work on putting together a chest of drawers for me.) But I'm beginning to see that I don't have to do it alone.

Nor should I.