Four Years Ago I Lost My Mom

Sometimes when I need a little extra strength to stand tall, I put on a pair of my Mom's shoes.

Four years ago today, my mom succumbed to Breast Cancer.   It was and is still so hard.  To be completely truthful, my relationship with my mom was complicated.  I loved her, she was my biggest cheerleader, and incredibly optimistic.  She also drove me nuts and my parents had some belief systems that sometimes strained our relationship. With all that being said, I miss her.  I miss her a lot.  

I still want my mom to be here, to be a Grandma, to be my friend, to tell me it's going to be okay.  I had no idea when she died, my family, in a way, would died with her.  My mother is probably horrified at the current state of the family and our infrequent interactions.  (The exception being my oldest brother, who is my best friend.  In spite of the fact that he hogged the dimples and good genes,  I still love him.)

As part of The Year of You, The Year of Me, I vowed that I would dump some of my emotional baggage that I've been hauling around.   I need to confess that while I miss my mom terribly, I have been so mad at her, I could hardly see straight.   I've been stuck in the anger stage of grief and just can't seem to move forward.  

She had Breast Cancer three years before her death and while she had surgery, she chose not to treat it with chemo or radiation.  She chose to go against the advice of her Oncologist.  She gambled and she lost, which resulted in my loss.  I lost my mom, my kid's lost a Grandma, and I lost my family as I knew it. I've been furious with her and her choice.

So, at the beginning of the year I decided it's time to move forward, to let go of the anger and leave my emotional baggage at the curb.  Someone else can have it, I don't need it anymore.   I've been lugging that around for a while now and I'm really tired.   With the help of a therapist I've been able to gain an understanding, a new perspective on my mom's choices.  It hasn't been easy and there have been many tears shed, but it has all been worth it.  

I have a new appreciation for my mom that I didn't have before.  She was a vibrant person whose life wasn't easy.  She spent most of her life swimming upstream while wearing hot pink lipstick.  She made the best of it.  Her Mama Bear instincts are legendary and I vividly remember the principal of my elementary school telling me, "I'm going to have to call your mother, but truthfully she terrifies me." (You can read the infamous Mama Bear story here.)

Last night I dreamed about her for the first time in a long time.  We were floating on rafts and I had been holding on to a rope tied to her raft.   She looked at me, smiled, and mouthed the words, "Let Go."  I hesitated and then she nodded and smiled.  I let go of the rope and she drifted away out of view, while I floated back to shore.  My kids, my husband were all there on the beach waiting for me to return.  

Today, I will celebrate my mom and honor the good things I inherited for her.  I will honor her vibrant spirit, put on some hot pink lipstick, and live my life to the fullest.  Just the way my mom would want me too. 

Dear Mom, Two years later,

There's a grief that can't be spoken.
There's a pain goes on and on.
Empty chairs at empty tables
There's a pain goes on and on.

~Les Miserables~

Dear Mom, 

Two years ago today, you succumbed to breast cancer. I still have the pervasive thoughts of... This is still so hard.  I didn't want to do this. I want to rewind the clock so badly, before there was cancer, hospice, and a funeral.  I woke up this morning and thought about you and the last few weeks of your life.  Those last few weeks were so hard, and when you passed away there was relief knowing you were not suffering.  Even though it was hard, I'd go back to those weeks in an instant to be able to see you one more time. 

A few weeks ago, I went to a women's conference and the speaker spoke about losing her mom and how hard it was. I envied the speaker, because she was 62, and had just lost her mom.  She had almost 30 more years with her mom than I did.   I still feel way too young to navigate my life without my you.   When I said this to a friend whose mom passed at the age of 96, she said, "Everyone feels that way,  no matter how old you are."  

Dad has a new life, and he is happy, which good, but the little girl in me feels like I've been orphaned. I know I'm being immature. I know this,  I should be happy for him.  When planning Christmas, there was only Mr. Man's family to coordinate with, and I felt a little left out.   Mr. Boy is still furious with Grandpa for moving "too far away to see my soccer games".  He refuses to talk to him on the phone or send him a letter. Last night AK burst into tears talking to Grandpa and just handed the phone to me and said, "I miss him too much, you talk to him."  Mom, I took for granted your presence in my life and my kids lives. I hear your voice in my head saying, "You need to forgive your father, he doesn't cope the same way you do."   I'm trying... well,okay, I'm not really trying, but I will someday.

I still wish you were here to help me figure out how to navigate the school system. Your knowledge as a teacher would really help right now. AK has some serious learning challenges and I have all these meetings with the school... IEP, SST, RSP, SECC.  Sometimes I feel like they are blowing smoke or trying to check off a box on a checklist.   I wish I had you here to prep me for these meetings so I can go in armed with knowledge.  Instead I'm trying to decipher and translate this all as I go along.   As for Mr. Boy, you'd be proud, he reads ALL the time, and his grades show it.   Right now he is struggling through fractions and I tried to tutor him.  Apparently, fractions aren't my forte because I taught him how to do it wrong!  I still vividly remember moaning and crying while I rolled around on our burnt orange shag carpet while you tried to teach me fractions and screaming, "I'll never ever need to use fractions again in my life."  You were right, I needed to learn it, because now I have to teach my son how to do it.  I wish I listened more. 

Mom, it still hurts.   Two years later and your loss is still painful.  I'm okay, I really am, everyone says it gets better... easier...and it has, but I still get these pangs of grief.   I just want to hear your voice one more time, to get some reassurance that I'm doing things right.   I see my friends with their moms and I want to tell them, "Oh, I know she makes you crazy sometimes, but  trust me you'll miss it so much when it's gone."   

The kids love to hear stories about you, we talk about you a lot.  The kids take comfort in knowing you are watching over them.   They love to hear about the time you got mad at my 2nd grade teacher. They also love to hear Part II of that story which hasn't been written down yet.   I am grateful that I grew up knowing I always had you in my corner.   I am trying to give my kids the same gift that you gave me, that no matter what, mom is on your side.  

You were such a vibrant person, and embraced life.  I'm trying to be more like you, and take advantages of opportunities as they come. When I would tell you about something, a trip I wanted to take, a pair of shoes I saw, you would say, "Wendy, make it happen. Life is short."   Today, to celebrate the life you lived, I will take my kids to the beach, I will laugh and play, and I will buy those shoes that I've been eyeing for a month.  Life is short, live it to it's fullest, you taught me that.  I love you. I miss you.

.  

My Mom's Christmas Gift

When I was in high school, my mom and her friend bought these books that were supposed to be filled out by mothers to pass on to their daughters..  My mom loved Donna Green's artwork and her friend thought it would be a fun project.  My mom said they were like school girls comparing answers and giggling because some of the questions were a little over the top.   My mom wasn't necessarily known for her lavish meals or holiday meals.  There were a lot of questions about holiday meals and places to write in family recipes, to which my mom wrote with, "Dress up fancy and go out." 

I stumbled upon this book during my "mom closet clean out" and on Thanksgiving night while I was outside doing puppy duty I started to read it.  I've read this book before and my mom's humor comes through in so many of her answers. Such as, "I'm famous for this recipe....  Mom's Cookies:  Buy a tube of Nestle Toll House Cookie Dough, eat half raw, bake other half.... give to neighbors, say it's a secret family recipe."

I sat in my backyard wrapped in a blanket, under the stars, and read while the tears flowed. I still miss my mom.  Earlier that morning I had stared at a mother and college age daughter in the grocery store to the point of embarrassment.  They were picking up last minute Thanksgiving items and buying things the daughter had missed while she was away at school.  I just watched them, envious of their chance to spend the holiday together.

The Christmas season was about to begin and I just wanted to cancel Christmas. My mom loved the Christmas Season and I couldn't fathom celebrating Christmas without my parents. It would be the first time  neither of my parents would be with me on Christmas. I felt terribly sorry for myself and I wanted to just ignore it the whole thing, instead of dealing with my feelings of grief.  

I looked at the upcoming holidays and saw it as a lot of chores.  Shopping, decorating, cooking, wrapping gifts, cleaning, all of them were activities I mostly enjoyed, but I couldn't get excited about it.  I would do all that work... for what?  It was a bad case of the "Bah Humbugs".  I knew I wanted to avoid it, because I would have the urge to call my mom and say, "We just *insert holiday activity*, it was amazing.  You should have seen ...."

Then I read this passage in my mom's own handwriting: 

"I would hope, Wendy, that you and your children will always be excited about Christmas preparation.  Never think of it as pure drudgery."

Those were the words I needed to hear. There is joy in all tasks, big and small during the holidays.  Some of my favorite memories of years prior has been wrapping presents with the kids help and delivering gifts.   This holiday season, I loved having them help decorate the tree and the living room.   They taped their school artwork to the wall and hung their paper plate wreaths on the front door with pride. They decorated the tree with me, clumping similar ornaments together. As for me, I savored it all.

I found joy throughout the entire season in all the tasks and felt like in some way my mom was with me during this holiday season.  I celebrated as she would have, and we even dressed up fancy one night to go out to dinner in my mom's honor. I felt my mom's love all around me this year and when Christmas was over, I packed up the tree with sadness.  I cried, because I was sad Christmas was over.   It had been such a wonderful time of year and my whole attitude had changed because of my mom's note.

The decorations are long gone but my mother's love still remains all around me and for that I am grateful.

Two years ago today...

Two years ago my mom sat my brother and I down and told us that her cancer had returned. It had metastasized, it was everywhere, it was terminal. She died three months later.

I still miss her all the time and after her death my dad cleaned out everything of hers. I took many of her things home and stuffed it in a closet and have kept the door closed. Every time I open the door, the tears flow and it is too painful to go through my mothers things. For the past year I have avoided this closet, until today. I'm ready to accept that my moms things are now my things. I am ready to embrace the tears and remember her vibrant spirit. She is gone but her memories still live on.