My mother passed away from COPD on July 9. I have been emotionally stuck since then. I was on autopilot trying to plan family services, and then handling her final expenses. My birthday was on July 22, and I could not really enjoy myself. I just remember wishing that she was here to celebrate with me. My friends took me to the movies, and I was fine during the movie. Before the movies, I needed to talk to someone, but there was no one around, so I went to a church friend's house. My mother was dying and I was not there. I was at my pastor's birthday party. I came home to find her unconscious. She died 2 hours later. That last image of my mother still haunts me to this day. No one should see their parent like that. The last thing that my mother said to me was to buy some honey for tea and to have fun at church. She told me she loved me and took her medication. She would be dead by the end of the day. 

My father passed in January of 2015. I am the oldest, so planning the funeral and final stuff was on my shoulders. I didn't get a chance to grieve until June of that year. I just broke down in church, and had to leave. It was difficult to process that the last time that my father said to me was that I talk too much. I think that he was emotionally and spiritually drained after dealing with lung and throat cancer. He died in his sleep with a smile, but I was not there. I was on my way to hospice when the nurses called me and told me that he had passed away already. I never got to say goodbye to my parents.  Just typing this was painful, and I want to cry. But I know that that my parents are never truly gone. I believe that people live on in the people that they leave behind. I see my mother in my sister and niece, everything from the facial expression to salty tongue.