Sit With Me

For the waiting that feels impossible to do alone.

This is the room that means the most to me.

I wish I'd had it a long time ago.

It's been a problem all my life. I struggle with waiting in almost every situation. Boredom, fear, not wanting to be there, not knowing what's coming, not wanting to go or not having the energy or motivation to get up and get ready. But Sit With Me isn't about waiting in general. It's about the specific kind of waiting that lives in your body differently. Sitting in an exam room in a paper gown. The minutes before therapy starts. Sitting at home dreading an appointment that hasn't happened yet, already convinced you can't do it.

That kind of waiting.

And for people like me, it's physical. The sensory issues are real. Being touched, prodded, given medication or a blood test. Feeling pressed in or locked in. The anxiety is in your body and it creates issues with verbalizing. You either give in too quickly or you try to advocate and come off too strong. And sometimes you can't speak at all.

I had to learn all this the hard way. That a nurse sticking me six times for a blood draw is unacceptable. That if I'm having panic attacks and need a tooth pulled, the dentist needs to know that hovering over me, making me sit completely still where I cannot speak, is claustrophobic and creates more panic. I learned I could raise my hand to get him to stop. It was just long enough for me to know I had an option and that I wasn't truly pinned in.

What I needed in those moments wasn't distraction. I needed someone to sit with me. To say: you're not stuck. You can leave. You can say you don't know. You can ask for accommodation. You can not go. These are real options that belong to you, and you are allowed to use them.

I've done all of these things in my life. I've walked out of the building, I've asked for accommodation, I've said I didn't know, I've decided not to go. And I've felt bad about every single one. Like I did something wrong by advocating for myself. Sit With Me is there to remind me that I didn't. That self-advocacy isn't difficult or dramatic or ungrateful. It's powerful and it's necessary. And it's something I'm still learning to believe I'm allowed to do.

The Read Aloud feature matters especially in this room. Because sometimes, in a health setting or a hard appointment, I can't find my own voice. The words are there but I can't seem to make them come out of my mouth. Read Aloud says them for me. I can hold the phone and let it speak while I just breathe. It's not a workaround, it's an accommodation I built for myself because I knew I needed it and it didn't exist anywhere else.

Sit With Me is the room I wish someone had handed me years ago, in every waiting room I've ever sat in alone, convinced I had no options and no voice.