So I met this older lady this week. She was near me in a crowded coffee shop and looking around and around like she was either confused or lost.

I watched her do this several times and I looked at her eyes as she twisted around and I could see a bit of fear

I felt badly for her, so I asked her if she needed anything.  She did tell me she was waiting for her husband to come in.

But it was the way she told me.  It was one word at a time, very slowly she found each word in her mind.  And it took her great effort to do it.  I could see.  The words were not completely clear she said them.

So I waited as she told me. And I listened hard over the loud sounds around us. And when I said ” Oh, so you’re waiting for your husband?”  I could see the relief and joy on her face.  I think it was because I understood what she told me.

After that  first sentence, she told me that she had had a stoke and that talking was hard. She could not get the words in her head out.

She motioned in a circle around her head and said ” But I know what I want to say and I can’t do it!” S

So I told her about Elizabeth.  (And I know the situation is vastly different.  But it is so very similar as well.)

I told her about her struggles to find words, to talk, to express feelings and to let the world know she was THERE.

I told how we taught Elizabeth to  let the world know this.

To practice saying words like “Please wait”, “I feel frustrated”, “I need time to talk”

I told her that Elizabeth learned these ways to tell the world these things.

This little older lady made a fist and put it to her chest and said ” You understand me” and then in her slow, methodical way she said,  “No one has ever told me these things. No on said  I can do these things.”

I nodded my head and she continued..

” I am so…..then she gritted her teeth and struggled to say frustrated”

So I told her how Elizabeth has told me how she feels.  That she too, grits her teeth and how she too, has told me she “just can’t get words out sometimes”

I told my new coffee shop friend, that when she is frustrated to close her eyes, breath and use one of the phrases.  She teared up now and I told her that I really understood.

It was about now that her husband came in, put his hands on her shoulders and talked to her, she tried to talk to him and got flustered. He said he was getting coffee and would be right back.  I saw the frustration because she kind of grabbed on to his shirt cuff as if to hold him there as she tried to answer him.  But she did not say more than “OK.”

When he had left to get coffee,  she said she  was going to remember the things I said and practice them.

She thanked me again and I told her that I was very happy to have sat near her and that I was meant to be here today.

She, them, thanked me for “being nice to me”

I must admit, I almost cried at this point and I squeezed her hand.

I knew that the gift I gave to this lady, who I will probably never see again, was because of the gift of Elizabeth in my life.

The lessons taught to me by my beautiful daughter are so many and so life impacting.

I say it so often but so many things are simply ” The gift of Elizabeth”

This was indeed one of them.

So when times with your special child are hard, trying, scary or sad…..know that the gifts from them to you are there!

Maybe someone needed to read this today, I hope so.

I wish everyone a blessed day.

Michele