Mother’s day.
I haven’t known how to approach this day in ten years. I remember the first Mother’s Day after my mom died, I was still at an age where you would make a gift at school and I just remember sitting there, staring blankly ahead, until the teacher came over to ask me why I hadn’t started.
I just remember looking at him until a look of understanding crossed his face and he hurriedly reassured me that I didn’t have to do it or I could give it to someone else. It was too late though other people had noticed and suddenly I was that girl again. The girl who had lost her mother.
It took everything in me not to burst out crying right then. Everyone has some sort of trigger for their grief and mine has always been when people start talking about their moms together. It makes me want to cry every time.
For the next few years Mother’s Day wasn’t really acknowledged in my house — it just hurt too much. Anything made in school went to my mother’s mother, but that was as far as we went in acknowledging the day.
The year my dad got remarried it changed. I love my step-mom. Now I even consider her a mom. She’s been there for me through the hard times and the good but she’s never tried to replace my mom and encourages us to talk about her if we need to.
I hear so many people complain about step parents, but I won the lottery with mine and I’m well aware of that.
Our first Mother’s Day together, my siblings and I never really discussed it but we all made her a card and any school presents now went to her.
We had someone to celebrate again, but we will always have someone to miss.
Five years ago, I started my own personal tradition — every Mother’s Day I buy or make two cards, for the two mothers in my life. While one still gets to open it, for the other I started leaving it at a church. I don’t know what happens to it or if anyone actually reads it, but I like to think she knows it’s there.
Mother’s Day will never be an easy time but it’s also the time of year I feel closest to my mom and I wouldn’t change that for anything.
