Dear Mom,
It’s been a year since you left us. I am
continually amazed at how much I miss you. I’ve wanted to pick up the phone so many
times to share something that was going on in my life. Feels so odd — I never thought
to call just to share when you were here.
So many things touch me in deep places now and I
know it’s because of you. I find myself crying a lot — at little things. A word
on a TV show, a passage in a book, seeing children with their moms or just because. Tears
have always been so hard for me. You never taught me how to cry. You taught me how to
withhold my feelings and be strong on the outside. I can only imagine what is was like for
you all the years you held in your own emotions. I thank you, Mom, for releasing me from
that lesson and, in your passing, for allowing me the opportunity to grow more fully into
accepting my feelings as real, as difficult and uncomfortable as it is sometimes.
There are still some things I remember you teaching
me or saying to me I will probably never agree with. I was angry about them for a long
time. There are other things in which I can see your wisdom — hindsight is so clear!
For those I can now thank you. Through it all though, I know you were always doing your
best for me and the rest of the family. You lived your life based on a truth I do not yet
know. That weekend you left us was the weekend I was going to ask you so many questions
about who you were. I missed that and am just now, after one year, getting past the anger
of you leaving so suddenly.
There are no mistakes. It was time for you to pass
on and I honor that. I can even stop feeling cheated because I know you are with me still
and, when I am quiet, I can hear you and sometimes even feel you. I know you loved me in
life and your love continues from the other side. I know you worried about me and wanted
me only to be happy, whatever that meant. I didn’t always understand that when you
were here…and I didn’t tell you how much I love you nearly enough. I’m not
sure I even knew. I was caught up in my own ego and my own life to pay much attention to
others. Yet you always had time to talk to me when I did call and you reached out to me
often. Sometimes I didn’t have time to talk and I cut our conversations short. I
often felt we didn’t have a common language to have an extended conversation. What I
didn’t see was we were both coming from different directions to the same desire. We
both wanted to have a relationship and never quite made it to that common place.
Except that one call when I shared a deep personal
hurt with you and I exposed my vulnerability to you (probably for the first time). All you
said was you wanted me to be happy and whatever I decided to do, you’d still love me.
I think I felt closer to you in that moment then ever before. It was a beginning of change
for me…change in our relationship and change in myself. I felt your love more
powerfully in that one conversation and it was my catalyst for wanting more.
Then you were gone. I’m sorry for all the hurt
and pain my actions caused you, Mom. Some was out of my own ego; some without my
understanding of how my choices were affecting you; some out of anger toward you and some
out of allowing myself to be controlled by other people’s wishes.
I know you are in a place now where you see truth
clearly and there is nothing I can say to surprise you. I am stronger now, more aware and
more willing to live my own truth — your truth. I still have much learning ahead of
me and find comfort in knowing you are still with me even if I can’t call you on the
telephone or hug you and tell you I love you.
Happy Mother’s Day, Mom. I love you!
A
Letter To My Mother
