Friday, October 02, 2015

Foggy

There are losses you never actually stop grieving. I understand, deeply, when women express the difficulty of mourning their mothers.  I have a friend who has been at her dying mother's side this week.  We've not heard from her in a couple of days, so we suspect her mother has passed on.  She's pretty intensely private, so one has to read the signs with her.

Two years ago, when my dear friend died, it put me in a daze that lasted several weeks. More or less, I have no recollection of anything that happened between his death in August and the first of October.  Why the first of October?  Because today is the two year anniversary of the death of a good friend's mother.  Her mother had been very ill, the night before my friend had to sign papers for her mother to have surgery.  The situation was dire . . . she would die in a matter of hours without the surgery and might not live with the surgery.  Her mother lived through the night, and my friend awoke, on her birthday, to believe her mother would recover.  Only, a few hours later, her mother died.

Realizing my friend needed support jogged me out of my fog.  And, today, on that anniversary, when others are leaving sweet and joyous notes on her social media, I'm the one asking if she's got a plan to make it through the day . . . because I understand what it's like to be robbed of ever seeing one's birthday as a holiday and pure celebration.

Being grown up really does suck sometimes.

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