What I’ve learned so far from this process, is that it’s very personal, and the nuts and bolts of it is different for each person experiencing it.  I have also realized that after the initial period of darkness, and you can get back into some sense of normal routine, the grief will still sneak up on you and slap you down when you least expect it.  When this happens, I’ve found it best to just go with it.  Stop the task at hand and just….feel.  Sometimes I will whither and sob for half an hour, sometimes it will only last a minute or so.  Sometimes the feeling of sadness will continue for the rest of the day, and sometimes it will be replaced with happy remembrance.

Thanksgiving was tolerable.  We had 14 people in our house so there were plenty of distractions.  No one talked about the space unfilled.  We didn’t toast to her.  I don’t know why.  Maybe because we were just enjoying each other’s company and we didn’t want to be sad.  It wasn’t until that night that her absence sunk in and I needed to let the waves of emotion  roll over me.

As Christmas approaches, I have had more frequent emotional experiences, for obvious reasons.  Mom LOVED Christmas.  Giving gifts was quite possibly her favorite thing, ever.  Every year, I begged her to cool it on the amount of gifts she bought for my kids, and every year, she ignored me.  Every year, I begged her to not buy gifts for Craig and I, and every year, she ignored me.  Stockings?  Good gravy, that woman could find the most random stocking stuffers.  [See here for a post on "Christmas Stuff" from last year]  We’ve had single chocolate truffles wrapped in wrapping paper, soaps in the shape of Christmas-y things, small plastic reindeer that “pooped” out jelly beans, and the traditional comic books.  My kids would receive stockings (separate from the ones they have at our house) literally stuffed with little things.  She even brought stockings for Craig and I.  Last year, I got a mini-bottle of Sauvignon Blanc.  I mean, that was awesome, but totally unnecessary.  The long and short of Christmas is, it was my Mom’s most favorite time of year.  I know she got so much pleasure out of shopping for everyone and thinking about the moment we would open the gift and ooh and aah over it.

This year, Christmas will feel much more empty, quiet.  The stockings won’t be nearly as fat.  The number of colorful packages under the tree won’t be nearly as much.  It’s what I kept asking for, but I didn’t want to gain it this way.

September 28th, 2011, at approximately 8:10pm Eastern Standard Time, she finally went home.

There’s so much to say and yet when I try and sit down to write about it, I find myself at a loss.  This grief is so deep, it penetrates to the marrow of my bones.  When I weep, it feels like my seams are coming undone.  When the sorrow begins, it won’t be choked down, it’s too strong, and so it boils up my throat and spills out.  Wave after wave of it.

There are moments when I want to pick up the phone and tell her something….and then I remember.

I wanted to tell her about everyone who came to her memorial.  I wanted to tell her what lovely things people said.  But she’s not here to listen.

My brain is covered in fine cotton.  The details of everday life and routine can’t be remembered as easily these days.

I want to tell you about her last month.  Her last days.  I will.  But the cotton covering my gray matter is not allowing me.  Soon….

This is the facebook status I just posted:  I can’t express the experience of this weekend.  So many emotions, raw, deep, horrible, wonderful, heartbreaking and uplifting.  I am a puddle of goo right now, desperately trying to get my bones to keep me upright.  Oh bones, don’t fail me!  Hold my frame upright so that I might be able to do stuff like hug my children, read them stories, snuggle with them in bed, walk to the bathroom (oy, that could get really messy if you disintegrate, bones of mine.), and walk up the stairs so that I might collapse into bed and hopefully drift off into dreamless, delicious, sleep.

I am so grateful to have the family I do.  We are not perfect, we don’t exactly tell each other our deepest feelings, but there is safety within our circle.  Safety where we can say what is on our hearts and minds and know that it will be met with unconditional love.  Even if at first there may be frustration or annoyance.  The love underneath holds everything up.

It was just Mom, Dad, and the kids this weekend.  Our little Potter family unit together.  We hashed stuff out.  It wasn’t pretty.  We talked about stuff that had nothing to do with Mom’s health.  We talked about stuff that’s been bugging us for years and we have avoided saying it, afraid that it was just us being selfish and for Pete’s sake, just get over it.  The funny thing is, a lot of that stuff we held on to ended up being so silly once it was finally said.  You realize that your perception in the first place was WAY off, and now you’re wondering why in the world you spent all those years holding on to it.  There were more than a few moments of, “I didn’t know you felt that way!”  and “I didn’t know YOU felt that way!  I thought you were just crazy!  Or I was crazy!”  and “Crazy is true, but not in this case”.

And there was anger.  Of the explosive sort.  It had everything to do with the differences in the way all of us communicate.  The difficulty in remembering to be aware of how our actions may be affecting others, even if there is no ill intent.  We gave each other permission to grieve in our own way, not expecting any other one person to do this the same way that we are.  It is useless to expect my left-brained brother to be as emotional as I am.  I’m not grieving “better”, I’m just doing it my own way.  There is no “good” or “bad” way to grieve, as long as we grieve and not avoid it, pretend it’s not happening.  So the anger was quelled.  The words came again, the lines opened, the “I’m sorry’s” and “I love you’s”, the tears and embraces settled in once again as welcome companions to this road we are navigating.  The realization that we don’t know what we’re doing, that each step forward is likely one of uncertainty, feeling for solid ground.

You see, we’ve never been through this, really.  I never knew my own grandparents, except for my mother’s mother, whom I barely knew and who died when I was young, maybe 6 or 7.  All of my aunts and uncles are still here, all of my cousins…even my cousins’ kids, all still here.  We’ve never done this before, much less for our own mother.  It’s not a good thing to be a novice in.  But we have to.  So we can either let it tear us apart, or we can commit to loving one another through it, and allow it to grow us together.  We have chosen the latter.  All for one, and one for all.

Caroline with her Grammy. There is LOVE here.

I’m in Michigan this Labor Day weekend, visiting my mom.  It’s joyful and excruciating at the same time.  Joyful because I’m with her, excruciating because I know these moments will be coming to an end.

I’m exhausted from it all, and I feel awful about it.  I want to make the most of this time while she’s here, and yet it’s tiring to sit in one room all day.

I find myself avoiding the “D”-word.  I know it’s coming, but I can’t say it.  I can say “when she leaves us” or “when she passes” or any other variation of non-D-word phrases.

I also want to be authentic in how I am dealing with this in terms of my faith.  Do not misunderstand, my faith is unshaken.  The foundation is strong.  But that doesn’t mean I’m going to be happy-fake I-love-Jesus-so-everything-is-great lady.  My faith in Christ does not mean this isn’t painful.  My mom and I are very close, so this loss will be very painful and very deeply felt.

Now that I’ve said that, when the time comes, I don’t want to hear anyone say, “She’s in a better place”, because I KNOW that.  Okay? I know.  But I will be without my mother, my best friend, my teacher, and that is going to suck.

That is what my grief feels like.

It’s also sort of like those dreams you may have where something terrible is after you, and you try to run, but all you can manage to do is move in super slow motion.

No control.

Mom is in hospice.

I know what will happen.  And I can’t stop it.  None of us can.

There are moments when it all seems so surreal.  Like this can’t be my life, this can’t be happening, it’s not time for this yet.  Like someone is going to approach me soon and say, “Oh man, we totally got you!  You completely fell for it.  Oh, hahahaha!  Yeah, you should have seen your face!  Hoooooooo!  Oh wow, well, yeah, no, she’s totally fine.  All is well.”.  Then we’d both have a good laugh and I’d say say something like, “I KNEW it was too soon!  Oh, you guys!  You did get me!  You’re just a bunch of punks!”.  Then we’d go out for margaritas or something.

But that’s not the case.  No, reality is more the “can’t stop the vomiting” scenario.

The weird thing is, is when it chooses to hit me.  Like a ninja attack, out of nowhere and I’m completely vulnerable.  Washing dishes, humming a little ditty?  *WHAM!!*  Grief vomit.  I am literally doubled-over, the emotion turning into physical pain and I can barely breathe.  I’ve found myself curled up in a ball on the floor, on my bed, in a chair, more than once, panting from the exhaustion of it all.

Because I can’t fathom a world without my mother in it.  I can’t imagine not being able to pick up the phone and ask her something.  I can’t figure out how I’m going to DO it.  How am I going to go through my days when she’s gone?  How will I find out the end of an incomplete childhood memory that I randomly thought of, and if I don’t discover the ending, it will just bug me?  How will I listen to anyone talk about their mom and how they love her so much?  Or how they can’t stand her?  How will I endure Mother’s Day without this gut-wrenching pain, this pit in my stomach?  How will I….?

All I know is that God has never failed to be with me, holding me, sometimes picking up my feet to move me, through any and every difficult experience.  Though this one is by far the worst, I know He won’t fail me this time….but it doesn’t mean there won’t be pain.  It doesn’t mean I’ll coast through with a plastic smile on my face.  I don’t want to.  That’s not me.  It never has been.  I want to be real.

So I can promise that to you.  I will be real.  I will be honest, good and bad.  It’s the only way I know how to do life.

Here is something I learned from this:  I have never experienced the level of emotional pain I felt this past week ever before.  Not even close.  I literally felt as if I were drowning.  Once I started crying, I couldn’t stop.  I physically couldn’t get a handle on myself so I just let it out until I was too exhausted to continue.  Sleep eluded me as vivid childhood memories came flooding back.  The way I used to snuggle with my mom and nuzzle my nose into her neck, which always smelled like Shalimar.  The time she sat on a bench outside the entrance to “The Whizzer” at Great America, and prayed with me for courage, as I was stuck between a desire to ride a roller coaster, and sheer terror.  Some of our horrible fights, including the one where I screamed an obscenity in her face, then took off running because I knew she’d slap me good for that one.  Standing for alterations on all of the many dresses and other clothing items she made for me and usually getting poked by the pins.  Trying on her jewelry…most times without her permission.  The time she taught me how to use a curling iron.  The way she cared for and comforted me when I was sick.  The shopping trips we would take together.  The way I never was embarrassed to hold her hand, even when I was a teenager.  The time she came to surprise me at college when I was really down and needed my Mommy.  Helping her in and out of her chair when her fibromyalgia got really bad.  So many more.  So many.

When she was diagnosed with cancer, I came to understand the mortality of my parents for the first time.  Up until that point, there was a silent expectation that both of them would always be around.  But the reality of actually losing my mom became very possible last week, and it was awful.  I could not rise above the grief.  I do not want to feel that again, but I know I will at some point.

Thank you, Lord, for letting Mom stay with us for now.

Keep fighting, Mommy.  We’re all in your corner.

So I’m going to have to get back to the whole Bachelorette thing.  Frankly, it’s grown tiresome and I have so little respect for those darn ABC producers that it’s difficult even to watch.  I picked up a few trash mags that had little blurbs on it so I may just comment on those as they are hilarious.  But again, I’ll get back to that later.

Right now I’m working on a little write up on family vacays.  That’s short for “vacations” for those of you who are unaware of cool short ways to say longer words.  We’ve been doing family staycation days over the last two weeks (not in a row, as the hubby has had to work a few days in between) and have done lots of “family fun stuff”.  And by family fun I mean, “How to survive a day with three kids without having a complete a total meltdown from one or all of them, whilst also attempting to have a delightful time of family bonding with fun and frolic intermixed” experience.  Fellow parents should know that this type of endeavor is not for the faint of heart and therefore should not be taken lightly in terms of planning and preparedness.  Thankfully, I learned from my mother who planned our own family fun experiences like the girl scout she is, preparing for every plausible possibility of weather, moods, accidents, and hunger needs.

Stay tuned…..

Speaking of this staycation, I have much to say about family vacations, amusement parks, waterparks, and the like.  My fingers are itching to type it out!

Until then readers……