The Road I Haven’t Taken Yet

Maybe you know this feeling too; the sense that life is calling you forward, but something invisible is holding you in place. Maybe it’s guilt. Maybe it’s fear. Maybe it’s responsibility. Maybe it’s love. Whatever it is, there comes a moment when we have to ask: Am I staying because I’m needed, or because I haven’t given myself permission to take my next right step?

Today, Facebook reminded me that it was one year ago today that I bought my RV. A year! I had to sit with that for a minute.

When I bought the RV, I wrote about what it represented to me then: freedom, possibility, and the beginning of a new chapter. It represented a way to finally begin living the life I had been dreaming about after years of working, building, serving, caregiving, and holding so much together.

In many ways, it still does represent a new chapter for me. But the year since I bought it did not unfold the way I imagined. There have been several hospital admissions for my dad. Home PT and OT. A three-month rehab stay. And a move to an extended care assisted living facility. There have been countless decisions to make, difficult conversations to have, forms to fill out, medications to track, appointments to coordinate, systems to navigate, and emotional landmines to step around.

In between all that, I was determined to not lose myself and my dream. I took a couple of local RV trips. I completed a major RV renovation project. I've set the RV up for living, working, relaxing, and sharing with friends. There has been a lot of learning and a lot of waiting. I've had some tender glimpses of the life I've  imagined, along with a lot of “almost.”

In my business I've built a new coaching program for 50+ women leaning into their retirement years and wanting to create a legacy of impact, called From Career to Calling.

I dipped my toes into the world of vibe coding and learned how to create websites, landing pages, and slide decks by simply talking out my vision to an AI agent and letting the agent bring my ideas to life. Ideas I used to carry around in notebooks and “someday” folders have come alive and taken a front row seat on my to do list. And then another round of COVID. More recalibrating. More surrendering. More becoming.

The list goes on and on. And here I am, a full year later. Still at my dad’s. Still talking about hitting the road. Still feeling tethered to something I can’t quite put my finger on.

Maybe it’s guilt, or fear, or responsibility, or love. Maybe it’s the years-old role of being the capable one, the available one, the one who figures things out. Maybe it’s something I haven’t fully named yet.

But I can feel something shifting. Because the truth is, my dad is in a good place right now. He is comfortable in his new home. He is safe. He is cared for. He has people around him who show up every day with skill, patience, and compassion.

And I am still close. Still available. Still part of his life.

But I do not need to remain frozen in place in my own life to prove that I care.
That sentence feels important and worthy of repeating.
I do not need to remain frozen in place to prove that I care.

I have been living the role of caregiver for my dad for almost two years now. Not theoretically. Not from the outside. Not as a concept I write about from a distance.

I am in it.

I have lived the phone calls, the hospital rooms, the medication questions, the rehab meetings, the safety concerns, the paperwork, the emotional complexity, the moments of fear, and the strange mix of gratitude for the connection I've been privileged to share with my dad and the sheer exhaustion that comes when someone you love needs more from you than you ever expected.

And maybe that is why I have decided to fully commit to writing the My Caregiving Essentials book.

Because this is no longer an idea I had that lives on a list somewhere in my file cabinet.
It is an experience I've been living every single day. It is the book I wish more families had before the crisis. Before the confusion. Before caregiving quietly becomes a second full-time job.

I have decided to put a couple of other projects on hold for now, not because they no longer matter, but because this one is asking for my full attention.

And rather than fighting it, I am listening and I am 100% committed. My goal is to launch it in mid-June.
That feels both ambitious and right.

Sometimes the thing we are living is also the thing we are being called to teach or share or write about. 
And sometimes the work we are meant to create does not come from stepping away from life, but from standing right in the middle of it and finally saying:

This is what I know now.
This is what I wish I had known sooner.
This is what might help someone else.

At the same time, I can feel another truth rising. It is time for me to lean into living my own life again. Not someday. Not when every detail is perfectly resolved. Not when no one needs me. Not when I have earned enough permission to go.

Now.

That means putting the finishing touches on the manuscript.
It means vibe coding the final changes to the website (and celebrating that at my age I even know what vibe coding is!)
It means creating the book launch plan.
And it also means hiring my RV tech, Kirk, for a couple of hours so he can meet me at a campground and walk me through every system in my RV, get it all hooked up, and help me feel ready to take it on the road with more confidence.

It means pulling out the map and planning the trip north. Or maybe it means parking the RV for a bit longer and just jumping on a plane, and heading back to a place and people I miss so much for a much needed break from everything.

Maybe it does not have to look one certain way.
Maybe freedom begins before the road trip.
Maybe freedom begins with telling the truth.

I bought the RV a year ago because some part of me knew I was ready for a different life. I may not have driven as far as I imagined. I may not have traveled the way I thought I would. I may still be sitting here at my dad’s, looking at the same Florida sky, wondering why I have not quite left yet.

But I am not the same woman I was a year ago.

This year has taught me things I may not have learned from a travel itinerary.
It has taught me about caregiving.
About responsibility.
About love.
About boundaries.
About the stories we tell ourselves about what it means to be a good daughter.
About the difference between being present and being consumed.
About the quiet courage it takes to choose your own life while still loving someone deeply.

Maybe that is the next leg of the journey. Not just learning how to drive the RV and feel confident using all its systems. But learning how to trust myself enough to go ...

To write the manuscript.
To launch the book.
To take the break.
To visit the people I miss.
To let myself be supported.
To let my dad be cared for by others.
To stop waiting for a perfect moment that may never arrive.

A year ago, I bought an RV. Today, I am realizing that the road may have been calling me all along. Not just the physical road. The inner one. The one that asks me to release guilt, soften fear, honor responsibility without being swallowed up by it. The one that is asking me to take the next right step for me.

The one that asks me to remember that my life still belongs to me. 

Maybe you know this feeling too. Maybe there is something you have been postponing until life settles down, everyone is okay, and the path feels perfectly clear.

But what if the next right step does not require abandoning anyone? What if it simply requires remembering that you are someone worth caring for too? That is where I am standing now, one year after buying the RV. Not fully on the road yet. Not fully untethered. But awake to the truth that love does not require self-abandonment.

And maybe that is where freedom begins.

If this season of caregiving, responsibility, and trying not to lose yourself sounds familiar, I’m writing My Caregiving Essentials for you. You can learn more about the book and join the launch list here.

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