A Piece of fabric
This text is a human testimony about a woman living between responsibility and fear, trying to preserve her balance under harsh circumstances. It is not so much a recounting of tragedy as it is an attempt to capture the shape of life when endurance itself becomes a form of daily resistance.
«Helplessness is not having nothing. It is having what you love and being unable to protect it.»
— Hiam
I am fifty years old, but the exhaustion in my eyes speaks of a much older life. Since my husband’s death, time has no longer been measured in years, but by the number of times I resisted breaking down without anyone noticing.
I am no longer allowed to be weak. I try to be everything for my daughters: the mother, the father, the support that cannot collapse, and the heart that must remain steady no matter what happens.
I used to sit behind the sewing machine for long hours. I stitched other people’s clothes while trying to mend my own life as it quietly unraveled. Sewing was never just work; it was a way to survive. Every piece of cloth became enough to carry us through another day, and every stitch was an attempt to continue.
I kept telling myself that this was enough for us to live, that something resembling safety still existed as long as work continued. Then the siege came, and everything stopped suddenly, as though life itself had lost its rhythm all at once. Nothing remained except fear, and it grew faster than my ability to contain it.
That night, the darkness felt deeper than a power outage. I kept thinking about all the stories I had heard of homes that were no longer safe, of women whose lives changed in an instant, of stories that began quietly and ended in unimaginable ways. The walls themselves felt too fragile to protect us.
I look at my daughters and try to appear strong. But fear cannot be hidden. I see it clearly in their eyes, painfully clear, as though we share the same feeling without needing words. They move closer to me as though I am their only shelter, and I hold them tightly, trying to shield them from the world, while carrying the silent certainty that my arms are not enough to protect them from everything.
Helplessness is not having nothing. It is having what you love and being unable to protect it.
I have endured much, and I have lost much. And still, I must continue. The exhaustion is there, and so is the fear, but stopping is not an option. Two small hearts depend on me, even when I feel myself collapsing from within.
Peace feels distant now — more an idea than a reality. And yet I remain awake, watching, holding tightly to whatever strength I still have left, because life has not left room for anything else.
