Memory & Reflection

Remembering life through the sounds that linger long after silence.

— Discovering the power of quiet moments.

— Facing sudden change with resilience.

— Exploring invisibility , absence, and the journey back to self.

Resilience & Healing

— Finding comfort and grace in the middle of challenge.

— Strength and hope revealed in the aftermath of loss.

— Navigating life with invisible illness and visible strength.

Love & Identity

— Rediscovering connection and self after hardship.

— Raw reflections on illness, vulnerabilty and identity

The Sounds That Stay

What Stillness Taught Me About Story

When the Day Changed Overnight

The High Cost of Disappearing

The Shape of Ease

What Remains

You Don't Look Sick

The First Thing I Choose to Love Again

Naked in the Dark

Read My Stories

Here you’ll find essays and reflections drawn from resilience, memory, and the human spirit.
Keep scrolling, and you’ll see the full list of stories — each with its own doorway in.

The Sounds That Stay

Some people remember faces. Others, places. I remember sound.

Not just any sound—
the ones that stir something in me,
that tug on memory,
that make me feel alive.

A baby's laugh that bubbles up from the belly — pure, contagious joy.
Wind chimes dancing in a summer breeze — soft and unbothered.
A boat horn calling out as the Tacony-Palmyra Bridge begins to rise — steady, certain, purposeful.

Freight trains rolling through Riverton —
long, low, and steady.
A sound you feel in your ribs before you hear it with your ears.
Through my hometown.
Through time itself.

A marching band swelling with the Star-Spangled Banner —
where pride and nostalgia live side by side.

The playful chaos of the calliope at the church carnival —
cotton candy on the air,
sneakers on gravel,
colored lights decorating the evening sky.

A Black Forest cuckoo clock chirping into a quiet room —
small, specific, loved.

The jingle of an ice cream truck weaving through summer heat —
reminding me to run, to hope, to taste.

There’s the ordinary holiness:
Church bells tolling over rooftops.
The soft hoot of a Barred Owl in the dark.
A car’s polite honk saying hello — brief, warm, and neighborly.
The front gate latch jiggling — unexpected, familiar, welcoming.
The ringtone I assigned to someone I loved —
instantly recognizable,
now achingly missed.

And then—there’s weather.

Rain on a tin roof, steady as breath.
Wild winds ripping through the trees while I’m safe inside —
the kind of storm that reminds you
you’re warm,
you’re home,
you’re still here.

The soft crackle of the fireplace, low and steady —
its rhythm almost a heartbeat.

Thunder crashing — raw and unapologetic.
The lightning alarm sounding — sharp, electric, expectant.

And Chuck Mangione’s trumpet — Feels So Good —
because sometimes music says everything words can’t.

These are the sounds I carry.

They are not background noise.
They are landmarks.
They are proof.

That I have lived,
that I have loved,
that I have belonged —
somewhere,
to someone,
in moments that mattered.

I long to hear them again.
And when I can’t, I remember.

Because some sounds don’t fade.
They echo.

Some sounds fade… and some stay with us forever.

What Stillness Taught Me About Story

📰 Publishing this week on Brevity Blog

In this craft essay, Mary shares how illness-imposed stillness transformed her relationship to storytelling. Without the distractions of busy life, she learned to listen inward—to let stories rise from presence, not performance. It's a piece about truth-telling, attention, and writing from the quiet places others often overlook.

Quote: “Stillness didn’t make me a better writer. It made me a truer one.”

Read this story here...https://marymonokyspeaks.com/what-stillness-taught-me-about-story

When the Day Changed Overnight

Some days begin like any other—familiar, predictable, filled with routine.
And then, without warning, everything shifts.
A single moment can unravel the fabric of normalcy and thrust us into a new reality we never saw coming.

When the Day Changed Overnight explores those sudden turns in life—the unexpected events that alter our path and challenge us to find resilience in the face of upheaval

A guide for weathering flare-ups when your body turns against you

I went to bed feeling proud. I had just finished learning how to hang wallpaper—bold tropical flowers on black. It reminded me of the garden I once revived in Florida. That day felt like progress.

But when I woke up, I knew something had shifted. Before I even stood up.
Once I did, I felt… swishy. Off. My heart was racing. My steps were unsteady.

It felt like a hangover — but I hadn’t been out celebrating.

I’d done something small. Something that felt good.
I made something beautiful. I took up space.
Not just physically — but emotionally, creatively.

I used what little energy I had to do something expressive.
I allowed myself to be visible. And that matters.

Was that too much? Was this my punishment for reaching beyond the narrow safety I’ve learned to survive within?

That’s the cruelty of it:
you never know what you’re being punished for —
or if you’re being punished at all.

My body had turned on me. Again.

That’s the hardest part of living with chronic illness:
No warning. No bumps, bruises, or bandages.
Nothing visible to explain the struggle.

It’s not just an invisible war —
it’s a full-scale battle inside your body,
waged in silence,
that no one else can see.

It’s isolating. It’s heartbreaking.
And still, we face it.

Here’s what helped me:

🔹 I named it. I said out loud, “This is a flare.” Naming it gave me clarity.
🔹 I sat down. Not from weakness — but from wisdom.
🔹 I used sensation. A cool cloth on my face helped me stay grounded.
🔹 I stopped pushing. I didn’t finish brushing my teeth. I listened instead.

And here’s what I didn’t do:

✘ I didn’t ignore it.
✘ I didn’t tell myself I was lazy.
✘ I didn’t apologize for needing care.
✘ I didn’t chase productivity.

That silence, that pause, was its own kind of strength.

I also didn’t go down the rabbit hole.
I didn’t spend my limited energy searching for explanations.

Sometimes, especially when you're newly diagnosed, it feels urgent to figure it all out.
You search and search, hoping for clarity, hoping to feel safer.

But most of the time, those answers won’t come.
And the habit of focusing on every physical detail can pull you further from peace.

Over the decades, I’ve learned something steadier:
How to recognize weird misfires from true red flags.
How to pause without panicking.
How to choose presence over panic — when I can.

It’s not about ignoring the body.
It’s about learning which signals to honor, and which to let pass without letting them own me.

That’s not denial.
That’s wisdom.
That’s practice.

And then, I responded — not with panic, but with presence.
Not with a battle plan, but with rest.

I didn’t know what the rest of the day would hold.
I only knew what I needed next.

I crawled back to bed.
Not in defeat,
but by choice.

I put on soothing sounds.
I closed my eyes.
Maybe I napped.
Maybe I just breathed.

Either way, I gave my body what it asked for — without apology.

This isn’t a triumph story. I didn’t “bounce back.”
But I did survive — with gentleness. And I counted that as a win.

I wasn’t grateful for the flare-up.
But I was grateful — for the acceptance, the knowledge, and the courage I’ve developed over time.

That didn’t come easy.
And my wish is to offer you something similar.
A reminder that it’s possible.

If your body sometimes betrays you —
if you're living with an illness that cancels your day without permission —
know this:

In a world that prizes visibility and connection, choosing to disappear—even briefly—carries a heavy price.

Disappearing isn’t just about physical absence; it’s about the emotional toll of fading from sight, from community, and sometimes even from yourself.
Whether due to illness, grief, overwhelm, or silence, the cost of disappearing can ripple through our lives in unexpected and profound ways.

This story explores the quiet struggle of becoming invisible in a noisy world—and what it takes to be seen again.

The High Cost of Disappearing

by Mary Monoky

Chronic illness takes so much from the body.
But what it takes from your life?
That’s harder to name — and even harder to grieve.

It starts quietly.
You miss a lunch.
Cancel a dinner.
Turn down a weekend trip because your body just… can’t.

At first, people understand.
They say, “Of course. Rest.”
They say, “We’ll catch you next time.”

But “next time” keeps moving.
And eventually, the invitations stop coming.

You don’t know when it happens —
that shift from included to forgotten, from central to optional.
You just look around one day and realize:
You’re no longer part of the rhythm.

And the ache of that?
It’s not just loneliness.
It’s erasure.

People don’t mean to disappear you.
They’re busy. They’re overwhelmed.
They don’t know what to say.
Or maybe your reality makes them uncomfortable —
a mirror they’d rather not look into.

But you feel it.
In the silence.
In the empty inbox.
In the group photo you weren’t asked to be in.

It’s not just that you’re missing out.
It’s that you’re being missed less and less.

That is the high cost of disappearing.
Not the flare-ups or the fatigue or the medical bills —
but the way illness unthreads you from the fabric of your own life.

And still—

Here you are.

Still offering love.
Still seeking joy.
Still becoming.

The High Cost of Disappearing

The Shape of Ease

A quiet meditation on the rituals and mindset it takes to rest inside a restless body.

Mary offers a vulnerable glimpse into what it means to chase not just sleep, but ease, when rest rarely comes easy. It’s a piece about surrender, softness, and creating permission where perfection used to live.

Quote: “I’ve traded the ease of getting out of bed for the ease of accepting the new day.

by Mary Monoky

Who doesn’t love the feel of fresh linens on the bed?
Cool cotton, smooth against the skin, carrying the scent of sunshine and air.

I remember lying there, limbs loose, breathing easy, my mind blissfully free of anything heavier than deciding whether to read another chapter or drift into a nap.

As someone who now struggles to get consistent sleep, I often find myself chasing that lost sensation—longing for the simplicity of sliding into rest, of trusting my body to surrender naturally to quiet.

I do everything I can to set the stage: dimmed lights, gentle rituals, music barely above a whisper, bedding chosen for softness. Pillows arranged just so, a cool room, the faint trace of lavender—each detail deliberate, an offering to the elusive gods of sleep.

There’s no clock in my bedroom. That’s intentional. I don’t want to watch the minutes slip away or feel the pressure of another wasted night. Timekeeping only makes the silence heavier.

Most nights, I invest nine or ten hours just to gather four or five hours of rest. Not sleep—rest. The difference matters. Sometimes the hours come in fractured pieces; sometimes they don’t come at all.

Still, I keep to the rituals. The tea. The darkness. The careful softness of everything.

Because what I’m really chasing isn’t just sleep.
It’s ease. That rare sense of being held by the night instead of resisting it.

My body wakes often. Sometimes from pain, sometimes for no reason at all, as if it has forgotten how to stay still. I turn, shift, wait. I try not to look at my phone. I try not to calculate how many hours remain until morning.

The goal isn’t perfection—it’s permission.
Permission to rest in fragments.
To gather what slivers of comfort I can.
To count ease instead of hours.

It’s been thirty-five years of living in a body that doesn’t follow the rules.
A body that wakes like a newborn yet aches like the old.
That forgets how to rest, how to regulate, how to just be.

There is no baby at the end of this sleeplessness, no finish line—only this unpredictable, maddening, miraculous body reshaping every corner of my life.

And still—I try.
I soften the bedding.
I dim the lights.
I chase ease, even if it only comes in moments.

What I’ve learned is to build my life around the sleep I get—not the sleep I wish I had.

I no longer force early mornings or obligations that ignore my reality.
If I need a nap, I take it without apology.
I’ve stopped performing wellness for other people’s comfort.

Instead, I honor the rhythms of a body that has carried me through more than most will ever know.

I am always awake at sunrise, no matter how much I’ve slept.

There’s something about that hour—the hush before the world stirs—that still feels like a promise worth keeping. Even if I’m weary, even if my mind feels thin at the edges, I meet the morning.

It isn’t optimism. It’s presence.
A way of greeting the day on my own terms, even if I had to crawl my way there.

Some mornings, the light itself is enough.
Just that. Just light.

I’ve traded the ease of falling asleep for the ease of accepting the new day.
It’s not the ease I once knew.
But it’s real.
And it’s mine.

What Remains

In the quiet aftermath of loss and change, what lingers isn’t always what we expect.
Sometimes, what remains is less about what’s gone and more about the unseen threads that bind us to hope, memory, and resilience.

What Remains is a meditation on endurance—the subtle strength we carry when the noise fades and the world feels still.

What Remains

by Mary Monoky

Chronic illness taught me a strange kind of waiting.
Not the kind with a clear end—no countdown, no cure, no guarantees.

Just suspended time.
Stuck between not quite dying, and not really living.

In the beginning, I clung to hope like a lifeline.
Every new specialist, treatment, or medication dangled the possibility of return.

Return to work.
To the rhythm of productivity. To being someone others could count on.
To contributing, providing, solving problems—signing forms, showing up, holding it all together.

Return to parenting the way I used to.
Not just watching from the sidelines, but jumping in.
The rides, the games, the last-minute school projects.
The warmth of being the one who made it all happen, even when no one noticed.

Return to being a sister who remembered birthdays and showed up for the hard stuff.
Return to neighborly conversations in driveways, a casserole on someone’s porch,
a hand extended before it had to be asked for.

I kept reaching outward—toward connection, toward usefulness,
trying to reclaim the roles that once defined me.

But eventually, the reaching wore thin.
Not for lack of love, but because my energy could no longer stretch that far.

And so, I returned to myself, alone.

Return to the self I recognized—the one who moved through the world with energy and purpose.
The one who didn’t always have to explain, or apologize, or measure the cost of each small task.

But return didn’t come.

Days passed, then months.
Each one carried a new promise—a referral, a medication, a test result—
and each one let it quietly slip away.

I marked time in appointments and side effects, in what I could no longer do.
The world moved on around me, full of forward motion and milestones.

I stayed still.

Not by choice, but by necessity.

At first, I thought it was temporary. A detour.
But detours eventually rejoin the road.

This… didn’t.

Years began to stack.
Holidays repeated themselves, indistinct.
Friends grew older, children taller, careers evolved.

My life was smaller now, quieter.
But not empty.

The hope I’d carried so fiercely became a quiet ache,
like background music I could no longer turn off.

Eventually, it settled into something else: presence.
I learned how to live inside a day instead of pushing through it.

I noticed things—really noticed them.
The way morning light filtered through the curtains.
The feeling of a warm mug in a cold hand.
A bird returning to the same branch, like clockwork.

It didn’t erase the pain, but it gave it context.

I stopped waiting for life to restart and began collecting it in pieces.

A good book.
A soft blanket.
A text from someone who remembered I was still here.

This wasn’t the life I planned.
But it became the life I honored.

What remains is not the noise or speed or achievement.

What remains is stillness.
Awareness.

The way resilience carves a quiet strength you never knew you had—
until that strength is all you have.

What remains is me—different, quieter, but still here.

You Don’t Look Sick

by Mary Monoky

What happens when the system you trusted stops believing you?

This isn’t about one bad appointment.
It’s about the slow erosion of self-trust —
when your pain is invisible,
your voice is questioned,
and your knowing gets overwritten.

The hardest part wasn’t the eye rolls.
Or the chart note that said “anxious.”
It wasn’t even the disbelief on the doctor’s face
as I tried to explain what was happening inside me.

The hardest part was losing my faith.
Not in God.

In medicine.

I believed in the system.
I believed if you were honest,
kept records,
showed up put together —
they would help you.

That belief was the last thing to go.
And when it did, I didn’t feel angry.
I felt alone.

Because once you lose that faith,
you start to float.

You become one of them:
the ones who talk too much in waiting rooms,
who bring folders,
who say “But I read online…”
The ones doctors don’t listen to.

And I hated that.
I hated becoming someone I used to pity.

But here’s what no one tells you: those people?
They didn’t start there.
They were made.

By dismissal.
By exhaustion.
By the slow undoing that comes
when you’re doubted again and again —
until even your own story
sounds suspicious in your own ears.

You start correcting yourself mid-sentence.
You apologize before every ask.
You laugh so the nurse won’t feel uncomfortable.
You hide the worst of it from your family,
because even their silence feels like judgment.

And one day,
you hear yourself describing a symptom
in the same flat voice you use to order coffee.

No urgency.
No heat.
Just routine.

And they say, “Your labs look fine.”
So you nod.
You go home.
And you lie on the bathroom floor —
because it’s cool,
and still,
and no one expects you to explain.

They don’t see that part.
They don’t see the quiet collapse
after being dismissed again.

They don’t see the doubt that grows like mold —
Maybe it’s just stress.
Maybe it’s aging.
Maybe I’m weak.

That’s the damage.
Not the pain.
The way you stop trusting your own perception.

It doesn’t take cruelty.
Just a long series of doubts
that make you forget
what you knew was true.

But I’m done handing over that knowing.

You don’t have to fix me.
You don’t even have to understand me.
Just don’t erase me while I’m still here.
Don’t rewrite the truth I live in.

Because I do know this body.
I know when something’s wrong.
I know when it’s more than stress.
I know when I’m not okay.

And I will not give that away
to anyone who looks at me and says:

“But you don’t look sick.”

When disbelief from the medical system erodes trust, the damage goes beyond pain: it makes you doubt your own truth.

🐾 The First Thing I Chose to Love Again

After years of only tending to survival, Mary invites a dog into her life—and something shifts.

This story honors the planning, vulnerability, and deep intention behind saying yes to a Labradoodle puppy.

Not an impulsive adoption, but a sacred beginning: the first act of chosen love beyond her own broken body.

The First Thing I Chose to Love Again

by Mary Monoky

There was a time when every ounce of my energy went toward managing this broken body.

Each day was a calculation: what could I do, what should I avoid, what would it cost tomorrow. My world got smaller, tighter. I became the only thing I was responsible for — and even that felt like too much.

But then, I got a dog.

Before inviting her into my life, I had conditions.
She couldn’t be high-energy. I needed calm. Compatibility. A presence that wouldn’t overwhelm the fragile balance I was barely holding onto.

I also needed a home that made it possible — which meant a fenced yard. A place where she could move freely without depending on me.

I wasn’t just planning for companionship.
I was planning for sustainability.

I prepared for the bad days, too — the ones when I wouldn’t be able to get out of bed. I installed an automatic dog door. A simple thing that said: I see this through. I won’t leave you stuck.

I considered rescue dogs, but in the end, I chose to start fresh.
I wasn’t looking to fix something.
I was ready to grow something.

My son had recently gotten a Labradoodle. I hadn’t known the breed, but his dog had a perfect blend of loyalty, intelligence, and ease.

Friendly. Non-shedding. Affectionate without being clingy.
Everything I hadn’t known I was looking for.

So I chose a female puppy born on a farm in Iowa.

It wasn’t impulsive. It felt sacred.
She was barely bigger than a loaf of bread, but something in me softened when I saw her photo. Not excitement — recognition.

I made arrangements with the family to send her with their brother when he flew to New Jersey.

No cargo hold. No stress.
Just a small dog, arriving gently into my arms.

Driving to the airport to meet this stranger carrying my puppy was probably the most excited I’ve been as an adult.

Of course, I’m not including raising my children and all the sacred moments that come with that.
This was a different kind of excitement.
This was just for me.

Naked in the Dark

Naked in the Dark is a raw, unflinching account of the nights no one talks about—the ones filled with pain, fear, and the quiet reckoning of living with chronic illness. In this spoken word story, Mary Monoky brings voice to the loneliness of 3 a.m. questions, the weight of not knowing, and the unexpected strength that comes from surrender. A powerful meditation on identity, uncertainty, and the courage to keep breathing when nothing feels certain.

Naked in the Dark

This story was born in the hours no one sees—those long, silent stretches between midnight and morning.
It’s for anyone who has ever lain awake with pain, doubt, and fear, asking questions no one else can answer.

It’s about chronic illness.
It’s about identity.
And it’s about the kind of strength that doesn’t roar — but breathes.

Early on in my illness, it was always the same stretch of time that undid me.

Somewhere between midnight and sunrise, when the house was quiet and the world was dark, I’d lie awake with my pain—and my fears—and the questions I couldn’t outrun.

There was no one to call. No lifelines. No gentle voice to talk me down, no presence on the other end of the line. Just me and the body I no longer trusted. Me and the ache that wouldn’t ease. Me and the dark that asked too many questions.

What if I never get better? What if I get worse? What if this becomes all I am? What if I disappear into it? What if my identity shrinks down to nothing but a diagnosis? Would anyone recognize me beneath it?

What’s to become of me?

In the daytime, I could pretend.
I could answer texts with emojis and “I’m hanging in there.”
I could make soup.
I could fold towels.
I could smile just enough to pass.

But at 3:22 a.m., all of that slipped off.
The brave face. The reasonable voice. The part of me that said, “You’ve got this.”

Because sometimes I didn’t. And that’s what no one talks about.

Not every night, but enough nights, I felt like the only person in the world awake and afraid.

On the worst nights, fear came in quietly — like smoke under a door.

Not panic. Not hysteria. But a slow, steady sense that I was slipping into something I couldn’t get out of. That this might be my life now. That I might be alone with it.

I’d lie there and wonder, What if this is the best I’ll ever feel again? What if no one really understands what this costs me, night after night? What if I lose everything I used to be — and never find a way back?

The future used to feel wide. Open. Even when it was uncertain, there was hope baked into it. But chronic illness rewrites that.

It doesn’t ask for permission.
It shrinks the horizon.
Until eventually, you’re lying awake in the dark, staring into a future you can’t imagine — because nothing looks like it used to.

And still, the clock ticks.
Still, the questions keep coming.
How do I plan a life I don’t recognize? What does strength even look like now? Am I still strong if I’m afraid?

I didn’t need encouragement. I was looking for concrete answers — solid ground beneath all this quicksand. But none came.

What I needed was validation.
What I craved was certainty.

Is this as good as it gets? I asked it in the dark, again and again.
And the answer never came.

Because sometimes the scariest part isn’t the pain itself. It’s realizing no one can tell you how long it will last. No one can promise it will ever get better. And you’re left to live inside that not-knowing.

So I kept breathing. Not because I was brave. Not because I chose to. Everything else was gone. Breath was all that remained — and it was mine.

The avalanche starts.
Not with a bang. But a shift — a crack deep in my chest, a tremor in my gut.
A question I shouldn’t have asked. A truth I wasn’t ready to face.

And suddenly the ground — the little ground I had — crumbles beneath my feet.

Everything I’ve used to hold myself up — hope, logic, stubbornness, faith, distraction — drops out from under me. I’m freefalling in a body that already feels broken.

There is no bottom in sight.

This is what people don’t understand: It’s not just the pain that undoes you. It’s the collapse.

The mental freefall that starts when you let yourself fully know — this might not get better. This might be your life.

And it’s not a drama spiral. It’s not self-pity.
It’s a reckoning.
A scream without sound.
A gut punch without witness.

No one’s coming to check on you at 3:45 a.m.
And if they did, what would you say?

“I think I’ve just realized I can’t outrun this.”
“I think I’m starting to believe this is forever.”
“I don’t know how to want a life like this.”

I lay still. Crushed by the weight of everything I could no longer carry.
Listening to the echo of my own mind cracking open.

But after the avalanche, after the panic, after the world crumbles and I’ve fallen through every floor I thought would hold me… there’s something else.

Not peace. Not yet.
Something quieter.
Something I didn’t expect.

Surrender.

Not the kind people romanticize — the brave letting-go, the graceful acceptance.
This isn’t soft. It’s not beautiful.

It feels like failure.
It feels like laying down in the wreckage because I have no strength left to crawl.

It’s not a choice.
It’s what happens when there are no choices left.

I don’t know what tomorrow looks like.
I don’t know how to want it.

But I do know this: I can’t keep fighting my life and living it at the same time.

So maybe surrender is what’s left.
Not because I’m weak.
But because resistance has become a second illness.

And maybe — just maybe — there’s a different kind of strength in that.

Not the strength to rise or overcome.
But the strength to stay.

To keep breathing inside the wreckage.
To whisper, “I’m still here.”

And for today, that is enough.