When Your Partner Feels Like a Kid Inside: A Guide From Someone Who's Been Both

Karl was eight years older than me. When we met, I was twenty-two and he was thirty. Back then eight years felt like a lot. Now it feels like nothing. Now I would give anything for eight more years. For eight more days. For eight more minutes of him leaving his shoes in the hallway and me pretending to be annoyed about it.

He was the steady one. He was the one who kept his head when things got hard. He was a high school history teacher who remembered every student's name and told stories at parties that made everyone laugh. And then cancer came, and he got scared, and he got small. He needed things he'd never needed before. He needed me to hold him. He needed me to make decisions. He needed me to be the strong one, finally, after forty years of him being the strong one. And I was. Because that's what you do when you love someone. You become what they need. You don't stop being their partner. You just learn a new way to be their partner.

This Is Not About You

When your person starts needing things that seem childlike, it's easy to make it about you. What did I do wrong? Am I not enough? Should I have seen this coming? Those are the wrong questions. The right question is much simpler. What do they need right now, and can I give it to them without making them feel strange about it?

I have been on both sides. I was Karl's caregiver, and I was the one who held him when he was scared. And then, after he died, I became the one who needed soft things. I became the one who bought stuffed animals and put them around his photograph. I became the one who needed comfort in forms that might look strange from the outside. My children didn't question it. My grandchildren traded plushies with me. Nobody made me feel broken for needing what I needed. That is what you do when you love someone. You don't try to fix them. You just stay.

What They Need, Not What You Think They Need

Your person is not a puzzle to be solved. They are not regressing in a way that needs intervention. They are coping. They are surviving. They are finding comfort in forms that maybe they couldn't access before, and that is not a failure. That is a gift. They are letting you see a part of themselves they used to hide.

The best thing you can do is not flinch. When they pull out the comfort show they've watched twelve times, don't make a face. When they buy a stuffed animal at forty-two, don't ask if they're okay. Just let them have it. Let them have the thing that makes the world softer. The world is hard enough already. You don't need to be another hard thing.

You're Still Their Person

They haven't stopped loving you. They haven't stopped being your partner. They're just carrying something heavy, and they've found a way to carry it that involves soft things. That doesn't mean they don't need you. It means they need you differently now. They need you to be the person who doesn't look at them differently. The person who still reaches for their hand in the dark. The person who buys them the little bear without being asked.

Karl held my hand until the very end. Even when he couldn't talk, he held my hand. And after he was gone, I found other things to hold. A bear. A bunny. A clip-on octopus from my great-granddaughter. I'm still holding. I'm just holding different things. Your person is still your person. They're just finding new ways to stay whole. Let them. Love them. Stay.

— Lydia

About the Author

Lydia is a retired LPN and military wife who became a widow at 66. She lives in California, where she maintains a rotating seasonal collection of stuffed animals around her husband Karl's photograph. Her great-granddaughter recently taught her about clip-on plushies, and she hasn't looked back.