Give Yourself Permission to Say “I Love You”

Editor’s note: This personal account is shared by Heera Kapoor, and was originally published in the Give Yourself Permission Anthology.

I had always been a fairly solitary person: independent and even nonchalant. I lived my own life, worked in New York in public relations for a software company, and had recently completed my emergency medical technician training. I liked EMT work. I had always wanted to learn new things and help people.

I lived in Brooklyn then, taking the subway to work and emerging between One Liberty Plaza and the World Trade Center. It was a beautiful September morning.

Then the building shook.

Through the window overlooking the Hudson River, I saw dark smoke and hundreds of loose papers fly past. Alarms began to sound. My first instinct was to grab the tiny first-aid kit from the office kitchen and get downstairs. In the lobby, people were screaming and panicking. I went straight to the security desk and said, “I’m an EMT — do you need me?”

Outside, I saw the smoking hole in the North Tower. I began looking for other EMTs, trying to understand what had happened and where I could help.

A day that changed everything

In the hours that followed, the scale of the disaster unfolded around us. I tried to move toward the work of helping, while confusion, noise and fear filled the streets. At one point I found shelter in the back of an ambulance as debris struck its roof; at another, I watched people wait in lines to use pay phones and tell loved ones they were alive.

The day held a kind of clarity I had never known. Faced with the possibility that there might be no tomorrow, all the ordinary noise seemed to fall away. There was only the immediate question: what can I do with the time I have?

My sister Priya called. I answered through tears, saying, “I’m alive, Priya, I’m alive.” Her voice brought me back to the reality of being here, of having another chance to say what mattered.

In the days that followed, I returned to see if there was anything I could do. I watched a city hold grief, courage and care in the same breath. The losses became names, faces, families and lives — each one a reminder of how little we can take for granted.

What I carry forward

That experience changed me. I now live my life one day at a time, one moment at a time. If I can make one person smile each day, then I am doing something worthwhile.

I was once so independent that I did not always tell my family what was happening in my life. After that day, I became less solitary. I make a point of telling my family I love them — before leaving the room, before hanging up the phone, whenever I have the chance.

We cannot always control what life brings. But we can choose to speak the love that is already there.

Give yourself permission to say, “I love you.”

Heera Kapoor worked in high-tech public relations for many years, including a stint at Hill + Knowlton. After nearly a decade of running her own business in Tahiti, she returned to Los Angeles to be closer to family and begin new experiences.