She slammed down the silverware on the table that night, and I bit back a sharp comment. It was hitting us all hard; this waiting, waiting, waiting — from Daddy’s diagnosis until the operation, three weeks away.

It was strange how difficulties did different things to different people, I mused. When I first heard the news of my father’s illness, I spent three days living in a bubble of my own — trying to process, think, over-think what this meant and why — while two of my siblings started making frantic phone calls, organizing Tehillim lists, meals for Shabbos, rides to the hospital.

I sensed their quiet disapproval of my withdrawal. Although I knew I was doing what I needed, it still hurt. It was the super capable oldest versus youngest war again, as they raced ahead, leaving the rest of us trailing miles behind, perhaps stuck in those awful, awful elevators that jolted and jerked their way up the floors of the hospital and down again.

And now it was playing out again — oldest sister was preparing supper, while I stubbornly refused to help. I was tired of playing this game of trying to do more but never quite measuring up. Even if she was using the Shabbos silverware by mistake.

It shouldn’t be this way, I thought. But as the day of Daddy’s surgery drew near, the tension intensified — more vibes, more looks, more thoughts. And it felt sad that despite being desperate for the support of family, we couldn’t just be there for each other, without the competition and need to continually prove our abilities. I quietly bowed out.

The day of the surgery brought clouds of various grays to the sky. I tried to carry on with my routine while chewing off my nails and murmuring kapitlach of Tehillim. It would be all right, it had to be. We received updates via my sister, good as gold and always there, no matter what. I should have been grateful to her, right? Sigh.

The last update was a good one, baruch Hashem; Daddy was out of the woods, we hoped. Of course, there was no question of who would spend Shabbos in the hospital with Daddy and Mommy.

And then it was Motzaei Shabbos and I, with four siblings, traipsed in to a head-achey-fluorescent-ward-10B, to join the mainstays, sitting uncomfortably on blue plastic chairs around my exhausted father. He looked dazed and bewildered, and my heart thumped with fear over the temporary loss of the strong father I knew, the one who carried on, no matter what.

(Excerpted from Family First, Issue 598)