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| First picture after not seeing each other for two years! |
Mother’s day was this past Sunday and it was a very different day for me this year! I am 30 weeks pregnant with my second boy and in love with chasing after my almost 18 month old firstborn son. We spent the weekend doing things as a family which is also my favorite thing: quality time! So amazingly this time Mother’s Day did not sting as much or blindside me with the constant reminder that my own mom was no longer here to celebrate. The first celebration after I lost my mom was incredibly difficult; there were signs every reminding me to buy a card, a present, or take my mom out. I was overwhelmed and under-prepared! It made her birthday look easy to get through honestly since I didn’t have to deal with all of the marketing. I remember driving around trying to see the road through my tears and I saw a garden store and pulled over. I bought a hanging plant for my front porch with huge flowers that I thought she would have loved.
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| Mother’s Day 2006 |
I am sure its understandable to see why the sting of loss gets easier over the years but one thing is getting harder for me. Having babies and raising them without my mom has got to be the hardest thing for me right now. Mother’s day as a whole has become easy because its on a Sunday and my husband is home and we can fill it with activities and the time flies. But day-in-day-out there are so many things questions left un-answered and conversations that just can not happen. I thankfully don’t feel the despondency of this loss intensely on a daily basis but if I could explain my great sadness as a mom it would not be “baby blues” or “post-pardem,” although I am sure I dealt with these things since I see them as a normal part of the process, but it would be the massive vacuum I feel wanting to share these precious people with her. You have to understand, my mom was a Grandma! She was an amazing grandma! I watched her love her grand babies fiercely! She took them for the weekend, she gave advice to my step-sister when she needed it, she taught them about Jesus! I got to watch and I got to get excited for my time to come someday when she would do the same for my babies! We even talked about it. We both shared our grief with the idea that if I stayed in overseas missions and potentially got married over there and started having children that it would be so challenging to be far away from each other. We were excited at the time because Skype was becoming more popular and video chat would make it easier to be far apart. I love that we talked about this then, it made me know her heart, her desire to be close to her grand babies that were not even alive yet!
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| Mom and Marlin on the cruise |
I feel like this subject is much harder for me write about, its fresh. In fact, its almost news to me how big of a deal this is in my life. I have known grief and I have walked through pain, but this is a daily part of living without my mom. I’m not ready to explain it away yet or to put a Bible verse on it. I am in the feeling stage and the walking it out in a real way. My son is in that stage where he is learning who people are and making connections with them. I know pictures and stories will be the way we teach him about his Grandma Connie but I also know how much he would have loved her! He can tell a joyful, kind person from like a mile away! He gave a hug to a sweet woman at a service we were at last week. This is not something he does very often but it was so sweet to her as he put his arms out to this woman, who of course reminded me a bit of my own mom!
My mom had a daycare in our house from the time I turned 7 until 17 years old. So I watched her take care of other people’s babies for years! We took trips to the library, the park, and of course during the summer we were daily at the pool! She taught them songs, always prayed before lunch, and let them play for hours in the back yard! I got trained as a momma by my mom from a very young age and for that I am thankful and reflective of what that did to impact me as a mom now. But I still want her on speed dial! “He isn’t eating, will he start sleeping, can you come take him for a night, mom what do I do??” “Am I doing a good job?” I never contemplated how much I would need her right now! The 8 years before I had my first baby, even my wedding seems now easy compared to this! I guess the next question to ask is “what is the Lord saying?”
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| Grandma with Grand-daughter Riley |
Personally, I was raised by my mom, but beyond that I also spent a ton of time during my childhood with my dad’s mom, Grandma Phyllis and my mom’s mom Grandma Doris! Both of these women taught me so much even if they didn’t really ever know it. My Grandma Phyllis kept us one weekend a month out on my grandparent’s farm. My favorite thing to do with her was play make-believe and she would do it with me for hours. We would pretend to take the tractor to the store to get supplies to make food for my “restaurant” and then we would go back inside so she could pretend to order from my restaurant and eat my pretend food! Hours! Seriously, I can’t even imagine how she did that! My Grandma Doris often got me or my brother for days at a time due to sickness. Unfortunately when your mom runs a daycare in your home instead of being cared for by your mom when you are sick instead you are shipped off to Grandma’s house! It was honestly not so bad! Grandpa would let us watch tv with him and Grandma taught me how to make angel food cake from scratch! They were an incredible part of my upbringing and I can’t imagine my life without them in it.
This blog feels a bit up and down but of course that is honestly how grief works. And part of grieving is letting questions go unanswered and tears left rolling down our faces. This is how we become who we are meant to be. We talk, we share, we cry, we miss, we remember, and then we do it all over again. Hugging and kissing the pain doesn’t have to equal depression and it doesn’t have to mean that we are falling apart everyday. We are just us! And that is to be expected. We didn’t ask to be in this situation but we get to make the choice to walk to it out. I miss my mom and I need her right now! Its not okay that she isn’t here to squeeze my little man. She is really missing out!! He is a ridiculously cute little person! I like to pretend that she would have convinced my step-dad to move here if she was still alive. But she isn’t here to do those things and that makes sense but it still hurts like crazy that she’s not. (Breath). I feel like Forrest Gump said it best, “and thats all I have to say about that!”
I guess thats my way of saying… to be continued!
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| So happy to be together after two years! |