How I got here

I am starting a blog in response to a girl I can now call my friend, and who I have looked at as a mentor of sorts during these past difficult and painful months. Ellie started a blog called "Motherloss" (Can you tell I didn't know what to call mine?) to connect women who have lost thier moms, and to allow everyone to share their stories. Here is mine...

I am coming up on my 27th birthday next month, to be immediately followed 4 days later with the one year anniversary of my mom's death. Since I am a chronic over thinker, I have realized that my mom has not seen me since I was 25. Only a matter of days really, I saw her 3 days before I turned 26 on my daughter's birthday, and it ended up being the last time I ever saw her alive. It is strange to think of all the big days ahead this year, harder to believe that it has now almost been an entire year, and harder yet to believe I am still alive and surviving it. Perhaps I should back up.

Growing up, I remember how much I looked up to my mom. She was gorgeous, and she was the most organized, artistic, creative, funny and loving person I knew at the time. (and strangely, still is. I have no idea how she did it.) I have always been attached to her. My grandmother told me that when I was three my parents wanted a night out together, but that I stubbornly sat staring out the window and crying until she came back. I look at that now and think maybe it hasn't changed much, except that no matter how long I cry and stare out the window, she can't come back to me anymore. As I grew up, I had an older brother, and later two younger brothers. I remember wanting a sister so badly, I even wrote angrily to my brother Shane that he ruined my chance at a sister, haha. But as I grew up, I didn't need to have a sister, because my mother was like a sister to me and I doubt I would have wanted to share that kind of mother daughter bond with anyone else. My mom was great at making us feel special, making us feel like we were the favorite. She took a painting class with my brother, and she took a ceramics class with me. She would let me stay up late to watch our favorite show on t.v. every night (Law and Order) and I always felt included whether it was a big group of adults or just me and her. Even as a teenage girl, my rebellion was directed toward my dad instead of my mom (I have no idea why, my dad is and was a sweetheart and did not deserve my brattiness). I went off to college and came home for dinner and laundry fairly frequently, and we talked on the phone all the time. We even worked at the same place when I was in college so we shared a locker at work and brought each other lunch or left little notes for each other. When I decided to move to Rochester she was of course supportive, and it is only now when I look back at different cards she sent me do I see how often they say she misses me and is lonely without me around. I was busy moving forward with my life but we still talked everyday, sometimes for hours, sometimes more then once. We took a vacation one year just me, her and my grandmother. We had planned to do more of them but never got the chance. Basically, what I am saying is that she was so much more then a mother to me. She was the sister I never had, and the best friend I can never replace.

This past summer of 2009 was mostly cool and rainy during June and July. My mom came out to see me for Abby's 2nd birthday part on July 25th. We laughed and joked about how we were both fighting with our husbands (men!) but mostly I was so busy playing hostess I didn't get to spend too much time with her. It started raining around dinner time and the party died down fast but she came inside with my Dad and my Aunt and Uncle and the five of us stood in the kitchen, talking and laughing. God, I can remember what she was wearing and how beautiful her smile was, I can remember the exact spot she stood in. Then she had to leave, and I was annoyed that she was going so early so I didn't get up to give her a hug. I just assumed I would see her the next day. Well, I didn't get to see her the next day, and she ended up going back to Albany. We talked a on the phone during the week, but truthfully that week is blurry now. On Friday night, my brother Shane and his girlfriend Ericka came out to stay here, we were going to go to the Rennaissance Festival on saturday. They camped out in the backyard and my younger and older brother were here too, Mikie had been living in Rochester and James had stayed the week and planned to go home with Shane. Looking back I think about how odd it was that everyone stayed here at my house, how we were all together that morning.

The next morning started what I guess I can now call the beginning of a second part of my life. I feel like I have the life I had before she died, and the life after. I am two different people.
I won't get into all of the specifics, though I certainly could. They are crystal clear in my mind. The phone call, what was said, where I was standing, the looks on my brother's faces, my dad's voice when I called, the car ride, etc etc. Very long story made short, my mom died from a heart attack at age 47. I was, and still am, devastated.

For people who have lived with grief, I am sure you can relate to this, but the experience is so incredibly painful and so unique, that it is easy to quickly find yourself feeling very alone. It doesn't take long for the cards or phone calls to stop. It isn't hard to get angry with the people still here for not understanding. It doesn't take much before you feel uncomfortable talking to people about it, afraid that you are not doing it correctly, not conforming to the societal needs and expectations of losing someone and then moving on. I can honestly say I have had some of the darkest thoughts of my life in those months after losing my mom, and I can say that I am grateful for a few specific people who have perhaps at times saved me, or at least saved my sanity.

One of the things that has helped tremendously, and the reason I am writing this blog to begin with is the Motherloss group I found on Facebook. It gets to a point where you feel like people are silently screaming at you to get over it, to stop being so over dramatic, that it was only your mother anyway, and it is normal to lose our parents. Thankfully, those attitudes are non-existant in this group of women who have all in some way or another walked in each other's shoes. It has been an outlet for support and understanding that I am overwhelmingly thankful for.

Now, as I am 10 months out, all I can do is keep trying. Losing her has made me re evaluate, or maybe even evaulate for the first time who I am and what I want out of this life, and those are answers I am still working on.