A Different Kind of Mother's Day

I look back to my first Mother’s Day, in 2003, the following morning my newborn baby would have his first open heart surgery. I held him all night long as he screamed and squirmed in my arms. He was starving because his body was in triple organ failure and the CTICU docs needed to minimize his energy expenditure so he could survive surgery. Digestion was too expensive in calculating his risk of survival.

My body was leaking the milk my baby desperately needed it. I understood why I couldn't feed him, but he never could. My son wanted my mother’s-milk, but all I could give him was my terrified heartbeat. I asked the nurse to clip a piece of his hair in case he wasn't alive the next evening. The next morning, we were told in no uncertain terms that his survival was uncertain. Yet here we are on my twenty-first Mother’s Day, but now I am facing a different pair of crises, of different degrees and dimensions. 

People who know me behind the scenes know that in March my mother-in-law, Karen, who I've known since I was seventeen, was diagnosed with Stage 4 pancreatic cancer. This is the same disease that Patrick Swayze, Alan Rickman, and Jerry Springer all had. With all of their resources and connections, well we know what happened there. Karen has shared her news publicly on Facebook in the past two weeks, so I am finally saying it here. It will be difficult to attend a Mother's Day gathering this Sunday knowing it is her last and our last with her. This isn't something debatable, of course. This isn't a cause for never giving up hope. This is merely a terribly uncomfortable moment to savor the dying light.

Western culture, especially US culture, has this ridiculous "thoughts and prayers," mentality that the bright side will appear before the film ends and the lights come on. I don't know why we do this to ourselves. It's not jaded to see grief for what it is, it is a gift. To always pretend there is hope is to rob ourselves of the reality that some things will simply pass, that they must, and hiding from loss means losing the opportunity to stand in the presence of grace. There is both pain and beauty, humility, and glory, all of it accompanies loss. The procession is solemn and holy, and it's a fools hope to wish that away. 

When I lost my own father in January 1997, he was 48 and I was 22. I just turned 49. I didn't have children yet when he died, and I was too young to understand how much his death impacted others around me. I had to tell my grandmother that her only child had died. . . and she comforted me.

Mothers are so much different from non-mothers of any gender, not because we are special, we are no different on the inside. Rather, we are different because transcendence is expected from us, and we do what is expected. Woe be to the mothers who fail to meet expectations, as they become their own form of social tragedy. To be a mother is to live in a constant state of pressure, but sometimes the pressure mounts to dangerous levels.

This Mother's Day, my husband is losing his mom, my children are facing the first really close loss in their lives, and my father-in-law is losing his beloved wife of 51 years. Then all the brother and sister in laws and nieces and nephews are losing such a vital and important guiding star. The communal grief is daunting. It hurts my heart. The need is so great, and I feel my own loss in the mix. This is a time to reflect. This is a time to lament. This is a time to savor the goodness in loving people even when the events are so bitterly painful.

And still . . . even more terrible things have happened on my side of the family. Unspeakable things done by and to someone who I've adored since the day she was born. I can't help but wonder if I had been her mother if things might have been different for her. I can't help but hurt for her mother, even though we are estranged due to her severe alcoholism. That story is a darker story, less natural, more tragic in how entirely unnatural and wrong it is; in how it didn't need to happen.

Someone I love is a murderer, someone I saw enter the world from her mother's womb is going to spend the rest of her life in prison, and I'm glad of it. She and the rest of us are all safer with her behind bars. Her own child will grow up never knowing her, and that is the best possible outcome, and it is horrible.

Again, we have no reason for hope. It was not self-defense. It was drug-fueled rage and mental illness. It is tragic, and it's all the more tragic because no one really cares about the man she killed, another transient drug addict, and society doesn't care to make things better for the mentally ill or their families . . . Please throw no more hopes and prayers at these tragic figures, imagining they will magically fix themselves. No, my friends, reality doesn't work that way. 

This all takes a toll, and it takes time to process. My sleep has been poor, my mind filled with memory and regret. I find myself losing track of time, losing track of my thoughts. My heart is beleaguered, and my soul is fatigued. These weights and the weights of everyday concerns, bills, taxes, stomach flu, and pet care are all a bit much at times. My attention has fractured. My work has suffered.

I am weathering a difficult season with as much grace as I can muster, and it simply has to be enough for the moment. The pain of the present is the mulch of resilience for the seeds of transcendence, and I will smile again. I will find the courage for these moments, and I will transcend them . . . eventually.

So, this Mother’s Day, don't think about my tragedies, instead think about your own loved ones and how beautiful the most banal moments of life really are. Remember that bad moments will come, must come, and while it's not pleasant, it is simply part of being a living human being. Please know that if you were kind enough to read this I am not preaching at you, but maybe I am reaching you as I convince myself of what I know to be true. Remember that every moment we have, difficult or deliriously dull, is a gift of grace and beauty. Sometimes, we just have to find the courage to look straight at it and say, "I still love you even though this hurts so much," before the light changes and a new season begins from this season's demise.

#mothersday2023 #loss #griefandloss