Week 2: Was This My Calling? The Question That Wouldn’t Go Away

Caregiving didn’t tap me on the shoulder with clarity and calm.

It arrived in waves—unexpected, relentless, and emotional. And from the very beginning, one question followed me like a shadow:

Was this my calling?

There were hard days. Days when the weight of managing my brother Clint’s Frontotemporal Dementia and our mom’s stage-4 cancer felt unbearable. Days when I questioned whether I was strong enough. Days when I missed the freedom of retirement and wondered if this was really how I was meant to spend the next season of my life.

But there were also moments. Quiet, sacred ones. The kind that stopped time and answered that lingering question in a whisper.

One of those moments happened on a regular afternoon. Clint and I were riding around the yard in my golf cart. The breeze was soft, the sun filtered through the trees, and everything felt still. He reached over, touched my arm, and asked me to stop.

When I did, he looked at me and said, “Aren’t you retired?”

I nodded, “Yes.”

Then he asked, “You have a life… why take care of me? You need to live your life.”

His voice cracked under the weight of emotion. Mine did, too.

I looked at him and said, “I am living my life. You are my life right now, and I’m living it with you. You’re my brother—and you need me right now.”

He began to sob. Then, with tears streaming down his face, he whispered, “Thank you.”

In that moment, I felt something shift. A calmness washed over me. The question that had followed me so persistently—Was this my calling?—suddenly felt answered.

Yes. It was.

Not because I had chosen it. Not because it was easy.
But because love often looked like showing up, sacrificing, and staying present. And I knew—deep in my spirit—that this was sacred work.

Clint may not have remembered that moment in the days or weeks that followed, but I did. I carried it in my heart as a reminder that this chapter of my life was not a detour. It was not wasted. It was my purpose, unfolding.

If you’ve ever found yourself asking whether caregiving was your calling, I want you to know—sometimes the answer comes softly, in the stillness, in a shared moment that reminds you:
You were right where you were supposed to be.