New Year, still no you... From a motherless daughter

Holidays are really difficult for me.  They are filled with fading memories and the ache of her absence.  The funny thing is, my mom had a way of owning every single holiday.  She was born on the 4^th of July and owned that with pride.  I can still see her smiling face lit up by the bursting of fireworks.  I think even as an adult she believed they were partly for her.  She owned, and still owns, that holiday. 

She will forever in my mind own Thanksgiving as it was her favorite holiday.  I will never forget the way she would fight everyone for turkey skin and “her flap” of skin.  You know, the flap of skin where the neck is and there’s always a little stuffing under?  Yeah, that was, and still is, “her flap”.  She always hovered over the turkey, driving my grandpa crazy, stealing as much crispy skin as possible while it was being carved.  Even though every Thanksgiving there was always some sort of argument or some sort of crazy unexpected thing happen, she always made it special.  She owns Thanksgiving.

At Christmas she always tried to stick to a budget, but since gift-giving was her love-language, she always went overboard.  She always got a glimmer in her eye watching anyone open the gifts she picked out, because she was a master gift-giver.  She could always pick out the perfect “I know you” gift.  She was the queen of finding a gift that was not on any wish list but was The. PERFECT. Gift.  And she always knew what was in every wrapped present for her.  She had a crazy sense about these things.  One year my dad wrapped presents in boxes that wouldn’t give away what it was.  For example, the movie Titanic was in a box almost as big as I was, and she knew what it was.  This particular year she shook a box and said, “this is the left speaker to my new car audio system.”  And it was.  She shook another box and said, “this is my new Bible.”  And it was.  And so on.  She was a gifted gift-giver and gift-receiver.  And she always had a child-like excitement about Christmas.  She owns Christmas.  I know she would enjoy spending it with my kids.

New Year’s Eve was my parent’s anniversary.  I am sure she did this on purpose just to own another holiday.  And probably another excuse to get presents right after Christmas, but there she had it.  She owned another holiday.  Some years they celebrated it out of the house, but a lot of the years they spent New Year’s Eve with Megan and I.  We would have a special meal and watch the ball drop.  They always played their wedding song “Here and Now” by Luther Vandross and it was special.  Time with her was always special.  Her giggle and her smile, the way she always got what she wanted, the way she cared about others.  She still owns New Year’s Eve.

I am standing on the cliff, the ending of 2016, peering into the valley of unknown.  I am not sure what 2017 will bring, but I am hesitant to venture into it without her.  How do I go another year without her?  Will this heartache follow me into the coming year?  How do I continue on in life without her words of wisdom and tough love?  Her gentleness and caring?  My friends have these moms that they can talk to, that care about them, that feed them, that hold them.  The last time I held her hand it was ice cold.  Her face didn’t look like her anymore.  I remember stroking her hair because that was the only recognizable thing in that casket. 

It all happened so suddenly…it all felt like an out of body experience.  And I cannot move past it.  I am not any more healed now than I was that day.  I am not in any less shock now than the day I walked in that house and knew her body was upstairs.  We are almost at 6 years later and I am still stuck.  I am a motherless daughter who desperately needs her mommy.  I need her voice in my life, I need her presence in my life. 

A new year, but it is already filled with despair.  It is already filled with emptiness.  A new year, but she will never be part of it.  The ache will never disappear.

I miss you, mom.  I ache for you, mom.  I need you, mom.  

Drowning in despair

 

 

I am paralyzed, overwhelmed, I am drowning and alone.  The cold water rushes over me and is causing my muscles to tighten, and I am unable to fight.  I can barely see the sky any more, I am unable to make out where the life sustaining air meets the water. I have no hope of breath entering my lungs.  I have the burning sensation of water enveloping my organs, filling me with the cold, beckoning me to certain death.  Water is weighing me down with life and pulling me farther from the warmth, farther from who I am, farther from existence.

 

Water was once a sense of refreshment, a place of cleansing, a place to be renewed.  Water was once welcome here, but that is before the tears of loneliness took over.  That is before I began to drown in my own sorrow.  That is before everyone turned away, leaving me cold, broken, and alone.  The judgmental looks from others pushed me further under the surface, though they might not have recognized it, they stripped me of hope and dignity.

 

I am unrecognizable.  I am purple and frozen, just the shadow of someone who was once vibrant.  Here I am, sinking into the chasm of regret and loneliness, and my heart is beating slower by every painful moment.  I am numb yet in pain all at the same time.  I am whole yet shattered into pieces.  I know not my name, I have no identity.  I know not my purpose as I am plummeting to my end.  It is too late for me.  There is nothing left here.  I am just a lifeless shell of someone who once tried too hard and failed at every step. 

 

 

My best friend...

Having a best friend has been one of the best things that has ever happened to me.  Little did I know that there apparently are people in this world that might not be blood relatives but are actually family.  I have a couple of people in my life who qualify as family in my book, and one person (other than my husband) who qualifies as my best friend.  I love her like my sister, and we complement each other in every way.  We are so alike in so many ways but are opposites in all of the right ways.  I truly believe that she is my best-friend-soul-mate, if that is even a thing.  Onlookers don’t understand what we have and that’s ok, they don’t have to.  This is our relationship, it’s our thing. 

We have this relationship where if she calls me upset, I am on my way to her house before she even gets three words out.  As soon as I hear the panic, pain, or stress in her voice nothing else matters and I just go.  It’s instinctual.    I even saved her life this way once because what she thought was a panic attack was actually her body starting to go into anaphylaxis from an allergic reaction.  We just know each other.  We can sense when things are wrong.  She does the same thing for me and will come at a moment’s notice if something horrible is happening.  We have this give and take co-dependency and we both know when to ask questions and talk it out, and when to just show up and be silent. 

When she is excited about something I celebrate with her.  Imagine teenage girly squeals on each side of the phone.  That is us to a T.  We both know how hard the other one works for things and we both know each other’s struggles.  When one of us has succeeded, we both have succeeded because we both put in the blood, sweat, and tears to get there.  When we moved she spent weeks helping me pack my house, when she was stressed I cleaned her whole house.  We grocery shop together, we talk every day.  We cheer each other on both in person and from afar.  I don’t need to compete with her, I don’t feel insecure when she succeeds I just feel joy and pride. 

The same goes when she is upset or hurt.  I have laid awake at night sobbing because of things she has gone through.  And I know she cries with and for me, as well. When she is broken, so am I.  When something happens to her, it is as if it is happening to me.  There have been times when my heart is so heavy and I feel so helpless because all I want to do is fix something but I can’t.  And I know that when I have been broken or hit hard times she is exactly the same way. I ache when she is in pain.

We both also get very protective over each other.  If someone hurts me she goes on a warpath, and I am the same way.  This is ironic because neither of us like confrontation, but both of us would fight to the death for each other.  When I forgive someone who has hurt me, it takes her longer to forgive that person and the same goes for me.  When I know someone has hurt her, or taken advantage of her, or has even just not been nice to her I want revenge.  I have a fierce desire to protect her and make sur that she never feels that way again.  She is exactly the same way.  Sometimes I giggle when she tells me how mad she is about something that I have already let go, but it’s comforting to know that someone has my back.  And that I have hers. 

For years we have told each other everything about our families, our childhoods, our marriages, our children.  For years we have held each other’s secrets,  hopes,  fears, and  insecurities.  There’s no judgment here.  There’s no condemnation.  Sometimes we ask for advice, sometimes we get unwanted advice, sometimes we just get a listening ear.  But we both keep coming back because she is one of the only people in my life that I trust fully.  She is one of the only people in my life who truly loves me unconditionally and I love her just as unconditionally. 

I literally pray that someday my daughters find a friendship like ours.  As a mom I know that I will always be close with my kids and that nobody can take that away.  I hope and pray that they find a best friend who will love them unconditionally, who will cry with them, laugh with them, celebrate with them, scold them, help them, keep their secrets,  and fight for them. 

My mom’s heartbeat in women’s ministry before she passed away was to help women find authentic relationships with each other.  She help found “knitted hearts” groups where these women could seek such relationships and nurture them.  This is exactly what I have with my best friend.  Our hearts are truly knitted together and my mom would be so happy we have each other.  My mom would love her because I do, my mom would pursue a relationship with her because she is so important to me.  And my mom would encourage our genuine friendship.  I deeply wish that my mom had met her, but I am so grateful God sent her to me when He did.  I found her not long after my mom died.  I was in a bad place and felt so very alone and my best friend just landed in my life almost by chance and it has been one of the best things to ever happen to me.  I could never imagine life without her, and I don’t want to.  

Chains of my own

There are days where I feel like I walk around with a sign over my head which points out my failures and mistakes. I carry the weight of my shame and shortfalls on my shoulders, feeling burdened and overwhelmed.  The heaviness of my choices leaves me breathlessly believing that I am unlovable, unworthy, and unwanted.  My expectation is that people will not accept me for who I am, yet I have the unrealistic hope that I will be. 

I tend to shut the world out, to not attend social events, and to generally keep to myself.  When I do get together with other people I tend to nervously chatter, and I second guess myself the entire time.  Oops, did I cut her off?  Did I say too much?  Why did I say anything at all?  I bet they’ll be relieved when I leave.  Am I missing social cues?  Do I come across as awkward?  Are all some of the thoughts running through my head.

I long to break free from this feeling, I long to feel like I have something, anything, to offer.  I have passions and goals, but I honestly am afraid that I will never be able to truly accomplish any of them.  I feel stuck in this incredibly lonely place of self-doubt.  On one hand I know that I have what it takes, and I am confident in my abilities, but on the other hand, I feel as if nobody else will ever be able to see my potential.  And, even when I do happen to feel a smidge of confidence, I still tend to doubt my own abilities.

I have been in school for psychology because I want to be a marriage and family counselor, but more than that, I have a heart for teen moms.  This is a passion of mine, and if I start talking about all of the reasons why, I will begin to rant, so I just won’t go there right now.  That being said, I have had it on my heart for a long time that I want to start a teen girls ministry within our youth group at church.  There are a lot of aspects involved and I have this entire dream of what it would look like and what I would want to do.  I get excited talking about it, and I am all fired up.  But then it hits me.  I remember all of the choices that I have made, I remember the devastating mistakes that define me  and I realize that I am not a role model.  I have no place in ministry of any kind.  I do not belong there. 

I sit at play group with these moms that I really love and admire, most of which are involved in different kinds of ministry and I feel so inadequate.  Not because any of them make me feel this way intentionally, they are sweet, loving, accepting, women whom I really love; but I sit there and just know that I am not spiritually in the same place as them right now.  None of them would make the ginormous mistakes I have made.  They can sit there and say that all sin is the same, but if I laid voice to the things I have said and done I can only imagine how that would change. 

I am the greatest of sinners.  When I screw up, I go big.  I just don’t know how to get past it.  I dream of being on staff at church, helping these girls the way that my heart is fired to do.  But I am in chains in the prison of my own sin and shame, shackled to the bare earth around me.  I am cold and alone, I am my own undoing.