Since you’ve been gone

She’s been gone for four years and four months.

Thanks to a GriefShare class that I took, my heart has accepted the loss–the massive loss, the huge void and the reality that my mom and I won’t have another conversation again this side of heaven.

The lump in my throat comes and goes. Sometimes when I feel it getting harder to swallow, I close my eyes and open the door…to feelings, to memories, to playing her voice in my head like an old tape recorder. Other times, I know that the grief may swallow me whole and I gently push it to the side until I can revisit it in a more sacred space.

I was fortunate to have a 12-day warning that her life here on earth was winding down. We got to sit next to each other and talk. I got to wash her hair and massage her hands and feet with lavender lotion. And I was there when she announced she was ready to go to hospice. But it doesn’t matter how many years, months, hours or minutes you are given (and sometimes we are given no warning), nothing can really prepare you for the final goodbye. No one can explain what life will be like after when you would give anything to have just one more conversation.

I feel like the first four years post-mom were a lot about learning to let my heart receive healing. I had to let go of a list of regrets I had, many from the last 12 days because I wasn’t aware of the timeline and thought we would have some time at home after she was discharged from the hospital. I have also had to surrender a fear of losing my dad. And in the mix of all of this, I lost my brother (and didn’t get to say goodbye) a year ago, unexpectedly, and that kind of knocked the wind out of me as I found myself grieving all over again. 

But something beautiful has happened this year as I have fought hard to embrace and also release grief which can sometimes be a delicate balance. As I have allowed myself to remember how much I loved my mom (and my brother), I started noticing that my grief was turning into a deeper love for them. It’s almost like a refining of sorts–transforming one thing into something more useful and valuable by removing unwanted components. As I let go of things like regrets and disappointments (mostly in myself) and the lists of things I wish I would have said or not said, they are replaced with beautiful memories focused on the amazing time we spent together, the deep and meaningful connections we had, and the conversations that strengthened my faith and my desire to share it with others. 

I continually choose to trade sorrow for sweet memories,

Disappointments for gratitude of decades of connection and relationship,

Grief for appreciation of mutual love that we shared and that grew deeper with time,

And a deep void for a full heart that can continue to grow in love and wonder of what I had with them.

I realized recently that my love for my mom and brother has grown since they left and I couldn’t really understand it at first. But then it dawned on me that they are alive in Jesus and that as I think about a sweet reunion with them one day, my heart explodes with anticipation and I can literally feel my heart expanding. I love the idea of making more space for loving them. The truth is, I continue to reflect on and realize the depth of the things they taught me, realizing that I took a lot for granted while they were still alive. They live on not only in memories, but in who I am because of them!

I’ll end with a little story. My mom and I absolutely loved shopping together. We would laugh because I’m a sucker for good deals and she was someone who was laser focused on what she needed/wanted and if it happened to be on sale, that was a plus. When I’m missing her a lot I love to go to one of our shops and pick out a little gift that reminds me of her. Tonight I stopped at Goodwill and found the most precious gift–a Christkindlmarket mug. Every year before Christmas we would visit the Christkindlmarket in downtown Denver and my mom loved it so much (her dad was in the military and she went to high school in Germany). God couldn’t have given me a more precious gift and then, when I got home, I discovered the cherry on top. The mug was dated 2021, the year my mom passed away and the first year we had to go without her. It was a reminder that God sees our hearts and is gracious and kind to send a little reminder that He loves us and has compassion for us. And it was both what I wanted and also a really good deal, which of course made me smile. 🙂

If you know someone who could benefit from this post, please share. God carved out a path of intense healing for me and I would like to share it with as many people who need or want to hear.