To the Pharmacy Techs Who Whispered:
To the Pharmacy Techs Who Whispered:
I wish you could step into this body for a day—to feel the tremors that come when your heart forgets how to beat right, the pain that splinters through joints that can’t hold you up, the exhaustion that no amount of sleep can fix.
I wish you could see the notes I keep with every medication—what helps, what hurts, what makes the nightmares come.
The long list of:
“this one didn’t work,”
“that one caused night terrors,”
“this new one made me hallucinate.”
I wish you could hear the weariness in my doctor’s voice as we try again, hoping maybe this time, it will help me stay upright, stay human, stay me.
So when I came today—after you called to say my prescriptions were ready—I came with hope.
Hope that maybe tonight, I might rest.
That maybe this new combination will make it easier to breathe through the chaos my body creates.
But then, I heard it.
The whisper.
“Pill seeker.”
And I froze. Because for a moment, I wasn’t a woman fighting invisible wars inside her body.
I was a label.
A suspicion.
A problem.
I saw how you looked at the bags under my eyes.
I saw how you took in the bruises & scratches on my hands.
I saw how you noticed the shakiness on my feet.
I wanted to tell you about my teenage daughter—how we roughhoused in the kitchen last night and how her laughter left small bruises & some scratches where she grabbed my hands to twirl me.
I wanted to tell you how hard it is to show up here, again and again, and not feel shame for needing the very things that make life livable.
But I didn’t.
Especially after you told me my scripts weren’t ready.
I just smiled, pulled my sleeves down, picked up my purse, thanked you, and walked away.
Here’s the truth: your job matters deeply.
You are the bridge between pain and relief, between despair and hope.
You hold the power to help or to harm—not through your hands, but through your words.
So, please—see the person before the prescription.
See the person before the problem.
See the mother, the wife, the human who is just trying to make it through another day.
See the person living several autoimmune conditions and a pacemaker.
See the person who is ill, WANTING to be well.
And even if I was seeking pills—see the humanity anyway.
Because kindness can heal more than medicine ever could.
