As young girls, we are conditioned to look forward to certain rites of passage. The ‘sweet’ sixteen party, the prom, THE proposal, our wedding day and the day we become a mother. We’re seemingly programmed to pursue that amazing transformation from girl to woman and then from woman to mother.
Becoming a mother is such a powerful turning point in our lives. Motherhood bestows many gifts, among them unconditional love, confidence, and a fierce protective instinct. We would go to the ends of the earth for our children. The bond is stronger than anything we’ve ever experienced before.
The day we birth our first child, any child, that very special day we become someone’s mommy, is forever etched in our memory. Women tell their birth stories over and over and remember them into their twilight years even when other memories have faded. We recall as if it were yesterday hearing their first cry, seeing them for the first time, holding them for the first time. There are so many firsts, and seconds, and hundredths. We hope…
I vividly remember the day Meghan came into my life. The second born of a twin set, younger than her brother by only four minutes. She arrived into this world feet first and feisty. If only we realized then she was simply showing us how she did things HER way. She ran the roost over her parents and her two brothers her brief three years with us and oddly, no one seemed to mind. Well, except for those (many) days we wanted to sleep, just for a few hours… oh how I look back on those sleepless nights holding her as an infant in my arms with bittersweet memories.
Birth days are memorable for sure. Death days are, too. Painfully so. I, too, remember that day vividly. So much so that when I allow myself to really remember, it brings back visceral feelings, raw emotion and a pain in my chest I never want to feel again. How I survived the shock, I’ll never know. The day Meghan left my life was traumatic on many levels, that goes without saying.
Anniversaries of any kind are days of recognition. Typically, they are of happy days and events in one’s life. Anniversaries of a death, especially of the death of your own child are the most painful on every level. Some ignore them or busy themselves so as to avoid the pain. Others choose to be present in it. There is no right way, only your way.
Mother’s day. This day is different. It’s a day to celebrate mothers. To honor them for their amazing work of growing, birthing and parenting their children, long after they’ve left the nest and become parents of their own. We never stop being mothers. We never understand that until we become a mom ourselves. It is a day unlike any other, when children thank their mothers for the self-sacrificing 24/7 job they do thanklessly most days of the year. Not that the gratitude is not there, it’s just not expressed as often as mom might need or want it to be.
If you are a mother and you have a child that has died, this day takes on a different meaning. It’s one of those ‘trigger’ days for many of us. A day when we are painfully aware one of our children is no longer with us, that there is a hole in our heart, soul and family. While we may celebrate with our other children, it is dulled by the pain of loss of the one who is not here with us physically. Oh how we would give anything to have them with us again.
I was surprised that first Mother’s Day how much I dreaded it’s dawn. How the day couldn’t end fast enough. How I didn’t want to celebrate it, at all. I just wanted to pull the covers over my head and wake up the next day. I felt like the ultimate failure as a mother. After only 3 short years, I failed Meghan. I didn’t protect her as much as I could have and her dresser fell on her and took her life in an instant and on what should have been a happy day just a week before Christmas, I had to say goodbye to her. Because of something I could’ve prevented. The guilt is so overwhelming if I allowed myself to dwell on it, I’d never survive.
My job was simple it seemed. Protect my babies. Facilitate their growth and learning, teach them to spread their wings and fly when the time was right. I never wanted them to have the wings of an angel. Yet here I was, missing my baby, my only daughter, Ry-Ry’s other half, literally. I was cranky and irritable all day. I fought back tears constantly and when I finally let them fall, at the cemetery, alone, sitting on the spot beneath which her body lays in its small white casket with angels on the corners, it was in uncontrollable mournful sobs. You’d have thought Hoover Dam sprung a leak. Then, I looked to the heavens and saw to my amazement a cloud in the shape of a heart. I smiled through my tears. Could it be a sign? A coincidence? Most would say yes, but I say no, because it’s happened many, many times since. You might call me crazy, but I don’t believe in coincidence.
Mother’s Day is again approaching. It’s my 6th Mother’s Day without Meghan. That blows my mind. How can that much time have passed? I’ve two wonderful boys still here with me on earth to celebrate with. Yet with it still 6 days away, I find myself already becoming anxious. I find myself resisting the urge to downplay the day, to spend it alone to avoid the pain and part of me still wants to pull the covers over my head and wake up when it’s over.
The reality is it will never be ‘over’. I am a mother every day. I am Meghan’s mother every day. Not a day goes by that I don’t think of her, miss her, love her. Every day is mother’s day. Just because the calendar and greeting card companies deem a Sunday in May ‘official’, us moms know it’s 24/7/365. It doesn’t matter if our children are here with us or have left us in some way, even in death. They are still our children. We are still their mommies. We love them as much as if they were still here and wish with all our being that they were.
So instead, this year, I shall follow my own tradition that began that first year quite unpredictably and unexpectedly. I will visit Meggie’s “special place” at the cemetery. Alone. I will bring my computer and I will write to her. I will bring her a gift to thank her for the things she taught me about being a mommy. I will cry. Hell, I am crying now. I will smile through the tears as I think of her insistent voice, her beautiful face and her gorgeous blue eyes that expressed wisdom beyond her years. I will thank her for all she’s given and taught me in her life and in her death. And maybe, just maybe, I will find a heart in the sky or feel the breath of an angel when I need it most.
So please, honor your mother and other mothers you know. And if you know someone who has lost a child, give that woman the greatest gift. Say something to her about her child that has died. Say their name and share a memory. Honor that child and their mother, on this, one of the most difficult of days for her. Don’t be afraid of her tears. Embrace her and honor her for whatever she is feeling. Provide a safe place for her to just be. No expectations. Just love. For that is what brings about her tears. It’s all about love.
Peace and Happy Mother’s Day.
Kim, proud mommy to Meghan, Ryan, and Kyle
