I’m nearing the four year mark of my mother’s passing. In a couple months time the anniversary of her death will arrive, as will the insurmountable grief that comes along with this darkened day on the calendar.
Knowing the incoming pain, I try to prepare myself. I sit outside and find the calm and quiet the outside air provides. I start talking to her. It’s a one-sided conversation but I’m used to that transformation.
“Well, mom, I guess I better start accepting that life is going to be different. Different than I dreamed and planned and hoped for. I need to start creating magic with what’s left and stop waiting for a different outcome. Things cannot be changed in ways I wish they could. I can’t bring you back so I need to start adapting to my new way, the one where you hold a different space. The one where you’re invisible but I swear with all my might you’re still in.”
The wind picks up as my words pause. I take a deep breath and continue my conversation, the one that includes only my voice and words.
“Everything changed when you stopped breathing and I’ve been waiting for things to change back, or make sense, or feel better. They haven’t. Time has shifted the sharp stabbing pain of your absence but it hasn’t eliminated it. I realize now that your absence has and will continue to morphe things into new paths, creations and futures whether we accept or like them. So now, four years later, I’m tackling the changes and going to start creating purpose with them.”
Tears fall. I wipe them as the constant stream of ache lingers. I continue with a whisper…
“While time has eased the paralyzing pain of grief, it’s intensified the amount in which we miss you. You’re loved with an intensity that exceeds measure or comprehension. I know you taught me never to hate things, but I hate that you’re not here. I’ll never get used to seeing your name in stone or the chair that used to be filled with your love and presence but now remains empty. I’ll never stop wishing you were here.”
As the birds chirp and my heart skips a beat from the heartbreak, I finish my words meant for her and for heaven….
“You used to tell us that you ‘loved us to the moon and back’ and it felt like the biggest and best love. It felt like infinity until we realized that there was a place far beyond the moon, a place you journeyed to, a place called heaven. So mom, I pray and hope and wish that you can hear us as I say…”
“We love you beyond the moon and beyond eternity. We love you with the biggest and best love there is, the kind that’s limitless. We love you to heaven and back. Always and forever.”
You might also enjoy…
LOST IN THE LAST GOODBYE: https://hopeandharshrealities.com/lost-in-the-last-goodbye/
LESSONS ON THE WAY TO A FUNERAL: https://hopeandharshrealities.com/lessons-on-the-way-to-a-funeral/
These are absolutely beautiful and true! I just lost my youngest of three daughters, she was 22. Then 11 weeks later my dad has a stroke and my mother was in hospital with sepsis from a leg amputation. The day I picked my father up my mom went on life support and we sat with her till her last breath. Did the same with grandmother. I’m an only child with hardly anyone but my two daughters. The grief is slowly killing me
Robin, I’m holding you in the light today. Lifting you in comfort, love and hope. xox, Chels