January 27, 2011

About a week ago, I found out via Facebook that a woman I went to high school with lost her 5 year old soon to cancer.  I just stared at my computer and started to cry.  My kids came into the room and started to ask me their usual questions, so I wiped away my tears and got back to daily life, but there's been a bit of sadness hanging around me since then.  Obviously, it reminded me of the loss of my mother, but it was also that reminder that there are even worse losses.  At least my mom got to live long enough to be a grandmother and to know all of her grandchildren.  Parents aren't supposed to lose their kids.  At least my loss happened in the order it's supposed to happen.  As much as other people with living parents can't fully understand my loss, I know I can't fully understand this woman's.  I hope she & her family find the support & love they need to work through this and to be able to still enjoy the rest of their life.  My heart goes out to them.

There were a lot of facebook postings reminding everyone to hug & kiss their kids whenever they can.  I've always covered my kids with kisses, even when they don't want it, but these postings got me to thinking.  I don't know if I do it because it's just who I am, or because my mom was diagnosed when I was pregnant with my firstborn.  I've never been a mom without knowing that death can come at anytime.  We had 6 years with my mom's illness to make sure we always said, "I love you" and to hug & kiss (although, with Mom being Irish, she wasn't so big on the hugs & kisses - but again, I gave them anyway).  I think her cancer does make me hold my kids more, and I guess that's a silver lining.  I don't live a day where I forget to kiss them or tell them I love them.  Of course, I'd still prefer to have learned that lesson the easy way.  But I'm slowly accepting that there really are things I can't change or stomp my feet and demand to have back.  It still sucks, though.

January 7, 2012

So here I am on the other side of my second big holiday season without my mom.  It was very different from my first in many ways.  Right up until a few days before Christmas, I was feeling like my usual pre-holiday self.  Then, I went to my son's school on the last day before vacation.  It was a great visit and all was still very festive until I went back to my car to drive home.  Bing Crosby's "White Christmas" was playing on the radio and I started to cry.  But the difference was that this time I was feeling the loss of other family members, most especially my aunt that died last year and my grandmother.  Music was such a big theme for my loss this year.  I have memories of both of those women women singing throughout my childhood.  And although my grandmother died years ago, I just felt her loss more deeply again this year.  I think my aunt's death didn't affect me as much last year because my mom died shortly after her, so all my energy went into first, doing what I could to help my mom to keep fighting her cancer battle, and then, when that was no longer a possibility, to deal with the process of her dying, and then her death. 

Now that I feel more whole again, I think I was able to let the aftershocks of my aunt's death hit me, and then the loss of other family members came again as well.  Not to say that I didn't miss my mom this year, because I did, it was just different.  I still wore one of her old shirts as I wrapped presents on Christmas Eve and I still felt the need to sit down and watch her memorial DVD.  But this time, it was more comforting and more of a happy thing rather than something to make me cry.  It made me feel more peaceful. 

But there were little things that made me feel the other losses.  My sister mentioned something she needed sewn and my first response was to tell her to ask her aunt.  Then, it was like that little sucker punch remembering she was dead.  I remembered temporarily forgotten visits with my grandmother when I was first starting to date my husband.  She always really loved him, and I was just starting to get to know her as a young adult, and she was gone.  I'm in my late 30s and so fortunate in so many ways, but these losses still hurt.

So the grumpiness set in a little bit, but that was different, too.  I was able this time to take some deep breaths and let the sadness come in and come out.  But for the first time in many years, I was ready just after Christmas to take the decorations down and be done with the holiday season.  Usually, I'm very happy to leave my tree up at least until after New Year's.  I miss them all.