I Thought My Niece Was Just ‘Going Through a Phase’ – Then I Saw the Messages Destroying Her

Not the casserole-dropping, thoughts-and-prayers kind. So I packed two suitcases, quit my apartment lease, and moved into their cramped three-bedroom house in suburban Ohio.

I’d wake up at six to help Tom with his medications. Then came the feeding tube routine, which Jenna had taught me with shaking hands and tear-filled eyes.

After that, we’d do physical therapy exercises in the living room while Jenna slept off her night shift at the hospital.

She worked as a nurse, which sounds ironic until you realize that nursing your own husband is completely different from nursing strangers.

And Mia? My 15-year-old niece seemed to float through it all like a ghost. She’d come downstairs in the same faded black jeans and gray hoodie she’d worn for weeks, grab a granola bar, and head to school without saying much.

“It’s just a phase,” Jenna told me one morning when I mentioned it.

“Teenagers, you know? They get weird about clothes.”

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