A Letter to ALS

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You showed up uninvited.
You didn’t knock.
You didn’t ask.
You just came and started taking.

You took without apology.
You chipped away at muscle and motion.
You tried to shrink our world, our laughter, our ease.
You thought diagnosis meant defeat.

But let me tell you something.
You may have touched the body, but you will never own the soul.

You don’t get to claim Maceo’s light.
You don’t get to erase his fatherhood, his brilliance, his presence.
You don’t get to rewrite our love story.
You don’t get the last word.

We’ve cried, yes.
We’ve broken down.
But we’ve also fought.
We’ve prayed. We’ve adapted. We’ve learned to advocate in rooms we didn’t ask to enter.
We’ve become warriors in soft clothes and hospital chairs.

You don’t know what it’s like to look into someone’s eyes and see them still here
— fully alive, fully brilliant, even as their body betrays them.
You don’t know the sacredness of showing up again and again for someone you love, knowing every day is a choice to keep going.

But I do.
We do.

So let me be clear.
You are not the center of our story.
You are the shadow — and we are the light.
You are the interruption — and we are the legacy.

Because even in this fight, we have found beauty.
We have found rest.
We have built community.
We have chosen joy.

And joy, beloved, is something you cannot touch.

So no — I don’t thank you.
But I do say this:
You underestimated us.
You underestimated the strength of our love.
You underestimated the power of our people.
You underestimated the God who still sits high and sees everything.

We will not stop speaking.
We will not stop building.
We will not stop loving boldly in the Sweet Between.

And you?
You can keep coming for the flesh.
But you will never own the fire.

Signed,
Maya
Wife. Caregiver. Advocate.
Still here. Still holy. Still fighting.

Another Year, Deeper Still

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It’s my birthday.
And this year, I’m not chasing newness — I’m choosing depth.

I’ve lived enough life to know that survival is holy.
That growth doesn’t always shout.
That sometimes the biggest win is simply still being here — soft, bold, wiser, and still willing to love.

This birthday isn’t about candles or cake (though I’ll take both).
It’s about reflection.
About honoring the girl I’ve been, the woman I’ve become, and the one I’m still unfolding into.

This year, I’ve carried joy and grief in the same arms.
I’ve buried part of my heart and still managed to show up with love.
I’ve advocated, mothered, built, cried, prayed, doubted, believed — sometimes all in the same day.
And I’m still here.

That’s not just aging. That’s becoming.

I’m walking into this year with more clarity.
More boundaries. More softness. More fire.
I don’t have to explain myself to be real.
I don’t have to rush to be relevant.
I just have to be — and that is enough.

So this birthday, I give thanks:
For my people. For my sons. For my husband.
For the breath in my body and the purpose in my bones.
For the ancestors who whispered me into this world.
For the God who has kept me through every valley, every yes, every no, every not yet.

I don’t take this year for granted.
It’s another chance to do what I was called to do — to love, to build, to rest, to speak truth, to heal forward.

So happy birthday to me.
To the girl who made it.
To the woman who’s rising.
To the legacy that’s still unfolding.

Here’s to the Sweet Between — and everything that’s still coming.

With joy,
Maya Simone Bailey Thomas Carter
Daughter. Mother. Wife. Writer. Healer.
Still here. Still held. Still holy.

I Still Believe in Us

I Still Believe in Us

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Even after everything… I still believe in us.
In people. In the possibility of healing. In the holiness of community.
I love humanity — and not in some fluffy, distant, “let’s all hold hands and pretend” kind of way.
I love humanity because I see it.

I see how people break and still show up.
How we grieve and still laugh.
How we carry trauma in our bones and still manage to cook dinner, raise babies, and whisper encouragement to strangers.
That kind of love — that kind of survival — it moves me.

I don’t love humanity because it’s easy.
I love humanity because it’s honest.
Messy. Beautiful. Conflicted. Resilient. Tender.
And worth fighting for.

I love us — the cycle-breakers, the storytellers, the caregivers, the question-askers.
I love the way we show up in protests and prayer circles.
The way we create beauty in the ruins.
The way we keep singing, keep dreaming, keep building — even when the world tells us to harden or give up.

I believe we are capable of more.
More healing.
More compassion.
More accountability rooted in love, not shame.
More collective rising that doesn’t leave the most vulnerable behind.

I know the news will try to convince me otherwise.
I know history has receipts.
But I also know what I’ve seen:
A boy giving up his seat.
A mother braiding her daughter’s hair while fighting stage 4 cancer.
A stranger sending groceries.
A community showing up at a funeral and a birthday in the same weekend.

I know love lives here. Still.

So yes, I love humanity.
Even when I’m heartbroken.
Even when I’m tired.
Even when I’ve been disappointed — I still choose love. Because choosing love is choosing life.

And this isn’t just poetic for me.
It’s practical.
It’s political.
It’s spiritual.
It’s legacy.

I love humanity because I come from people who survived what should’ve destroyed them — and still passed down joy.
I love humanity because I believe in restoration — not just resistance.
Because every day I care for my husband and raise my sons and build The Sweet Between, I am choosing love as strategy, not just sentiment.

I still believe in us.
And I always will.

With heart wide open,
Maya

I Love God for Real

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Not for show.
Not for the post.
Not because I was told to — but because I’ve met God. And I love God for real.

I love God because I’ve needed God.
Because I’ve been in rooms where no one saw me but Him.
Because I’ve cried prayers I didn’t have words for, and still felt peace show up anyway.
Because I’ve been mad, confused, heartbroken, and halfway done — and God didn’t flinch.

I don’t worship a distant deity who only shows up when I’m smiling and clean.
I walk with a God who comes close when I’m in the pit.
Who holds me when my heart is shattered.
Who doesn't shame me for my questions or my boundaries or my therapy.
A God who says, “You are still holy, even when you're healing.”

My faith is lived.
It’s in the way I care for my husband when no one’s watching.
In the way I show up for my kids when I’m tired.
In the way I choose joy even when grief lingers.
In the way I rest — because I know I’m not the one holding the universe together.

I’ve been through too much to fake it.
And I’ve seen too much of God to ever walk away.

I love God because He loved me when I couldn’t love myself.
Because grace has carried me when strength ran out.
Because Jesus saw me. Not the filtered version. Me. The loud one. The soft one. The bold one. The one with questions and fire and a lot of “why’s.”
And He stayed.

I don’t need a platform to prove my faith.
I just need the quiet assurance that I am not alone.
And baby, I’m not.

So yes — I love God.
I love God because He is home.
Because I know what it's like to be lost and found.
Because His love is not transactional — it's transformational.

My faith holds me in the Sweet Between.
In the “not yet,” in the wilderness, in the waiting rooms, in the overflow.
I don’t walk it perfectly — but I walk it honestly.

And that? That’s enough.

With love and deep thanks,
Maya

The Man I Love Is Still Here

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His name is Maceo.
And I love him.
Not just because he’s my husband.
But because even in silence, even in stillness, he is everything.

ALS didn’t make him more worthy.
It didn’t make me stronger.
It just revealed what was already there:
a love that holds,
a faith that endures,
and a man whose presence speaks even when his arms no longer can.

Maceo is not what the world sees.
He is deeper. Louder in spirit. Fierce in soul.
He is laughter that still finds a way.
He is eyes that say “thank you” and “I love you” in the same glance.
He is the quiet rhythm in our home — and the reason I keep showing up.

This disease has taken so much from him.
But it hasn’t taken him.
Not the man who gave me my children.
Not the man who taught me what it means to be loved fully — flaws, fury, faith, and all.

Maceo loves Carolina basketball and the sound of water.
He loves his boys — the way they’ve grown into protectors without ever being told.
He loves music. He feels music.
And he loves me.
Still. Always. Boldly.

We built a life. Not a perfect one — but a real one.
And every day I fight for that life.
For him. For us.
I advocate, I write, I build, I believe — not just because I’m strong.
But because I refuse to let his story fade in the noise.

Maceo is the reason for The Sweet Between.
The reason I know rest is resistance.
The reason I believe caregiving is sacred.
The reason I still believe in miracles — even when they come slowly, quietly, or not at all.

I love him.
I love him beyond vows, beyond diagnoses, beyond words.

He is still here.
And so am I.

Together, we are building something beautiful.
And that? That is legacy.

With everything in me,
Maya

For my sister in love

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For Jocelyn: The Quiet Strength That Carried Us

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It’s still hard to believe she’s gone.

On July 4, 2025, Jocelyn — my sister-in-love, my friend, my family — transitioned from this world into the arms of our Creator.
She wasn’t my sister by birth, but she loved me like she had known me forever. And in so many ways, she did.
For decades, she was steady, prayerful, gentle, funny, and full of grace. She was the quiet strength in the room, the one who would hold your hand, pray over your babies, and mean every single word she spoke.

Jocelyn loved my brother with everything she had.
Together, they built a family rooted in faith, love, and laughter — raising children, surviving grief, and walking through fire together.
Their firstborn, TJ, left this earth years ago. And now, Jocelyn is with him again. That brings a kind of peace that words can’t touch.

We honored her life in a homegoing service that felt like both a release and a promise.
The next day, we celebrated our grandmother’s 95th birthday — because this family, this love, knows how to hold joy and grief in the same breath.

Jocelyn wasn’t loud, but her love was.
She showed up. She covered us.
She believed in the power of prayer and the power of showing up when it mattered.
She was steady in the storm, and soft in the silence.

I miss her more than I can say.
But I know that everything she poured into us — her family, her children, her friends — it’s still here. It didn’t leave with her.
It’s in how we show up now. It’s in how we love. It’s in how we carry each other.

Jocelyn’s legacy is love in action.

So this post is for her.
The one who chose love every single time.
The one who prayed for us when we didn’t even know we needed it.
The one who loved me — not by blood, but by bond.

Thank you, Jocelyn.
You did this life with grace.
Now rest in glory, and hold TJ close for all of us.

With my whole heart,
Maya

Motherhood Is a Holy Thing

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Motherhood is the hardest, most sacred assignment I’ve ever been given.

Not because I do it perfectly.
But because I do it with everything I have — even when I feel like I have nothing left.

I am a mother to three boys.
Three beautiful, bold, brilliant souls who stretch me, heal me, teach me, and test me.
Every day I mother in the tension — between caregiving and dreaming, between advocacy and exhaustion, between joy and grief.

I wipe tears and noses. I listen to stories that have no ending. I show up to games and appointments and hard conversations.
I teach them how to pray, how to rest, how to speak up, how to love.
I carry the weight of legacy — the kind our ancestors never got to pass down out loud — and try to make it light enough for them to carry forward with pride.

Sometimes I cry in the bathroom.
Sometimes I laugh so hard I scare the baby.
Sometimes I look at them and wonder how God trusted me with something this important.

Motherhood is not soft all the time.
It’s fire.
It’s fierce protection.
It’s a quiet kind of rage and a louder kind of hope.

I mother while caregiving.
I mother while grieving.
I mother while building something that can hold all of us.

And in it, I have learned:
I am not just raising sons.
I am raising legacy.
I am raising truth-tellers.
I am raising men who know how to love and be loved.
I am raising boys who have seen sacrifice up close — and still know joy is their birthright.

Motherhood breaks me and remakes me every day.
But I wouldn't trade it for anything.
Because this love? This work? This soul-deep knowing that I was made for them and they were made for me?

This is holy.

With every part of me,
Maya

Caregiving Chose Me

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I didn’t sign up for this.
Not in the way people think.
I didn’t go looking for a title, a role, a name tag that says caregiver.
But life, love, and legacy had other plans.

Caregiving chose me.
And I said yes.

I said yes to wiping tears and signing forms.
Yes to 3 a.m. fears and 3 p.m. medications.
Yes to holding my husband’s hand when he couldn’t hold mine back.
Yes to explaining hard truths to my children while still tucking them in with hope.

Caregiving isn’t clean or poetic.
It’s sacred and exhausting.
It’s watching someone you love lose abilities, and choosing to love them louder.
It’s laughter in the hallway one minute, grief in the bathroom the next.

It’s calling insurance companies and praying in parking lots.
It’s learning to advocate like your life depends on it — because someone else’s does.

People ask how I do it.
Some days, I don’t know.
But I do know this: caregiving has taught me how to love deeper, show up stronger, and sit with the things most folks run from.

It’s also taught me to rest.
Not because I want to — but because I have to.
Because I can’t pour from a broken spirit.
Because I deserve softness too.

And I created The Sweet Between to hold that truth.
To say: you are not alone.
To say: your care is sacred.
To say: you can still dream, even while caregiving.

This journey is personal.
It’s mine. It’s ours. It’s not pretty — but it’s beautiful.
Because love is still here.
And I am still here.

And that? That is holy.

With tenderness and truth,
Maya

It Started with Love (and Pressure)

July 2025

It all began with love — and a whole lot of pressure.

Not the kind of pressure that crushes. The kind that calls.
Calls you to show up even when you’re tired.
Calls you to dream even when your hands are full.
Calls you to build something that holds you while holding others too.

The Sweet Between started as survival.
Now, it’s sanctuary.

Maybe you’re here because you’re a caregiver.
Maybe you’ve buried someone you love.
Maybe you’re the strong one. The soft one. The seeker. The cycle-breaker.
Maybe you’re all of that at once.

Whoever you are — welcome.

This space was built to be real. To be rooted. To make room.
It won’t be perfect. But it will be true.

My story — our story — is still unfolding.
And this site will grow with it.
Right now, this is where I put the pieces of myself: the book, the store, the journal, the vision, the hope.
This is my offering. This is my breath.

So take your time.
Take your breath.
And take what you need from The Sweet Between.

Later will take care of itself. It always does.

— Maya