The Most Important Lesson I Learned This Week
Belonging means more than just loving. It means including.
True belonging—to self, community, or home—requires both the emotion of love and the act of including.
I read a post by a writer who captured this beautifully. For years, she’d been woven into the fabric of her family’s life—especially during holidays. She was in the kitchen with the grandkids, roasting the turkey, making cookies, soaking in their stories of school and camp. She was embedded in their lives.
Because she’d lost her husband five years earlier, these celebrations were essential to her sense of belonging. As the children and grandchildren slowly created their own ways of celebrating—which didn’t include her—she felt pushed aside. She was no longer included.
But her story stopped there.
What if she had written: “And that’s when I asked myself, what am I going to do now?” Could she create her own story, build her own experiences and traditions as she becomes someone new?
Could I?
Role Exit Theory, developed by Helen Rose Fuchs Ebaugh, describes what happens when people leave a life-defining role—spouse, professional, nun. The caregiver transition maps directly to this process.
Key Aspects of Role Exit Theory:
Definition: Ebaugh (1988) defines this as disengaging from a role central to one’s identity.
The Four Stages:
Doubt: Feeling dissatisfaction, unhappiness, or lack of fulfillment in your current role. It took a long time to say this, but I was unfulfilled and lonely as a caregiver; as devoted as I was, it didn’t support me or lift me up.
Alternatives: Searching for new options, evaluating them, and realizing life outside the role is possible. I gradually tried out new experiences and a new role in life. Travel. Learning. New friendships.
Turning Points: Specific moments or decisions that trigger the actual exit. When visiting Lee wasn’t possible anymore, I understood that it was time for me to move forward, even in baby steps.
Creation of New Identity: Building a new identity that often incorporates the past “ex-role.” I honor Lee every day, by lingering over a photo or when a small event triggers a happy memory. The roles I lived in with Lee-both wife and caregiver-will help shape who I am becoming.
Application: Role exit helps us understand transitions like divorce, retirement, leaving a religious order, quitting a job—or leaving the caregiver role.
Role of “Ex”: People often struggle with shifting roles and must learn to define themselves outside their former identity. It is taking time to get comfortable in this new “skin”. It think that’s healthy. It’s all a work in progress.
Caregiving transitions map closely onto this framework. I transitioned from wife to caregiver. Now, I’m transitioning from caregiver to—who?
Include Yourself in Your Own Life
Belonging to self is a deep, internal, active commitment to self-acceptance, autonomy, and self-love—being your own best advocate.
When my husband declined to the point where he didn’t know me and moved to Assisted Living, I essentially became a widow. Not married, not single—many of you know this feeling.
I tried several things to feel “normal” again:
I tried to recreate my past life, just without my husband. The evening routine of the evening news and a glass of wine, then dinner. Trying out new recipes. Sunday mornings on the porch with the paper. These were easily replicated, but without my partner they felt meaningless.
I tried to insert myself into the lives of friends who had shown so much support. I invited them over, suggested dinner out, perhaps a movie. In many cases I ran into a brick wall—”we’ll take a rain check.” After several rejections, I realized the support only went so far. They were embedded in their own unique lives.
I tried to reconnect with friends from my distant past—colleagues, coworkers, friends from college and my younger days. We had some laughs about “old times,” but there was a strain once we got past the reminiscences.
Nothing worked. And it was hurtful. I felt rejected, isolated, and very alone.
But over time—not coincidentally, as I started writing and researching my grief—I realized three things:
I can’t go back. I can treasure the memories of shared routines and rituals, but without my partner, I was going through the motions.
Not every friend who supported me through the years of grief is going to include me in their life now. As well-intentioned and sincere as friends are, not all are going to open up their lives to include me. The support ended with “thoughts and prayers.” And that doesn’t indicate anything bad about them—it’s just all they can give. There’s no playbook for this, and we all have our own journeys to travel.
I give myself permission to evolve, learn, and create a whole new life—a new universe—without needing outside acceptance. Permission is key. No guilt, no reservations, no second-guessing. I am allowed to pursue interests, activities, and dreams without seeking permission or acceptance.
“Belonging to self” means trusting your gut, prioritizing your needs, and above all, honoring your worth—regardless of external validation. Once you’re comfortable in your secure, authentic identity, you can stand alone without fear of loneliness or isolation. In fact, I believe the world will want to come to you.
This life is a journey—filled with incredible sorrow and total joy. We live somewhere in between most of the time.
I was a caregiver for my husband with Alzheimer’s for four years and lost my sense of who I was along the way. I write about ways to belong to yourself again (once you’ve lost her) in my weekly newsletter “The Tender Warrior.” Because— I truly had to be a warrior most days, but for the man who was the absolute love of my life.
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