When life delivers unexpected challenges, the author discovered that true strength lies not in self-sufficiency, but in the courage to embrace vulnerability and build meaningful connections with others. Explore how relying on community, even when uncomfortable, is essential for navigating life's most difficult moments and finding the support needed to survive.
On a random grade school slow-as-mud day, I was called into the principal’s office, and my life split into before and after. I didn’t have a slot in my trapper keeper planner for the words “your father has cancer.” I didn’t have a script for watching him fade. Later, I didn’t have one for my mother’s diagnosis. And when my own came, the irony wasn’t lost on me: three jolts, each one more unplanned than the last.
There’s no Pinterest board for this. No tidy checklist. No bucket list you actually want. What there is—what I’ve found again and again—is people.
And here’s the catch: needing people requires admitting you need them. That’s vulnerability, and it’s about as comfortable as showing up to a black-tie dinner in your pajamas.
The False Badge of Strength
I have always prided myself on being, or at least publicly portraying myself as, strong. Stoic. The one who “has it together.” People told me often, “You’re so strong.” It felt like a compliment, and so I continued to seek out that validation. But the truth is, it wasn’t. Strength, at least the way we define it, isn’t a badge—it’s a weight. And if you carry it too long, it doesn’t make you stronger; it crushes you.
In his book, “Give and Take,” Adam Grant reminds us:
“The most meaningful way to succeed is to help others succeed.” Real strength is found in lifting others, not in carrying burdens alone.”[1]
When my dad was sick, my very young self tried to hold it all together. But grief is not something you can schedule or manage. It leaks out. It breaks down your carefully stacked walls. Maybe it comes out while watching “Armageddon” when – SPOLIER ALERT – Bruce Willis sacrifices himself by staying on the asteroid to detonate the bomb. Or grief sits like a pit in your stomach, causing actual, physical pain, lack of sleep, crying alone, and a true sense of abandonment.
When my mom was diagnosed, I wanted to be the capable daughter. The one understood all facets of the diagnosis, sent meals, provided encouragement, offered all aspects of help, managed the storm. But strength didn’t protect me from fear, and it didn’t replace the need for someone to simply sit beside me. Instead, strength left me in a position of denial, busy work, and an inability to be as compassionate as my mom may have needed.
And when it was my own diagnosis, I didn’t want to ask for help. I didn’t want to be needy. I didn’t want to be that person. But I was. I am.
Vulnerability Is the Price of Connection
Researcher and author Brené Brown says it best: “Vulnerability is the birthplace of connection and the path to the feeling of worthiness.”
She’s right. Vulnerability feels like exposure—raw, messy, unfiltered. But it’s also the only way to build true connection. Asking for help, asking for prayers, admitting you can’t carry it all—it’s terrifying. And it’s the very thing that lets love in.
Being strong is not the answer, but being courageous is. It takes real courage to ask for help—to be vulnerable enough to let go and trust someone else with your fears, your hopes, and your pain. During my breast cancer journey, I discovered just how much bravery it requires to reach out. I sought mentors who had walked this path before, joined online communities, and found people at my church who understood the unique challenges of breast cancer. In those moments, I wasn’t just searching for advice or support—I was searching for a reflection of myself in another. That first act of reaching out, of admitting I couldn’t do it alone, was the beginning of connection. And often, it’s in the simple act of finding a friend—someone who says, “Me too”—that the foundation of true community is laid.
C.S. Lewis said “Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: ‘What! You too? I thought I was the only one.”[2] Friendship, in its purest form, is the first bridge from isolation to belonging, and it is through these connections that we begin to experience the strength and comfort of community.
Brown also reminds us: “Connection is why we’re here; it is what gives purpose and meaning to our lives.” And it’s true. You don’t realize how much you need people until life tilts sideways.
The Unplanned Community
Community shows up in unexpected ways. Sometimes it looks like casseroles on your porch. Sometimes it’s the random card in the mail from a friend who knows sending a “this sucks” sentiment is just what you need. Sometimes it’s a person at work that says, “your hair looks great today,” with such a fervor and genuineness even though they know you are wearing a wig over your chemotherapy bald head. Sometimes it’s a stranger in an online group who types the exact words you needed: “me too.”
Community can be transactional, and that’s not a bad thing. A meal. A ride. A prayer texted from across the country. A doctor explaining something for the fifth time because your brain is still spinning. These small exchanges are what make the unbearable a little more bearable.
Other times, community is solidarity. The patient in the next infusion chair who smiles knowingly. The widow who has walked this path before and isn’t afraid of your tears. The circle of people in your health care sharing ministry (HCSM) who carry your name and your story in their prayers.
Building Before You Need It
The thing is, you can’t construct community in the middle of a crisis. You draw on the one you’ve already invested in. Mine was built through faith, friendships, and the imperfect but steadfast structure of my HCSM. It wasn’t flawless, but it was there. And when you’re fighting for your life, there is everything.
Community doesn’t promise to fix what’s broken. It doesn’t erase the diagnosis, the loss, the fear. But it makes survival possible. It reminds you that being human is not about being invincible—it’s about being connected.
Choosing Connection Over Isolation
If I’ve learned anything through my father’s cancer, my mother’s, and my own, it’s this: self-sufficiency is a myth. Strength doesn’t come from silence. Independence won’t save you.
We survive by asking for help, by admitting our need, by letting people in—even when it’s uncomfortable. Especially when it’s uncomfortable.
The moments we don’t plan for will come. The question is: who will sit beside you when they do?
Because in the end, we don’t survive on strength. We survive on each other.
Tricia Bell is the Chief Legal Officer for Christian Care Ministry, the not-for-profit organization that operates the Medi-Share healthcare sharing program.
[1] “Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our Success” (Penguin, 2013).
[2] Lewis, C.S. (1971). The Four Loves. Harvest Books
Photo credit: ©Getty Images/Curly_photo
Tricia Bell is the Chief Legal Officer for Christian Care Ministry/Medi-Share, the not-for-profit organization that operates the Medi-Share healthcare sharing program.
