Mom's passing
I'd like to use this journal to periodically process some of my feelings about losing my mom a week ago. Mom made it 10 11:50 PM on April 16; ten more minutes and it would have been my birthday. I kind of wish it had been my birthday, because it would have felt like things had come full-circle, and I don't like knowing that not only did I lose her, but that I then had to immediately go through my first birthday without her. I will miss her playful birthday teasing, "38 years ago today I was heading to the hospital...!" Every year, every birthday.
My DS friends and community have been tremendously supportive, and I don't have the words to show my appreciation. So many of you have kept in me prayers and sent notes to me, and some of you even provided flowers for her memorial. The donations many of you have provided (and will provide) will go to support our spiritual healing retreat next year, and I hope you will all come back!
Losing my mom has been hard because she was a good mom and I had a happy childhood. I don't have awful stories of turmoil from my youth. I never had to hide from a parent's anger, I never had to fear my friends' seeing things happening in our home. I think that losing a good parent might be harder because it ends 39 years of memories I want to keep.
Mom made sure that my sister and I believed that the purpose of life is to uplift the worth of all other life, not to accumulate status and products. As such, she instilled in us a commitment to peace and healthy social change for all. To her, this wasn't a political maxim, it was what guided her to hug someone who was crying, befriend the sad, uplift the self-hating, and include the outcast. Never once did she turn away from another's need because it was too painful for her to bear; she was not selfish with her spirit like that. While many people around her attracted more attention and glamor, mom just humbly perevered, actually doing the work of loving, healing, and allying with the bruised and brokenhearted of the world.
Her death was a good death, which may sound strange until I explain it. Before her surgery, we had chances to express ourselves to her and to hear her words to us. My son, River, hand-wrote her a letter to her the night before her hospitalization that told her how joyful she made him feel, that he will always remember their jokes, that he doesn't love her because of the things she buys him but because she helps him like himself more, and that she is the silliest old woman he'd ever met. None of us has that "I wish I could have said..." regret.
Mom never recovered from the ICU, and wasn't even aware of the passing of time. On Thursday, April 15, her breathing tube was removed and ver health signs were improving. She was happy and had visitors. On Friday, her deteriorated systems collapsed, and she was sedated. When she died, then, she was in no pain, surrounded byher best friends and husband, after a final day of happy visiting. She had even disclosed that if she ever came to this point in her health, this would have been her choice too.
One of mom's final acts at home was to gather and discard journals she never wanted us to find. These dated to her time in therapy for depression when I was very young. Mom felt useless and insecure about herself, and became angry easily with my hyperactivity, and she took my own mercurial personality personally. In counseling, she wrote and processed her feelings, and to this day I don't remember turmoil or distress in my childhood. I suspect these are the journals she destroyed so that we would never be burdened by the discovery of her depressed thoughts, especially since she didn't feel that way anymore. Mom was truly happy, and was the first to affirm the fullness and richness of her own life.
I don't know how to respond to her loss. I'm confused because I don't feel as distraught as I think one would. I'm not unhappoy about the circumstances of her death, and I don't feel like we had unfinished business to reconcile, I just miss her. Mom helped me see that ours is not the only pain that matters, and that our responsibility is to care for and embrace the life around us.
More later.
Replies
I echo the comments here too. Your mom was an amazing person, and I never got to meet her. I think all one needs to do is to look at you and your sister, see how you both have \"love in action\" in your lives, and that is a direct reflection of her. She lives on in your actions, and you should be proud, she is!!
Hugs
I can say these things with pride:
I am glad that after facing adversity, I did not become bitter and scornful and hateful toward those who could have easily become targets for it. I know what it\'s like to feel betrayed by someone you\'ve only uplifted and encouraged and seen power and hope in. I don\'t think a single person here could quote a single vicious, cruel, unkind, or hostile thing I\'ve EVER said about such a person; my comments have been kind and graceful even through loss and pain. I am glad my mom did not see me become calloused and venomous; it would have pierced her. I am glad she saw me persist with compassion, even acknowledgment of my own faults and mistakes. I am happy with my response to my trauma, and see it as a testimonial to her. I never saw her become hateful toward anyone, and if I had done so it would have been a rebuke of her best traits.
I am happy that mom taught me not to be careless with my memories. I collect and treasure bits of my past. I write about, draw, story-tell, and reminisce about many experiences of mine. I\'ve been careful not to leave too much childhood behind. One of my critics told me (with spite) that I seemed to her to be a \"child in an adult\'s body,\" but she had no idea that this was a complimentary thing. My children have never had to fear family wrath, violence, or abandonment. My house does not sound tense, it sounds like laughter, peace, safety, companionship, encouragement, and play. Oh, and space battles--it sounds like space battles. My children have happy childhoods; betrayal pain has not touched them. If it takes a child within an adult to father this way, then count me in.
Mom didn\'t have to approach the end of her life with regrets. In fact, she wrote a letter before her surgery in which she recounts her adventures and joys, and concludes \"I have had a full, happy life.\" Even during the turmoil of my childhood difficulty, she sought help and made changes so that I would not grow up in a conflicted household. She sought counseling and parenting help, and it worked. There are no \"should haves\" in my recollection of her parenting. I was not abused, I was not mistreated, I was encouraged and supported, even when it made me weird.
\"even when it made me weird\"
I certainly like this brand of weirdness. I think you should feel so proud that you can hold onto your compassionate nature. It has certainly been tested. When I struggle with certain spiteful/hurting people and it tests my own patience and compassion, you are one of the people I think of to remind me to look past initial anger or thoughts of giving up.
You have also taught me to stand my ground where it is needed. So I thank you and your wonderful mother for giving you these gifts and showing you how to use them.
Matt, what a blessing to be able to say those things.
I\'ve watched you walk through this past year and have appreciated how open you have been with us about your pain caused by a betrayal that is still incomprehensible to me. Until I found out about it, that one person\'s survivor letter was like a lifeline to me. \"Someday I will be able to believe this,\" I would tell myself. So it wasn\'t just with detached interest that I watched your reactions.
I would have understood anger, bitterness, denial, put on a happy face -- but I got to see you live out exactly what you believe in a very transparent way, without minimizing your hurt. Now I know that the stuff you wrote in RAR wasn\'t just for us. It was your heart.
I love how you describe the sounds in your home. Having met your wonderful boys, I can just imagine it. And that child within you? It\'s a big part of what makes you feel safe to us. To be able to see ourself through your unjaded kid eyes, to be silly and playful with you -- that felt healing to me. So did watching River\'s sweet face as he worked on his quilt square. Because of the way he\'s being raised, because of your mom and you and Tonya, I have no doubt that he will grow up to be one of the good guys.
My words at mom\'s memorial:
http://files.me.com/akicita/i18ebp
Flute playing at mom\'s memorial:
http://files.me.com/akicita/wgji2a
I listened to your flute and in my mind I saw eagles soaring over a canyon on currents of air. Dipping and soaring and dancing one above the other and sometimes side by side, the mother eagle ever watchful of her son.