I can’t pretend it doesn’t still hurt. It will still hurt for a long, long time, and it will never go away. Losing my mom ripped a chunk out of my heart that simply cannot be replaced or filled. I miss her every day, in a million little moments, realizing I can’t call her, I can’t email her, I can’t plan my next trip to visit her. It’s like a vicious sucker punch that knocks my breath away, and it takes a minute to catch it again, to stagger back to my feet.
But I have grown tired of laying on the floor. Mentally, emotionally, I have been checked out ever since my mom died. Maybe even before that, when I knew what was coming before it happened. I will still mourn, of course, or else I wouldn’t be human. But I feel like I got stuck, dug myself into a pit that I couldn’t get out of and wasn’t even trying.
That wasn’t helping anyone, especially me. A thought flashed into my head this morning: taking care of myself is like honoring the way my mom took care of me. Who knows, maybe she nudged that thought into my thick skull to help me shake some sense into myself. I believe in spirituality and some form of life after physical death, so maybe she is still looking out for me.
I am going to drift back to things that made me happy. I have so many hobbies, so many interests, so many sources of joy that I have abandoned, feeling too overwhelmed to even think about them. Well, it’s time to think about them. It’s time to think about my loved ones. It’s time to think about me. And it’s time to get back to living.
Sweat & Sparkle 