But I could not, would not, endure my child being diminished.

The love I had never been able to summon in my own defense arrived, instantly and totally, in his.

For his sake, I could do the things I had never been able to do for mine: refuse, fight, stop holding up the walls, walk away.

My parents thought a child born into their disapproval would be a burden that finished breaking me.

Instead he was the one thing in the world large enough to make me finally, fiercely whole.