Do you have one of those “things” you find difficult to talk about no matter how much time has passed, and how much healing, understanding and emotional work you’ve done around that “thing”? For me that “thing” is my mother. I haven’t seen her face, touched her skin or heard her voice since the very end of October 1990.
If she were alive today she’d be preparing for her 74th birthday on November 19th.
Instead, I’m very deep in thought as I remember that 22 years ago she left this world nine months after being diagnosed with lung cancer.
She was a beautiful woman.
More than beautiful in appearance, my mother was beautiful in her continued search for happiness, for acceptance and more painfully understood, today, twenty two years after her last breath, for love.
This is my mother’s high school graduation picture.
The hand written inscription is to Johnny, her first husband and father to my older brothers. I know very little about him. The “us” she is referring to is to my oldest brother who was named after the man she hoped would bring her the love she longed for.
I could stare at this picture for what seems like an eternity. By the time I finally came along, that deep sense of beauty my mother exuded had run it’s course. Replaced, instead, with depression and demons that followed her where ever she went until that early morning when she took her last breath and hopefully felt the relief she had so desperately needed.
When we experience life in ways we feel unfair, we often want to point fingers and blame someone else. “Look what you did to me”, “It’s your fault”, “I’ll never forgive you”…My mother was no different. It took Death coming at her full force to finally return home and be with her mother and sister after almost 30 years of a strained and non existent relationship. A few weeks together, trying to forgive a lifetime of pain, did very little to ease her conscious but it was needed much more than any medication she could take to ease her into her final days.
I spent many years, after she passed, festering in the very same depression and being chased by the same demons that chased her for 52 years. I blamed my life on her. I blamed the abuse on her. I blamed everything on her. On top of blaming her for what had already happened, I was pointing my finger at the ghost of my mother and blaming her for what I would never be able to make happen; finding my own happiness, loving who I was and instead of pointing the finger outward in blame, pointing it inward and figuring out how to stop living in a shit hole of mental illness that has plagued this family long before I was born and long before my mother was brought into this world.
I often wonder what life would be like today if she had lived into her 70’s.
I miss her immensely.
But to be honest, I miss her because of who I am today and that wouldn’t be possible if she had lived. It was in her sickness that I was able to heal. It was in her death I was able to live. It was in her desperate search for happiness, acceptance and love that I am on a path of truly finding what it means to have all three things in my heart not just for a few weeks before I take my final breath but for a lifetime.
November is a “trigger” month for me.
This is the time of the year that those demons come creeping back into my emotional state of being. I think about my mom a lot both in her years of life and her many many years of death. This year it seems to be especially difficult as this week marks the one year anniversary of Mimi’s accident and my panicked state of leaving the only place I’d ever called home to forge a new life with the one person who brings me exactly what my mother spent her life hoping to experience:
Happiness.
Acceptance.
Love.
You always hear people say “I’d give anything for 5 minutes with a loved one” after they pass. I think about what I would do if I was given those precious 5 minutes. I’d ask her to sing for me. She had a beautiful voice. One that was never allowed to sing loud enough for the world to hear. I’d hold her hand, look her in the eyes and tell her it was in her death I found my life and as much as I wanted her to stay she would have to go…
Not because I blame her for my life.
But because I thank her for my life.
11/19/1938 – 11/06/1990
Sometimes when I think about the magnitude of things that you have experienced in your life before we came together I can’t breathe.
I think about all of the heartaches that you’ve overcome. The addictions and the changes and days of feeling misunderstood not only by people around you, but by yourself.
And then I just feel this enormous wave of gratitude. To you and for you.
I’m so thankful that every last one of those things that you experienced brought you to who you are today, brought us together, brought our lives the love and acceptance and understanding that I don’t think either one of us ever imagined we would find.
I’m so thankful for your Mom. I wish so much that I had had the opportunity to know her. To hear her voice, to sing with her. I wonder if she would like me, if she would see so plainly how much love and respect and acceptance I have for you. I wish I could tell her that without her life I’d be without you and it wouldn’t be enough.
Instead I tell you, every day how thankful I am to have you as my Mate. How important you are and how much I appreciate our relationship. It’s so much bigger than the words I have.
Always. #lawn
A beautiful tribute. She gave you the gift of life not once, but twice. She gave us the gift of you. If I had five minutes with your mom I’d tell her what an amazing human she created and how proud she would be to know the person you have evolved into – the pheonix that has risen.
xo
I lost both my mother and father to cancer. This post moved me to tears. Thank you for sharing this story. I understand what you mean about trigger months. You are so strong and such a beautiful person. I know your Mother is so proud.
Tara, this is exquisite. Thank for sharing it and for being so unflinching candid.
Reading this helps me understand people in my life who are unable to articulate these emotions, and even though I cannot ever truly know, reading this post illuminated things I have had a very hard time understanding. Your situation is as unique as a thumbprint, but your post allowed me to understand relationships in my life that have been affected by similar pain.
Just…thank you. And I’m sending you heart vibes all November long 🙂
Thank you for writing so poignantly about your mother. You a role model for me in this regard and each and every time you write about your past, it helps me understand mine just a little bit better. Hugs.
Thank you for sharing this with us. Hugs to you and Meegan as you work through the month of November…..
What a lovely post about your mom Tara. I hope you and Meegan make it through the month ok.
Beautifully done. I lost my mom when I was 16, from a freak infection. It changed my life irrevocably and I have a tough month, too. It never gets easier, now 25 years later. Hugs from Massachusetts, my friend.
I was overweight as a child and teen, so my issues did not stem from her death. I know how concerned she was for me, and I like to think she’s proud of how I’ve turned it around on the health/fitness front. I wrote about her this past Mother’s Day and I think it was the best thing I’ve ever written: http://alifetimeloser.blogspot.com/2012/05/in-which-i-get-it-from-my-mom.html
Well now I’m crying! That was so beautiful Tera! Thank you for sharing with us.
Beautiful post–my first time reading your blog and you brought me to tears!
This is so beautiful. What a gorgeous woman, and one who clearly passed on her beauty to you, inside and out.
What a poignant way to honor your mom, T. You made me teary eyed and then the comments? Made me cry. At the office. 🙂
Simply beautiful! I’m sure she sees the life you made for yourself and she is proud. {{{Hugs}}}