Today is my mother’s birthday.
I had to write this blog two days ago, because I knew there was no way I could write it the day of and make any kind of sense. My mother died two years and one month ago. I thought that it would get easier, but if anything it’s gotten harder–and easier in other ways. Easier, because I’m starting to accept it and recall more of the happy memories, rather than dwell on the grief. But harder in other ways that hit me when I least expect it. I’m almost 40, and before my mother died, I’d thought I’d outgrown the need for a mother. Sure, I called her when I screwed up making a pie crust or I was having a difficult day with the kids, but mostly, I’d figured I had this grown-up thing down.
After all, I had been on my own, married, since I was twenty-one. Running my own house. Raising kids, making dinners, shopping, trying to stick to a budget (ha-ha). Whatever could I need a mom for?
You realize pretty quickly what you need a mom for when you don’t have one anymore. My mother and I had our issues, our disagreements, but we were friends. Occasionally she’d call when I was working and I’d find myself wishing that she had waited an hour. Or I tried to get her off the phone because I was on deadline and the work seemed ten times more important than a chat.
Then a stroke took her voice and I spent three months at her bedside, tending to her most basic needs and I realized what I would give to have that voice back. For a little while, she seemed to recover and I could talk to her, sometimes calling her room at the rehab hospital, thrilled she understood me, but then her heart gave out and I lost her voice forever.
It’s been two years and I have yet to delete the phone number to her room on my cell. I know she’s not there, but I can’t erase this reminder of her. When I scroll past the number on my way to call my daughter or my husband at work, I remember I can still talk to her, in a one-way conversation with heaven.
As I raise my own teenage daughter, I realize now how much I need a mother. For the advice, for the sense that I’m not in this alone with the hormones and the mood swings and the joyful moments peppered between the frustrations. I need a mother to tell me I’m on the right path. To hold my hand when I’m sure I’ve alienated my daughter by laying down the law–and to reassure me our relationship will survive these years. Just as my relationship with my mother survived her rules, her protectiveness and most of all the love that circled around me like a blanket, shielding me from so much that could have hurt me during those same years.
But most of all, I need her voice. Her common sense, her wisdom, her soft compassion for bad days, her quiet pride on good days. She has missed a lot in the last two years, in my life, my husband’s, and my kids’, but I believe she is watching from up above. In fact, I’m positive.
At about my age, my mother lost her own mother, ironically, in the fall, too. My mother used to tell me she missed her mother talking to her, the two of them sitting around the kitchen table and talking for hours, long into the night. When my grandmother died, my mother told me Nana would always be watching from heaven. For an eleven-year-old, that became a sort of extra conscience. I’d think twice before I did anything, because I could just picture my Nana seeing me misbehave–and being disappointed.
So, today, I will raise a toast to my mother on her birthday and find a quiet place where we can talk. I’ll tell her all that has happened in the last year, and hope that if I listen very, very carefully, I can still hear the whispers of her voice.
Shirley
No related posts.
Nine years ago, on the Saturday after Thanksgiving, my mother passed away. She was in her seventies and had been battling an illness for decades. I was forty-five. Should have been easy, a letting go. But it wasn’t. And it was three years before I could sit down to a Thanksgiving dinner.
I’d love to tell you there’s a linear progression and that on a certain day, after x-number of months have passed, everything will be fine. Healing, moving on, takes a while. But each moment becomes a part of something more. You grow and you pass on what you’ve learned in growing and even though it may not be of use now, what you learn becomes a part of you and of everyone who knows you. Can’t pretend it’s pleasant. Or that it’s anything I would choose or wish on anyone. But it is life. And cold and banal as that might seem, it’s true.
You have wonderful memories to build on. Take them and build.
Thanks, KeVin. That’s pretty much what I’ve found, too. There are days that are good, days that stink. Holidays that are easy, others that should be easy and are oddly hard — like Mother’s Day. I can’t even touch Mother’s Day. I hate the fall because it reminds me so much of all we went through. I’m okay once I get past October, because the weather changes enough that I can forget, but those days that are the same as when I was driving back and forth to the hospital…tough.
And you’d think, as with your mom, that when your mother is sick for a long time (mine was, too) that you’d have that easing into the loss and it would be easier. But I don’t think there’s ever an easy way to lose a loved one.
I have used what happened in my writing without a doubt. Everything has become richer, at least to me. Readers might not notice, but I can feel more of me pouring into the work.
Thanks again — and hugs to you, too.
Shirley
That was a really wonderful piece of writing. My mother is still alive and healthy, but you captured perfectly the love (mixed with a little bit of ambivalence at times) that I feel for my mother now that we are both adults.
I appreciate her so much more as a adult. Growing up I was always a bit of a “Daddy’s Girl” and my Mom worried about everything so much that I felt I couldn’t tell her anything. Now when I am depressed and upset I know I can always reach for the phone and call her and she will always listen, no matter how stupid or trivial my problem is.
Thank you for sharing your wonderful memories of your mother and never worry that your daughter will realize how great you are some day, even if she doesn’t always show it now.
Thanks, Jill!
It was always that kind of love/annoyance thing (kind of like with my daughter
. And I do have hope with her, LOL. But as a high schooler…well, she’s a long way from appreciating me. I just keep following a fellow author’s (Diann Hunt) advice, who has raised some great kids. She told me once to just keep talking, even when they aren’t listening. As long as you’re talking and talking and talking, keeping those lines open, eventually those lines build into threads, build into ropes strong enough to maintain ties forever. It worked for me as a kid and as an adult with my mom, so I’m doing it with my daughter, too.
Even as she perfects the eye roll.
Shirley
I still have my Mom with me, and she’s 80 now. Her health is very precarious, though. I visit her about four days a week, and I know that soon she’ll be leaving me.
I don’t know what I’m going to do then. Just thinking about it and writing this makes me cry. I’ve always needed my Mom and always will.
Happy Birthday to your Mom. My Mom and I will raise our iced teas to her over brunch today
Wow, Shirley, that brought tears to my eyes and helped me realize how much I take my mother for granted. The way she drives me crazy at work when she calls me just talk about television shows. But that made me think. If she wasn’t around, who else would talk about them with me?
Thank you for reminding me what is important. *bighugs* for you on this emotional day.
Hi Lone,
Hugs to you–and sorry for making you cry, too.
Have a wonderful brunch and a great iced tea! You’ve got to be somewhere WAY warmer than me to be having iced tea
Shirley
Hi Melanie,
OMG, my mom would do the same thing. She’d see something on TV and call me, to talk all about it, and it would drive me nuts, LOL. Now I’m totally out of the loop about the newest discoveries (she watched all those news things).
And thanks for the hugs. They help
Shirley
Oh Shirley, I feel for you. I lost my Dad 6 years ago. We were very close Last night, my mom and I were at a restaurant after house hunting, (she might move down here closer to me so we were checking out the area) and most of the evening was spent talking about my Dad and all the things we missed, and how hard it was for her to move on. I’m one of the few people with whom she can talk about him, and she’s one of the few with whom I can talk about him. Not the he was a great man ( he was) but the silly nonsensical stuff that we remember and that was so important to our daily life, the struggles we went through as his cancer took him. Our regrets. Our joys. I’m very close to both my parents (Dad too because even after 6 years it’s not fully real) and I dread the day my daily talks with my mom are no longer possible so your post really hits home.
Again, hugs.
My mother passed away six year ago and her birthday was this month. We weren’t close. I couldn’t talk openly with her nor could I go to her for advice when she was alive, but I am changing that with my daughter. I honor my mother, in that she was the woman who birthed me, and I’ve learned from her mistakes. She taught me to draw my children close and love on them. To be open to their desire to talk to me. To actively seek out time to spend with them and to enjoy the little things about them. She taught me to laugh and enjoy life because she never did. To follow my dreams of becoming a writer, because she didn’t. To live life to the fullest and never give up, because she gave up. So even though she couldn’t be the type of mother I needed, she taught me how to be the type of mother my children need.
I too lost my mom two years ago. Hers was a sudden death , completely unexpected from a brain aneurysm. I will always be grateful, that two days before she died all of my siblings and I and our kids were together with her at a baseball game and that the last thing I said to her when we last talked was I love you. I turned 40 this year and I understand everything you wrote. Although my kids are younger, I have the same struggle, wanting to talk to my mom about the various stages of life. I have struggled to find a way to feel like she is still in my life and recently started going through old photographs she had taken and that were taken of her. I am digitizing them and hope to make a book that I can share with my children to help us with remembering happy days with her. You have my sympathies and your piece was wonderfully written.
Awww Shirley. I lost my mom this past May and the memories are so fresh. Mom was 85 and had a wonderful life, but wow was it hard to let her go.
What a beautiful post about yours. And I can’t delete my mom’s # from my cell phone either. Probably never will. I still miss talking to her and every time I pass by the picture of her in my living room, I smile and say “Hi Mom”.
There’s nothing in the world like losing your mother, especially if you were close. Big hugs and understanding.
Hi Sarah,
Hugs to you on your dad. I got really close to my dad through all this (I had been closer to my mom) and we talk all the time now, too, the same as you and your mom. That’s been really nice, because he and I have a great relationship that I just treasure. I feel the same as you — just don’t know what I’ll do if I don’t have him. He’s a friend of a different kind; the dad/daughter relationship is different, but he’s just as precious to me.
Shirley
How wonderful, Sara, that you are doing such a great job and leading with such a powerful example! Kudos to you for realizing that you could change the patterns of your past and leave your kids with a different legacy. And hugs that you didn’t have a mom as powerful and loving as you clearly must be.
Shirley
Thank you, Soleil. I’m about the same age as you (I’ll be 40 this summer) so I’m at the same life stages as you. That picture up there is from two months before my mother’s stroke, and the last time we had together (I live 1000 miles away).
Hugs on such a tragic and sudden loss. I think the photo thing is a great idea. I have a memory board I made up of my mom. I have it in my office, so I can see the funny and precious pictures of her life. Some days they make me cry, but most days they make me remember funny moments.
Shirley
Hi Jaci,
Hugs on losing your mom. I don’t think it’s ever easy, is it? I was surprised when I went to RWA and a few friends and I got talking and I realized how many of us had membership in this “club” (and didn’t want to, of course).
I hope it gets easier for you as the days pass.
Shirley
Your column is a beautiful tribute, Shirley. I’m so sorry for your loss. Creating a presense of your mom for your own children is the best gift of all. You’re keeping her alive and I hope you can take some comfort in that.
~Misa
Hugs Shirley. You wrote a very touching post that has resonated with a lot of people. I’m not in that club, and pray I’m not there for many years, but having heard what you’ve gone through over the past couple of years has really made me think about my own relationship with my mother. You and your mom have popped into my mind at the oddest times when something was going on with my own mother. It’s funny, but those calls when the kids were at school and I finally had time alone to write used to drive me insane, but now not so much. So thank you!
Enjoy your conversation today! I’m sure she’s looking forward to it, too.
That made me cry in a good way. I can feel the love you have for her. Here’s to you hearing her whispering to you today. I’m sure she’s so proud of you.
And now I’ll stop telling my own mother she’s supposed to be proofreading not crying when she reads my writing. (Even though I still don’t understand why she cries.)
Big cyber hugs from me to you.
Oh, Shirley, I really feel for you. My mother is still alive, she’s almost 68 and I’m almost 47. I’m especially lucky to have her as my father has never really been a part of my life, even though he’s had the opportunity to be.
I think a mother/daughter relationship is great. I cherish the times I have with my own daughter these days when she comes home from university.
Your mother has probably passed a lot of good qualities on to you, Shirley. And one in particular, I think of one I think of you, is your spirit of generosity.
Maybe that was one of her gifts to you.
Lynette
Shirley, I can not imagine how you feel. I would be lost without my Mother. Isn’t the progression of a mother/daughter relationship an awesome thing? As I got older I realized what a treasure my Mom is to me, and I only hope with a preteen daughter that one day she will feel the same way. Thank you for sharing. It makes my heart warm to know how you feel. It’s a beautiful thing this mother/daughter bond. Much love-Andie
Thanks, Misa. One of the things I did for my kids that first Christmas was give them a gift from my mom — a cherry box that they could keep all their special mementos from my my mom in. It had photo slots on the outside, and they put photos of her and them on there. I filled two of the three slots with pictures of my mom at their respective ages, and had them monogrammed with my kids’ names (I got them at Things Remembered). My mom had told me when she was able to talk, for that brief period (she knew she wasn’t going to make it) that she wanted something memorable for the kids for Christmas. That has become their “special” box and they use it for their most private things.
Shirley
Thanks, Melissa. I’m glad that sharing this helped you, too! It’s also made me treasure my conversations with my siblings, where before I’d get frustrated with interruptions from about anyone, LOL.
Shirley
Melissa Blue,
Maybe it’s pride that makes her cry when she reads
My mom only got to read one of my books (she got macular degeneration around the time my first one was published) but just hearing her talk about my book was so cool. And she got to see and hold the books, which was really neat.
Shirley
Aw, Lynette, you are way too kind
But thank you.
Shirley
Hugs, Andie, on getting through the preteen years! Oh, those were the worst so far! It got easier once my daughter got past the first couple years of hormones, and “evened out” with all that. Now she’s at that “please don’t shop with me in the mall” stage in case a friend from high school should OMG see her with her MOM.
But she still hugs me and still watches “The OFfice” and Stephen King movies with me, so I figure the least I can do is stay out of Hollister when she’s buying a T.
Shirley
What a wonderful tribute to your mom….And a swift reminder for those of us with children of our own.
Bless your heart. My mom died of lung cancer two years ago next month, and that was the hardest day of my life. Then we had the service, and that was the hardest day of my life. My first birthday without her- you guessed it. The day I called my dad and got his voice mail and heard her voice a year after her death was not precisely a pleasant surprise.
My teenage daughter was her special grandkid, and they were delighted with each other. My daughter is more grownup than I am, sometimes, and I find her dispensing Gran’s wisdom when I need it most.
Oh Shirley, I needed this today. I needed to hear it. My mother is still here, she’s not ill, she’s still quite young… but our relationship has always been sort of rocky. But she’s there for me, like today when she picks up the kids for a few hours so I can get things done with out klingons around my ankles. I know I need to be thankful for what I have: my mom. Before she’s not here… in reality we are not ever guaranteed even one more minute.
I’m very lucky that my mother, aged 84, is still alive. What I realized was that I was taking her being around for granted. With kids and work, I somehow never had time to see her, although we talked every day.
Some time ago, I realized that I was heading down a very wrong path, because I will not get to enjoy her forever. I now have lunch with her every Monday, just the two of us. Even if the kids and I see her other times during the week, Monday lunch is our special time. I also make sure to tell her, often, that I love her.
Your beautiful post is a reminder of how much we miss once our parents are gone, and I don’t want to have too many regrets when her time comes.
Shirley, what a lovely tribute to your mom. I felt a clutch in my heart reading it because I know how you feel. My mom died 22 years ago–my son was five and my daughter just two. I was only 31. Sometimes I think I can hear her voice, but it’s a real struggle after so many years. But even now I wonder if she’s proud of me and the job my husband and I have done with our kids. Is she proud of my kids as well?
I still occasionally feel cheated that she hasn’t been here all these years to share with us.
My dad calls all of us (his five kids) every night, and he keeps everyone informed about who is doing what. He suffers from macular degeneration and doesn’t get around very well, and that is his way of keeping his finger in the pot, so to speak. So we really appreciate
getting to hear from him. My parents would have been married 66 years this year.
I know things are hard for you, and I won’t lie and say things will get better soon. It will take a while. I don’t think about her every day now. Sometimes 2 or 3 days go by.
But I still miss her.
So, bottom line? Embrace your loved ones, and rejoice with those who are still with you.
How terrible of you to make me cry late at night when the rest of the house is asleep. I’m so lucky to still have my mother. But all the things you mention remind me of how much I miss my father. It’s been almost 14 years and today at my son’s college football game I thought how proud he would be watching the game, how much I would love to have him beside me. I only hope that I’m near to the type of parent he was.
My mom is still alive but not a healthy person and I know someday in the near future, I’ll be getting a call from a family member telling me she’s gone. I know I’ll be driving the 500 miles it takes to get to my hometown to attend to the arrangements and helping my dad through it- all in a fog because my mother is my very best friend in the world. I can’t imagine going through each week without hearing her voice during our routine calls, can’t imagine her not hosting my family when we visit during the summer. I think it will probably be the hardest thing I’ll ever have to endure.
Your words are beautiful and are a wonderful tribute to your mom. I’m sure she’s so proud of you and her heart is touched by the powerful feelings you have for her. They’ve also made me appreciate more what I have and that I should hold each and every moment I have with my mother close to my heart because someday, probably soon, there won’t be anymore moments to hold except in my memories.
That was a beautiful tribute to your mum, Shirley, and I’m so sorry for your loss. I still have my mum and you’ve just reminded me how lucky I am.
I think the thing to hold on to is the fact that you did have her and you still have your memories. I never knew my dad – he died when I was a baby. There’s no pain attached to that, not in the way you grieve for your mum; but it does mean I will never in my life understand what it means to have a father.
(hugs) I SO know what you mean. I never knew a broken heart until my Daddy died from lung cancer, 3 weeks after his diagnosis. He was only 59. And lately, my 96 year old Granny, ill and out of it;, I used to wonder how many times I could hear her tell the same story, but since she’s been sick, I found myself wishing she’d just tell the story one more time. Any story, even if we’ve heard it a zillion times. I know what’s coming. And I dread it.
Any loss such as these immediately reduces one to a child again, no matter how old we are.
May God comfort and sustain you. You will see her again, in time.
Thanks, Erika, I appreciate it.
Shirley
Oh, hugs, Robyn. I hear you on those hardest days. I kept thinking the next one would get easier, or it would get “realer” but it didn’t seem to for quite some time. There aren’t any words…just hugs from another who has been there, too.
Shirley
I agree, Heather. I was just watching a Dr. Phil the other day with this hideous daughter-in-law to be who was so mean to her MIL (vicious and cutting her off before the wedding even happened) and Dr. Phil asked her what she was trying to win, and if the victory would be worth the cost, should the MIL ever die. How she would feel knowing what it would do to her husband’s heart. She just kind of shrugged, like “so what? I’d have the evil witch out of my life.” I wanted to smack her
. One thing something like this teaches you is to let a whole lot of things roll off your back, because honestly, what’s the point? Someone you love could be gone tomorrow and what you thought was a big deal is really nothing in the grand scheme.
Shirley
What a wonderful idea, Andrea! I wish I lived closer to my dad, because then I’d do something like that, too. I try to call him often enough that he and I get one-on-one conversations without anyone else around (usually when he’s driving home from work or something like that). That’s such a great thing to do!! And what a cherished memory to have.
Shirley
Nikki,
I hear you. That line is “Sixth Sense” where the mom asks her son to ask her dead mother if she is proud of her–that one leaves me crying for the entire rest of the movie. There are times when I can’t even watch it. I wonder the same thing. If my mom is proud of the job I am doing with my kids, my job, my house…every little decision I make. I have my dad, and he tells me he is, but I suppose there’s nothing like a mom’s pride.
Hugs to you, too. I think being so young (I had just turned 37), makes it harder, too. Like you’re too young to have to grow up, even though you’re supposed to be a grown-up, if that makes sense.
Shirley
Sorry, Susan, for making you cry. But I have no doubt your dad was watching and very proud.
And rooting for your son’s team 
.
Shirley
Marie,
One thing I can tell you to do now is to make a list of people to call ahead of time. And anything you should know/find out early (date of birth, etc.). My dad and I had the presence of mind to talk all that out about a week or so ahead of time and oh, did it make my life easier. I was a complete mess after my mother died, but I had that list of who to call, an action plan, if you will, and had her date of birth, the cemetery phone number, all those things that I couldn’t have named if you paid me once I lost her. It was a one-hour meeting at the funeral home and I was done, thank God. My brother and I made up the memory boards together, and took care of the flowers, and had loads of time to support Dad and each other.
It wasn’t easy to talk about it ahead of time but SO MUCH easier than after the fact, believe me.
Shirley
Dawn,
What a hard thing to go through in life. I can’t even begin to imagine. Hugs to you…and may you someday get to meet him in heaven.
Shirley
Thank you, Desperate Writer. My grandma is 97, and I know what you mean about the stories
but they are a blessing, too. I began to write them down one day and used the story of how her and my grandpa met in Rescued by Mr. Right (which came out last October). Hugs on the loss of your father…holding on to that knowledge of seeing loved ones again does give me a strong sense of peace.
Shirley
That was a lovely tribute–you really touched me. Big hug to you. I’m in those last years of a relationship with my mom, as she’s failing quickly. I try to remember to treasure each conversation, each kiss or laugh. I don’t know how I’ll deal with her loss, but I expect to feel something like you do. You sound like a good mother.
I lost my mother when I was 17 (she was 48). Now that I’m 49, I’ve started to think about her a lot and wonder what she’d be like now at age 80. I’d give anything to find out.
[...] Shirley, an absolutely beautiful tribute to your mother. ((((HUGS)))) [...]
Excellent tribute to your mom. Made me realize to be grateful for the sage advice from my mom on my 15 year old. At times, I’m almost in the mood to nail her bedroom door shut with her in there, then my mom reminds me I was not a whole lot of fun at that age either. Made me realize to be more understanding for those times when I get those annoying “did you see this?” calls or “read this” at the times I writing a great line or having a “serious discussion” with either one of my two (God give me strength, this too shall pass” teens..:smile:
May we all get to those days where the only conflicts are in the plots of stories..