Friday, May 11, 2012

grief: mother's day edition

Are you tired about reading about my grief for my mom? Because I'm tired of writing about it. But it still fills me up, and sometimes needs to pour out of my fingertips so that I don't drown.

The thing I'm realizing is that I've been in a bit of a survival mode in regard to my grief over the last 9 months. It's been this sort of "Just hang on...hold on...until....until..."

Until, what?

I have been hanging on to this surreal idea that somehow my mom will be back again soon. I think the part of my brain that is protecting me and keeping me going has created this sort of weird cushion where I am unable to process the permanence of her death. That if I just hang on, get through these  times without her, that everything will soon be okay and normal again. Like she is on a long trip to somewhere far away where phones and emails don't work, but everything will be safe again soon.

The fact that she is not coming back, ever, is just so hard to process. I hate that I will be lying flowers on her grave for Mother's Day, not just this weekend, but for the rest of my own life.

I hate that her death has made me lie awake at night in terror of my own mortality. I hate that she will never watch her grandchildren grow. I hate that my dad and my sister have to live in that big house without my mom. I hate that I have to hold it together for the sake of everyone else. I hate that I just want to sit on the kitchen counter and watch her make vegetable soup and let my daughters run circles around their grandma's legs, but it's never going to happen no matter how much I wish it so.

This is permanent, this is forever. And I miss her.

1 comment:

  1. I was just thinking that you do have the oldest child burden of "having" to hold it together for everyone and be the new matriarch. You are doing a great job. Xoxo.

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