During a text check-in with a fellow Dead Kids Club member this past weekend, our conversation turned to how no one tells you just how challenging life can get. She noted that sadly, she learned that as a child, but she had a similar conversation with another DKC member whose life was uneventful until the passing of her son. It had been incredibly jarring for her to find out as a 40+-year-old that life does not always go as planned.

I wondered when my “life is unfair” bubble popped. I was fortunate to be raised in a loving, supportive, and financially secure home. Horrible things happened to people around me: a neighbor was hit by a car on her bike, my Aunt was in a severely debilitating car accident, my Mimi passed away in her early 60’s from cancer. But my family wasn’t particularly close with the neighbors, and we didn’t live near my Aunt or Mimi - none of these tragedies affected my daily life.

That’s not entirely true, I was pretty upset about my Mimi dying, but grandparents die. While the timing seemed unfair, it wasn’t unnatural.

My first “this stuff happens to other people not me” moment, was when we discovered at our 20-week ultrasound that Elvis, the baby I was carrying when I was 32, was not going to survive his birth. Still, I thought I had endured my life’s major trauma. I wouldn’t learn that trauma is not equally distributed until Adelaide was diagnosed with infantile spasms when I was 34.

Eight years later, I know the asteroids are out there, that they are not fairly rationed, and can fall at my feet at any moment completely reshaping the landscape of my life. After Adelaide died, it took years not to live in perpetual fear of the asteroids. Depression told me there was no point in planning for a future that could be destroyed without notice. Anxiety had me scanning the horizon, teetering at the precipice of fight or flight.

Though tempted, I will not debate whether having this bubble popped as a child or adult is better or worse. Much like competitive grief, this discussion benefits no one. We don’t get to choose when these lessons are learned or the severity of their impact. But we do get to decide how we respond to the lessons and the realities they uncover.

What I will say is we can respond to them one way initially, or even for years following, and then decide to change that response. This is where our control lies, not in our circumstances, but in our response to them. Which harkens back to last week’s post about emotional strength as a measure of the variety of tools we have at our disposal.

As I breathe today, I am abundantly aware that life does not go as planned. That doesn’t mean the life I have is less than, it just means it’s different. It also means that when plans go awry, and they will, I will be better equipped to manage the fallout. This awareness helps clarify what I value and prioritize. In doing so, it better focuses my energy and attention.

Not unlike a superpower. Hear me out.

Every superhero has an origin story. A tragedy befalls them setting in motion their path to heroism. Come to think of it, not unlike a villain’s origin story, but let’s choose to focus on the good guys…

Superman’s planet, along with his family, dies but he escapes to Earth where his abilities are magnified. There have been way too many Spiderman stories at this point for me to remember the order of things but, his uncle is murdered around the same time that he is bit by a radioactive spider and voila: superhero. Batman’s parents are murdered, he falls in a cave full of bats, never outgrows his teen emo phase, and invests in high-tech gadgets. Honestly, though, if Batman had just gone to therapy he might have realized he could have been even more heroic by donating to community programs…

Only once our bubble is popped can our superpowers emerge (remember stronger/smarter superpowers require therapy, #DontBeLikeBatman). How we utilize those powers is up to us. Look, these aren’t the superpowers I would have chosen – but we’ve already established choice isn’t a factor. So, we do the best with what we’ve got and remind ourselves that according to comic book dogma, we are, in fact, super. Whether we feel like it today or not.

ID: Kelly standing in a white kitchen in front of a stove holding a spatula with one hand on her hip. She is wearing a teal and white ombre cotton tank dress and is turning away from the stove to smile at the camera. A cartoon red cape and yellow, wonder woman style crown have been digitally added to the image. Photo taken by Kelly’s daughter, Anessa (5yo).