There is a particular kind of pain that feels especially tender and helpless.
It isn’t the pain of your own struggle or your own loss. It is the pain of watching someone you love struggle, and not being able to do anything about it. Standing close enough to feel everything and far enough away that you cannot reach in and change it.
If you know this feeling, you know how heavy it sits.
Maybe it is a child. Maybe it is a friend, a sibling, or a parent. Someone who’s hurt you would carry it in a heartbeat if carrying it would actually help. But it wouldn’t. And so you stay. You show up. You love them from where you are standing, and you try not to let the helplessness swallow you whole.
This is one of the most quietly devastating experiences of being human. And it is also, I think, one of the least tended to. Because when someone we love is suffering, the instinct is to pour everything outward. To be available, to be steady, to be strong for them. We rarely stop to ask what we need in the middle of all of that.
But here is what I have come to understand through my own life and through the people I am lucky enough to walk alongside.
Being an example is one of the most powerful gifts you can offer someone you love.
You never know who is watching. Especially the people closest to you. The way you handle difficulty, the way you return to yourself after hard seasons, the way you choose joy even when circumstances don’t invite it. That is not wasted. That lands somewhere, even when you cannot see it.
Disappointment is inevitable. Challenges will come, even when we do everything right. Even when we parent with intention and love with our whole hearts and show up consistently for the people who matter most to us. Life still brings things that are beyond our control, and that is genuinely frustrating. It is okay to name that.
But our ability to find joy inside the struggle is a lifelong and honorable pursuit.
Not toxic positivity. Not pretending things are fine when they are not. But the quiet, courageous decision to tend to yourself anyway. To keep going back to the things that fill you. To refuse to let someone else’s pain become the only thing you are.
That is not selfish. That is how you survive loving someone through something hard.
When I find myself in seasons like this, I double down on my own care. I get outside. I paint. I breathe slowly and intentionally. I let myself feel what I feel without letting it become my entire identity. I look for small moments of genuine joy and I protect them, not because life is easy, but because I know that my capacity to show up for the people I love depends on whether I am showing up for myself first.
Expanding our capacity to sit in discomfort without being controlled by it is the work. It is not comfortable. It does not happen quickly. But it is possible. And every time we choose it, something in us grows a little stronger. A little more rooted. A little more able to love well in the middle of hard things.
The most courageous thing you can do when you love someone you cannot fix is tend to yourself anyway.
Not instead of loving them. Alongside it.
Because a tender heart that is cared for has so much more to offer than one that has been emptied by grief and helplessness alone.
You are allowed to grieve what you cannot change. You are allowed to feel the weight of loving someone through struggle. And you are also allowed, in the very same breath, to choose something gentle for yourself today.
Both can be true. Both need to be true.
That is how we keep going.
30 Seconds With Beth
Place a hand on your heart and take one slow breath.
Ask yourself honestly: Is there someone in my life I have been trying to carry instead of simply love?
Then ask: What is one small thing I can do today to tend to my own tender heart?
You cannot pour from empty. And loving someone well over the long run requires that you stay full enough to keep showing up.
Give yourself something gentle today. You deserve it too.
About The Author
Beth Inglish is an artist, leader, and transformational speaker who creates spaces where people feel seen, supported, and invited to grow. Through her abstract paintings and keynote experiences, she helps people reconnect to themselves, regulate their nervous systems, and move forward with clarity and confidence. Her work blends creativity, emotional intelligence, and storytelling to create meaningful moments of reflection and change. Whether on stage or in the studio, Beth focuses on helping people feel grounded, aware, and empowered in their lives. Visit her online gallery to explore her work and learn more about the stories behind each piece.
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