Poor Michael: When There Are No Answers

Since he was born, Michael has been a challenge for me — not in love, but in understanding and advocating for him. Loving him has always been effortless; it’s the kind of love that’s written into my bones. But understanding what’s going on inside him, finding the words to make others see what I see — that has been the lifelong part of mothering him that stretches me in ways I never expected.

For over a year now, he’s had this relentless pain in his right jaw and ear. It comes and goes, but lately it’s been stronger, sharper, impossible to ignore. We’ve been to the dentist and the doctor more times than I can count. Each visit brings hope and then the familiar ache of disappointment. They’ve found things — a broken tooth below the gum line on the left side, an infection in his left ear — all things that should explain pain, but none of them do. Because his pain is on the right.

It makes no sense, and yet it’s real.
He can’t sleep without pain medication. He can’t focus without wincing. Watching him live like this, round-the-clock meds just to make the day bearable, tears something inside me that words can’t touch.

This coming week, we’ll see several more doctors — more specialists, more scans, more questions. I pray every night that one of them will finally see what’s wrong, that someone will listen deeply enough to understand what I’ve been trying to explain for months: that his pain is real, that he’s not exaggerating, that something unseen is happening beneath the surface.

And under all of that hope, there’s guilt.
That quiet, unrelenting guilt that mothers carry — the belief that we should have known sooner, done more, seen something differently. It sits in my chest like a stone, whispering that maybe his pain is my failure.

I know, in my head, that isn’t true. But in my heart, it feels like it. Because no matter how many appointments I make, or how many prayers I whisper, I still go to bed each night with the sound of his pain echoing in my mind — and the helplessness of not being able to fix it.

Still, I keep showing up. I keep hoping. I keep believing that answers will come, and that healing — in some form — will find him. And until it does, I’ll keep doing what mothers do when love has no cure: staying near, holding steady, and letting him know that he’s never alone in the ache.