She is frail. My energetic, smiling, vibrant mother—the woman who shaped my entire understanding of love—has been battling leukemia. Nine months of chemo and continuous transfusions for blood, platelets, WBCs have taken their toll. She is no longer able to sit up on her own.

With trembling fingers, she beckons me. She wants water.

The nurse lifts her torso off the bed. I slide in behind my mother, supporting her carefully, conscious of her neck catheter, aware of how fragile she’s become. At her diagnosis in March, I had already done the math—she may not live to see 2025. Now it is December, and we are still here together, still unaware that we have perhaps 40 days more.

I have had months to absorb this new reality. And yet, when I hold her like this something breaks open inside me.

I cannot tell her how much I love her. Not in the way my heart wants to scream it. How much love I received from her. How grateful I am to God for having had her as my mother. Today, I am her strength, her courage to face life each day as it slowly makes its way toward the end.

I know I should get a hospital bed for her. But it is these moments—when I get to hold her, press my face against hers, and express my love in tiny installments—that make me hesitate. Too much emotion, and we’ll both lose the courage to keep fighting.

A slight cough brings me back to this moment when I have her in my arms. I blow softly across her neck, tickling her gently. I feel her hand reach out to touch mine briefly, and I know there’s a faint smile on her face.

That is all the time we have.

She’s exhausted. She needs to lie back. I help her settle into the pillows, smoothing her hair, whispering that I’m here. My fingers still trembling—not from her request, but from the weight of loving someone this much while knowing it’s temporary.

I know she’ll call me again in a few hours.

I know I’ll get to hold her again.

And I will treasure every single moment, because now I understand: these fragile moments are where love lives. Not in grand declarations, but in soft breaths and brief hand touches and the quiet courage it takes to keep showing up, keep loving, keep letting yourself be broken by someone you would break yourself a thousand times over to protect.

This is caregiving.

This is love.