I'm 50 Years Old and Miss My Mom

I remember when it REALLY hit me that my grandmother’s Alzheimer’s disease had changed her and there was no going “back” to “once was”.  My aunt had snapped a photograph at my wedding, and in that picture, I couldn’t help seeing. I could no longer deny that life would never be the same and that I had lost Grandma Rose. From that point on, I remember thinking, “I lose her over and over again” as she weaved in and out of being partially who she had been in her healthier years. I would get glimpses of her, only to lose her again a few hours later, a day later, maybe even minutes later. I kept busy then. With a farm, with animals, with my son, with my husband and family. I dove into life and ran as fast and far emotionally as I possibly could, visiting grandma daily, checking on her, helping her, but able to keep some sort of emotional distance or disconnect to what was happening in front of my face. My very last image of her is horrific. I had gone to visit her, turned the corner to her room, and saw nurses holding her down while another tried to force feed her. I am pretty sure things have changed a lot since then. I believe at that time, it was required to try to make the residents in the nursing home eat, even when they didn’t want to or couldn’t. Hearing her choking and seeing the way she was acting like a trapped wild animal instead of the woman who had been almost like a mother my entire life, sent me running even more. Only this time, out of the nursing facility’s door, into my car and as far as I could manage to get away. I didn’t let her know I had been there. I didn’t say “hello”. And sadly and regretfully, I didn’t tell her one more “good-bye”. She died within the next two days. And it all haunts even now, years later.

Fast forward to the other day. I received a photograph of my mother. And I’ve been crying off and on since. Because even though she still looks beautiful, still looks like “mom” in most ways, I recognized a similar expression on her face and in her eyes. That look that seems hollow now instead of a look saying, “I’m alive and mom”. And her smile seemed rehearsed or overly forced as if I could feel the confusion and disorientation hidden behind it. And that image knocked me to my knees. Again.

Difficult situations happen that we have to kick into “fight or flight” mode in order to handle. I’ve come to realize that over the years and I respect it. I’m thankful for the innate ability to cope and deal by the choice of “fleeing”. But sometimes what you are running from comes crashing down around you and you can’t help LIVING it. Feeling every ounce of EXTREME emotion that oozes out of your pours and down your cheeks in the tears from your eyes. The kind of emotion that you feel is powerful enough to shatter the heart, to send it racing, to bend and twist and re-shape it somehow. And no matter how far you’ve been running or how fast or how long, you come face to face with the hurt.

What I’m learning now, I think, is that it’s all good. Even the darkest of dark is GOOD. Because it somehow elevates energy. It carries us into a new direction, either without or within. It stretches us. It changes us. It sets our course and becomes part of the wind that guides our sail. And in turn, somehow, it adds to the collective whole. It alters the total consciousness of a giant world, one tear drop at a time. And pushes my children and grandchildren forward, and hopefully further than I’ve been able to go. So in turn the ripple effect builds a better future for who and what lies ahead.

It’s all bigger than me. Bigger than my fears and my discomfort. Even though during the times of crying, I feel and wallow in “it’s all about me and how this all affects me”.

I’m allowing myself space and time for awhile to just FEEL. To allow the pain to enter in and take hold and teach me what I’m supposed to learn…. Or maybe not what I’m supposed to learn, but rather what I CAN learn if I keep my heart and mind open.

Losing my mother over and over again. Added onto a lifetime of loss. It’s time for Grief to be recognized for what it has become; one of my greatest friends and one of my amazing teachers.

I miss my mom.