Mom doesn’t just cross my mind every now and then. In fact, I spend the majority of my time and energy trying to put my thoughts of her far enough to the back of my mind so that I am able to do life’s most mundane tasks.
Quite frankly, grief has exhausted me in this year. My every day life has been changed FOREVER because of the permanent removal of one person.
After losing family members in years past, I thought I understood grief and loss. Because I had lost. But losing my mom exposed me to facets of grief I could never imagine. Losing my mom has left this gaping black hole, that sucks away anything I try to use to soften the echo of my pain bouncing off of the walls.
Missing my mom has such permanence now that I am wondering whether I actually understood what it meant to miss something/someone before.
I know so many mean well but remembering the good times right now does me no good because I know there will never be anymore. Knowing she is proud of me is lovely but I am an affirmation lover so hearing it from her myself as I achieve would mean so much more.
Mom, no amount of ‘counting my blessings’ or ‘being positive and looking towards the future’ has calmed the sting of your death. I feel so betrayed that the world has continued to move without you. I’m so sad that people are living as if you didn’t just die. I’m actually a bit disgusted in myself too because I’ve been existing without you too. Like how?? How is this even possible? I can’t believe that in some ways I’ve just continued without you. The void is so clear. It’s so evident and it’s so hard but life has continued to go on, even when my life seem to have just stopped! The world has still continued to turn and so today I am even more angry, even more upset, even more empty, even more confused and even more lost than I was when you first died. I don’t know when or if these feelings will ever go away.
Ironically, Mother’s Day is round the corner (two days away to be exact) and my feelings around that are also confusing me. I don’t want it to come but in the same breath this is the first Mother’s Day that I get to celebrate being a mother to the most beautiful little girl I have ever bestowed my eyes upon. But I wanted to share that with you in the flesh and the reality is that I will never be able to do that.
So mom I miss you dearly. Pieces of Akeem and I died the afternoon that you slipped away. And you never really prepared us for the reality of a life without you. Probably because you hoped that we would never experience the pain you experienced when you lost your mom at our age. Every day it takes so much of me to not wish to be where you are right now.
All I want is my mom.
