PRACTICE BEING IN UNCERTAINTY - I don’t like this grasping feeling I have and yet here it is. I really, really, really want to know. We underscore the importance of developing a capacity to dwell in uncertainty, but in this moment my body bristles with frustration only a test result will soothe.

FOR TENDERNESS - The door to the scan room is wide and the steel door jamb looks like it belonged to a bank safe. The yellow “Caution Radiation” sign has me feel a bit uneasy. When the door swings open, a platinum blonde woman waves me in....

FOR CARE I CANNOT GIVE MYSELF - It has been more than a week and I still do not have an appointment for the swallow and breathing study. “Why?” asks a friend. “Just pick up the phone and make the appointment.” I shake my head. “I wish it was that easy....

FOR CHOOSING BACK - There is a strange logic that seeks something to blame, as if fighting that is a better use of energy than sitting with the unsettling knowledge that my world, our world, is changed. I don’t want this change, I don’t want this thing I have no name for yet.

FOR WHAT WE DON'T HAVE - We went to lake Erie on Sunday and swam for hours. But we weren’t alone in the waters. There were sneaky parasites looking to make their home in ducks. But because we are hot bodied too, they mistook us and burrowed into our skins.

GRATITUDE AND AVERSION - Today I get an MRI. The first one in my life! And I feel both a rush of gratitude and aversion...

FOR POSSIBILITY - The ENT doctor with his curly grey hair and grey eyes looks at me with tenderness. His face mask is shaped like a duck bill, which makes this moment more endearing. “Do you have people that care about you in Pittsburgh?” He asks knowing I’m an immigrant. “I do.” I say.

FOR ALL THE HANDS THAT HELP ME - “I’m fine, mamma” I say as tears flow over my chin and collect on my woolen turtleneck. My mom takes a breath on the other side of the phone, on the other side of the world. “Sometimes we need to be honest, Hanna. You are not fine.”