←Recommendations of Taking Turns Holding On - Monologue

Tender, intimate, and deeply lived-in, Taking Turns Holding On honors caregiving as an act of love, endurance, and mutual vulnerability. Helms writes with quiet honesty, making this monologue feel like a private conversation generously shared.

Rich Helms has taken us on a marital journey - a journey of life and a journey that sets us on the road of a 'caretaker's and caregiver's'. The sensibility of this piece is so real, it's as if we're sitting in the character's kitchen, each with a beer late into the night, reviewing our lives. The marriage discussed is a solid one but the third member of this grouping is cancer. But we are in it as with a good friend - it does not ask for tears. It asks for an ear. Well done.

This monologue resonated with me for a number of reasons. I've been on this journey in my own way on several occasions, and the way Rich Helms describes it has a universal connection with anyone who has loved and cared for someone and then been cared for themselves. It is a part of life, of living, and for those who have yet to set out on it, it is a roadmap that they will fill in with their own markers. But seeing where Rich has gone is a generous gift.

This feels like a reflection of a true lived-in experience, something so private that we are privileged to listen to. It puts the spotlight on the aging body, role of caregiving, and cancer that rarely gets attention on the stage. This would make a great selection for a festival on cancer, aging, and senior characters.

I was not only fortunate to be present at the reading of this incisive, well written monologue, but I just happened to be picked to do the actual reading. And what an experience it was! Rich Helms' "Taking Turns Holding On - Monologue" works because of the utter immediacy of the piece, and for the fact that it avoids melodrama and delves head-first into the vicissitudes of mortality. Well done, Mr. Helms!

RICH HELMS’ monologue, “Taking Turns Holding On”, is personal storytelling telling at its finest. As I read it, my mind’s eye could picture and relate to the well told life circumstances of handling, as best as possible, the tragedy of death, disease and despair. I, too, like so many, have dealt with cancer, not as the person with this horrible disease, but as the caregiver. Rich tells his story with such depth of understanding, such honestly, that you will be totally captivated. I certainly was

A powerful journey across years in which mundane and life-shattering moments sit side by side, a vulnerable look at the cycles of giving and receiving care that make up what it means to be human. Lovely and sincere, Helms lays bare so much humanity across these pages.

Helms takes us on an incredible, incredibly moving ride in this heartfelt monologue. To say he and his wife have been through a lot would be minimizing the truth. What resilience and support for each other they have shown! This is not fiction, but hard, cold facts of life. If hope springs eternal, Helms and his wife have captured hope in a bottle. This is a must read piece of work.