The Writer, the Empath, and the Swift
A rescue mission meets the intensity of a neurodivergent mind. In saving a bird named Valente, I found a mirror for my own fragility and the exhausting task of feeling—and writing —everything.
The Encounter and the Flower Tomb
On January 1st, fate handed me a responsibility: I found a wild bird on the sidewalk and, although I don’t recall the exact moment my eyes noticed it, the impulse to act was immediate. The scene felt like a painful déjà vu: three or four days earlier, I had found a lifeless chick in the same spot and placed its body in a large flower pot that guards the building’s entrance—an improvised tomb among plants struggling to stay alive.
It was about noon. The Belo Horizonte sun was unforgiving, and the little bird was restless, its body hot and its appearance worn. It no longer had the strength or a place to flee; lethargy made it easy prey for the heat. I picked it up easily and brought it into the shade of my refuge, moved by the simple idea that anywhere would be better than under that scorching sun.
The Failure of the “Flight Trainee”
My intention was restoration and departure. I researched, talked to AI, tried to decipher the species and understand how to return it to nature. The guidance was clear: it needed its parents. So, the next morning at 6:30 a.m., I made my way back. I placed it on the large pot, where it quickly camouflaged itself among the semi-living creeping foliage, and I considered my duty done. Following the advice available online, I let nature take its course. “The parents will come to rescue it,” the AI told me. It would receive the encouragement to take flight back to the nest and its routine as a “flight trainee.” I returned home with a light heart, convinced I had sealed a happy ending.
From my living room, I could hear the chirping. These were sounds that had always been there, but I had never truly listened to them. It was the soundtrack of its family approaching. I kept the door closed, as instructed, so as not to scare the parents away. But noon arrived again, and with it, doubt. I ran to the pot where I had left it and celebrated, thinking it had made it. However, my eyes quickly located the corpse of its brother, partially decomposed on the ground, likely knocked down by the rain. As I turned my face to escape the horror of this scene, I saw him—running along the sidewalk, as if he weighed more than twenty grams.
It was sad to have failed. Its failure was my failure.
He had jumped from the pot but had not claimed the sky. Even tired from what must have been more than six hours of struggling to take flight and return to his own, when I approached, the brave little one bristled all over, showing resistance. He was once again surrendered to the high sun, exhausted and a fighter, trying to peck my hand as I gathered him for the second time. I had no choice but to take him out of the sun and attempt a more effective rescue. The rain that followed assured me I had made the right decision for him, but for me, it meant an unprecedented crisis.
The Via Crucis of Empathy
Between calls to environmental agencies that wouldn’t answer due to the holiday and veterinary clinics that saw an opportunity for profit in that creature’s tragedy, my anguish grew. I realized, with a sharp pain, that I saw myself in that bird. I saw the vulnerability, the abandonment, and the desperate desire of some to gain something from the misfortune of others. Empathy was a luxury item that no one seemed willing to offer.
I tried to feed him a mixture of egg yolk and water, but he refused. With every frustrated attempt, the pain in me increased—a physical pain I didn’t know the source of. When I called the Fire Department, I heard the phrase that pierced me: “Unfortunately, we can’t save everyone.” All I could think was that he might die in my hands, and that was desperate.
In the silence of my isolation, my only support was the dialogue with the AI; I delegated the role of compass to it. “Keep him in the dark,” the instruction said. “Swifts are diurnal; he needs to sleep to be better tomorrow.” My fear, however, was that he might not have a tomorrow. The emptiness in that creature’s stomach seemed to echo in mine.
Safe Harbor
To my surprise, he survived the night. And through dialogue after dialogue with the AI, “Valente” (Brave) became his name. On Saturday, the struggle began anew. I felt that, gradually, he was absorbing some nutrition, but his fragility was still extreme. When the family of the house where I am a guest returned, the bird had to leave the laundry room, where the dog sleeps, and come to my room. There, within four walls, the attempts to return him to nature were gradually abandoned. We analyzed his wings and understood the cruel biology of that moment: he didn’t have the wingspan to fly on his own, and there was no place high enough for him to launch himself from, nor any certainty that if launched, he would sustain flight. Nor did he have the strength.
It was at that moment that a certainty solidified within me: that life mattered. No matter the cost, I would do everything possible so he wouldn’t die. Suddenly, his life was mine. I saw myself in that abandonment, in that lack of importance the world dedicates to the small. I decided it wouldn’t be that way. Not this time. Not for this tiny life in my hands.
Dignity in a Shoebox
I tried everything. I ordered syringes and food through apps that failed and delayed. I went back to the egg yolk, insisting on the mixture. It was only late Sunday that I discovered the secret: texture. I got the consistency of the mush right and—I don’t know if out of hunger or because he finally understood I was his safe harbor—Valente ate.
There were moments when he became restless in the shoebox, and I feared he would hurt himself. But when I brought the box close to me, he calmed down. Since swifts live collectively, perhaps my presence filled the void of solitude. Seeing his droppings—a sign of life and health—brought me a relief that few things have lately. This morning, the cycle was completed. He opened his beak—a mouth that seemed huge for his size—and ate until he was full. He drank water, settled into his paper towel nest, and for the first time, I saw a serene dignity in that survival.
The Farewell and the Duality
With him fed, I took an Uber to CETAS (Wild Animal Triage Center). The city passed by outside with its hardness, but inside that box, something had been saved. Even knowing it was the correct decision, my heart would not accept the verdict. I tried to use humor as a shield, saying he needed a mother who knew how to fly. But it was hard to hand over my temporary foster son.
At CETAS, while filling out the form, the tears won. I asked them to take care of him. I said his name was Valente. I left there with a broken heart. The crying came without brakes in the Uber; nausea rose in my throat, and a headache arrived uninvited. I felt like a mother giving her child up for adoption because she knows she cannot offer the future they deserve. It hurts not knowing if he will have the necessary training to fly.
My anguish is still a mirror: I see my own fragility in Valente, and I am fully aware of it. But I also see his strength. And between one sob and another, the cold voice of the writer in me said: “Think of the piece of writing this will yield.” The person who felt all this pain—who still feels it—is the same one who never stopped being conscious of what she felt. It is an exhausting exercise in coexistence: the great empath and the clinical observer inhabiting the same cramped and battered space. The empath falls apart; the narrative “psychopath” notes the details and assesses the rhythm of the fall.
In the end, hope remains. Perhaps one day Valente will be free, crossing the skies of Belo Horizonte. If that day comes, the great empath in me will have won. Every tear and every line written will have been worth it. And the narrative psychopath celebrates.