I don't even know where to begin, truly. I mean, we're all just… doing our best, right? Trying to survive, trying to be good. Trying to do the *right* thing. That’s what I told myself, every single day, every single day for the past five years. My grandparent, you know? They needed help. Needed someone. And I was the one, the only one, really. My siblings, they had their excuses, their jobs, their kids – not that I didn’t have any of that, I did. My own kids just left for college, actually. House is so quiet, it’s like a tomb. Empty. And my spouse? We’re just… living here. Strangers sharing a mortgage and a memory, I guess. So it was me. Every meal, every pill, every… everything. Constant. A weight. A heavy, heavy weight. And I felt it, every single second. This dull ache behind my eyes, this clenching in my chest. This feeling of being *trapped*. I mean, I love them, I did. Still do. But it was a cage, a gilded cage maybe, but a cage nonetheless. I watched my friends move on, travel, start new things, and I was stuck. Answering calls, changing sheets, listening to the same stories over and over. "Remember the war, darling? Remember the rationing?" Yes. Yes, I remember. Because you told me yesterday. And the day before. And the day before that. I became this… caretaker. This role. And the person I used to be, the person who had dreams and plans, she just sort of… faded. Like an old photograph left in the sun. Then, last month. It happened. Not suddenly, not really. It was… gentle, I guess. They just sort of… stopped. Stopped breathing. And in that moment, in the quiet after the doctor left, after the funeral home people came and went, after the phone calls and the hushed condolences… I felt it. This… immense… SENSE of release. Like a diver surfacing after holding their breath for too long. A gasp of air. A lightness. And then, the crushing, overwhelming guilt. Because what kind of a MONSTER feels relief when someone they love dies? What kind of human being is that? I’m sitting here now, 2 AM, in this silent house. My kids are gone. My spouse is asleep down the hall, probably dreaming of… I don’t even know what. My purpose, the thing that defined me for so long, it’s just… gone. And I’m free. I’m free and it feels terrible and amazing and I HATE myself for feeling amazing about it. Every fibre of my being screams that I should be heartbroken, devastated, weeping. And I am, a little. But mostly? Mostly I just feel… light. Like the world has let go of me. And I don’t know what to do with this. This lightness. This hollow space where the burden used to be. It’s like, who am I without it? What’s left of me? Am I a bad person? Or is this just… how we are? Humans. Terribly, terribly flawed. I think it is. I think we are. And I don't know if I can ever tell anyone.