Not everyone understands a family like mine.
And honestly, I don’t always know how to explain us.
If you don’t live it, you don’t always get it.
Part of the tension is this:
Sometimes I don’t share enough.
And sometimes I wonder if I have shared too much.
There are chapters in our family story that may never be written publicly.
Not because they do not matter.
Not because I am pretending they did not happen.
But because those stories do not belong to me alone.
They carry people.
People I love.
People whose lives are still unfolding.
People who deserve tenderness, dignity, and respect.
Some truths may be powerful, but that does not automatically make them mine to tell.
I have had to learn that over the years.
And sometimes there is a cost to that kind of caution.
People see pieces of our life and naturally try to make sense of the rest.
They may not understand why I am unavailable.
Why friendship can be difficult to maintain.
Why I disappear for stretches of time.
Why something that looks simple from the outside can feel almost impossible from inside our home.
There have been seasons filled with appointments, therapies, medications, school meetings, behaviors, caregiving, grief, growth, laughter, noise, and more people needing something than there are hours in the day.
In those seasons, investing deeply outside my family has sometimes felt like a luxury I simply did not have.
I know how that can look.
Aloof.
Distant.
Maybe even selfish.
But there is often more happening beneath the surface than anyone can see.
Over the years, I have also learned to be careful about who receives the fuller version of our story.
Some people have sat at my kitchen table long enough to understand.
Some have walked similar roads and need very little explanation.
Others know only pieces.
And that is okay.
I have reached out before—to family, friends, believers, and nonbelievers—and watched information about our lives be misunderstood, repeated, judged, or used in ways I never expected.
Experiences like that teach you caution.
They teach you that openness and wisdom are not always the same thing.
There are days when the distance feels heavy.
Days when “social outcast” does not feel quite as dramatic as I wish it did.
But I am learning that I do not have to make every part of my life understandable to everyone.
God already sees the whole story.
He sees the parts I share.
He sees the parts I protect.
He sees the things I cannot explain well.
He sees the relationships I wish were easier.
He sees the chapters that may never be written.
And perhaps that is enough.
I can tell the stories He gives me permission to tell.
I can protect the people He has entrusted to me.
And I can trust Him with everything that remains unwritten.
Let’s Talk
Have you ever had a season of life that was difficult to explain to people who were not living it with you?
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