The Friendship That Found Me

This song took me somewhere I hadn’t visited in years.

There are songs about love that feel light. Full of hope and certainty. They tell us that love is beautiful, uncomplicated and destined.

This isn’t one of them.

It reminds me that sometimes love arrives quietly. Sometimes it grows where neither person expected it to. Sometimes it appears at the worst possible time.

A few years ago I became seriously ill with Long Covid.

For almost a year I barely existed.

I was bed-bound. Housebound. Watching life continue without me while I lay in a room wondering if I’d ever get back to the person I used to be.

During that time somebody reached out.

She simply wanted to know if I was alright.

When she realised how unwell I was, she offered to help with my children. What began as an act of kindness slowly became friendship.

I was grateful beyond words.

We spoke most days.

When I recovered enough to leave the house again we’d meet for coffee, spend evenings talking and laugh about the ordinary things in life.

She listened.

Really listened.

For somebody whose life had been built around never trusting another human being, that mattered more than I could ever explain.

Eventually I found out she worked as a social worker.

I panicked.

My childhood was full of abuse and I convinced myself that once she knew everything she’d see me differently.

She didn’t.

She reminded me that I was still the same person she’d already chosen to spend time with.

Looking back now, I think that was the first brick removed from the wall I’d spent decades building.

She didn’t save me.

She simply treated me like I was worth knowing.

Sometimes that’s enough to change a life.

For the first time in years I began looking after myself again.

I bought clothes because I wanted to.

I wore a dress for the first time in over twenty years.

I stood taller.

Looked people in the eye.

Started believing there might actually be a person underneath years of survival.

I thought I was healing because I was becoming stronger.

I didn’t realise I was quietly becoming emotionally dependent on the one person who had made me feel safe.

I wouldn’t understand that until much later.