Missing my Mom

I hate Mother's Day.  Even though I am a mother, this day is incredibly hard for me.

I hate seeing the advertising that screams, "Call your MOM!" and "Mom's Special Day."  It doesn't seem directed to me as much as it seems like a direct hit to my soul.  I have no mom anymore.  I have no one to call.  I know I am a mom, but still. 

I miss my mom.  There is no other way to describe it.  I simply miss her. She died two months after learning she had cancer. I was there when she died.  The hole that was left is still there. She died in October 1997. I remember every single moment. 

My daughter was born in March of 1999.  I missed my mom the whole time as I went through infertility treatments, through each month of my pregnancy, and of course, each year; no, each day of my daughter's life.  There is something missing from my daughter's life.  And it is my mom.

My mother would know what to say to her now, as a teen going through teen things.  She would advise me what to do.  She would hug us and tell us we were fine.  I need those words so badly. I really do. I don't feel fine. I need her so much.

My mom was not perfect.  No mom is.  But the love, when real and raw, can be perfect, if only in hindsight.

I hope my daughter misses me when I am gone.  My hearts breaks for all those girls, and are we not just all girls, no matter how old we get? Anyway, my heart bleeds for all those girls who have a mother to see, but who cannot be touched.

So what are we to do, the unmothered?  None of us are totally motherless, otherwise we would not be here.  But so many of us are unmothered.  Either because of death or something like a living death.  It is all heartbreaking.

Sometimes I look at old pictures of my mom.  I wonder what she was thinking, who she was inspired by, who she hated, who she revered.  I never thought to ask those questions, always seemingly caught up in my own world, looking inward at myself.  And always thinking there would be more time.

I wish I knew then to ask.  So many regrets.  So much time I thought we would have together.

But then time ran out.

It makes me think of my own daughter, lost in her own world as well.  I am much more demonstrative with her, more open, spend much more time with her than my own mother ever did with me.  But that was not out of any lack of love or understanding. It was just the way it was back then.  And it is just the way I am now.  No accusations.  No, not at all.  I am who I am because of her. 

Anyway, to all you moms who no longer have moms, I wish you a very Happy Mother's Day.  You are not alone.  We all grieve and celebrate and move on.

It is what our mothers would have wanted. 


Happy Mother's Day Mom.

A little girl, asked where her home was, replied, "where mother is."
~Keith L. Brooks

Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell.
~Edna St Vincent Millay