“When the Heart No Longer Mends the Same Way”I am Vanina Vergara - C.V. Vergara to the english-speaking world born in Asunción- Paraguay. I have three children whom I love deeply, and this is my life. There are sorrows that never scream, yet they weigh —upon one’s shoulders, one’s breath, one’s weary soul.Today, I want to speak about that quiet ache:when everything around you seems unchanged,but you — inside — are no longer the same.Sometimes life stalls, suspended in a kind of stillness.A son who never calls.A father who grows old, clinging to what destroys him.And you — somewhere between love and sorrow —trying simply to breathe.Trying to understand why some things cannot be mended,no matter how wholly you offer your heart.I recently returned from Uruguay.I was there with Pablo and my in-laws —aged eighty-nine and eighty-seven.There is something profoundly tender — and deeply painful —about watching two fragile souls still caring for one another,their eyes soft with time,as though the clock had finally stopped mattering.They looked at me often,and in their gaze I felt something I had forgotten: rest.As if someone whispered without words,“You can let go now. You needn’t be strong all the time.”But then I returned.And with me came that quiet lonelinessthat has nothing to do with being alone.That hollow feeling no routine can fill.Because sometimes, you can be surrounded by peopleand still feel the air slicing through you.I still miss my mother.I miss her without idealising her —with all her shadows, with her full humanity.And in that contradictory love, I’ve learnt this:to remember is also to heal.Love doesn’t need to be perfect to be real.It only needs to remain.If you’re listening and feel that your heart no longer mends the same,that some days simply breathing is an act of courage —let me tell you this, from one silence to another:you are not alone.You are not weak for feeling deeply.There are many of us still piecing ourselves together,still breathing gently through the absences.A few days ago, I read something by Lucas Casanova,from his view of secular Buddhism, that struck me:we were taught that self-sufficiency was the goal —that needing meant you were broken,that missing someone meant you lacked self-love.But he asks: since when was humanity measured by isolation?And then I understood —to need is not a weakness.It is profoundly human.Lucas speaks of a silent epidemic: loneliness.He says that when the nervous system has been wounded by relationships,it learns to protect itself —to mistake silence for peace,distance for safety,and isolation for strength.And so we begin to hide:behind screens,behind words that don’t meet the eyes,behind digital ties that never quite embrace.Yet the soul hungers for real presence.For eye contact.For tenderness.From that Buddhist gaze, the path is not to harden —but to return to the world without surrendering to cynicism.It’s difficult, yes — but freeing.Because only when we dare to trust again, even just a little,do we begin to heal that ancient wound:the one that made us stop feeling we belonged.And if you don’t yet know how to reconnect — that’s all right.Many of us are learning too.Learning to say hello again.To talk without a screen.To belong without losing ourselves.Because we were made to connect.And even if the heart no longer mends the same way —it still beats.And while it beats, there is hope.Because life, with all its cracks,is still — somehow — beautiful.Thank you for listening.

I hope my story helps you find words for your own.

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