A few words about my Mom … and my confession

Hmmm…

I’m trying to figure out if I feel bad for my Mom. She’s a really nice lady. I love her with my whole heart. I’m her only daughter and we are close. Very close. She has the patience of a saint, a heart of gold, and a sense of humour that makes me want to hear her laugh all the time.

She’d also disown me if she knew I was writing a post about her.

Our personalities are similar enough that we get each other but our generational separation means that even if she “gets” some of the things I say and do, she still doesn’t necessarily approve.

My Mom was widowed fairly young, as well, so she understands what it’s like to navigate the road of widowhood before it should be. She doesn’t offer advice unless asked and she understands the grief wilderness: the swings of sadness, guilt, anger and happiness,  sometimes in one barrage of words. 

She was the first call I made when leaving the hospital the night My Favourite Husband (MFH) died. She picked up her phone when I called at 3:45 a.m. from my car and said, “Mommy, he died. Can I come home?” Hers were the arms that held me when none of it made sense. Hers have always been the arms that hold me.

My Mom had to listen to me tell her I was thinking about becoming a nun after MFH died. When asked, I told her I thought it would be a peaceful life. At the end of my proclamation, the only things she said to me were, “You’re not Catholic,” to which I responded, “I can convert.” She agreed it was a possibility; however, her next point was harder to refute. “You cuss, a lot.” That’s true. I can be salty. While I was thinking about how I was going to solve that problem, she offered this solution: “I’ll support this decision if you join a convent that has a vow of silence. I’m pretty sure that’s the only way this will work.” Did I mention I love my Mom?

In my early period of grief, she’s heard everything from my desire to skydive (“Why do you want to jump out of a perfectly good airplane?”) to volunteering in a country wracked by war (she had no words, only a motherly look that I interpreted to be WTF). As have been progressing through my grief, she’s heard my lament, “I’ll never date again,” to proclaim “I’ll never date again!” and never uttered a word either way.

She has offered me everything from sound financial advice to tomato plants. She came with me when I picked out a headstone and gave an opinion when asked but refused to see it in person because seeing my name on it is not something she wants to see. 

She has been with me every step of the way my entire life and held my hand throughout this journey, never letting go. She has cried with me, laughed with me and let me grieve how I need to. If I’m ever, in my lifetime, half the woman she is, I will consider myself blessed.

So, my Mom doesn’t like social media. And, I was nervous to tell her about my blog. And, yes, I’m a grown-ass woman but I still have a healthy respect for my Momma. But I thought she should know and I thought she should hear it from me. So, I took her out to lunch. (No, I didn’t chicken shit out; we needed to eat, you know.)

I eased her in by first telling her about a minor medical concern I’m having. OK, so far, so good.

Next, I proceeded to tell her about an upcoming vacation I’m hoping to have. Look, she’s smiling. This is going well!

Then, big deep breath:

“Hey Mom, I’m writing a blog.”

She looked at me and said, “And?” 

It was at this point I panicked a little. You see, if the reaction to the blog wasn’t great, I was going to follow it up with, “I’m having a fantastic sexual affair!” In my mind, I figured she’d focus on that and the blog wouldn’t be such a big deal.

So, before I went in any direction (verbally), I tentatively said, “And what?” 

She replied, “Well, what’s your blog about? On TV, people talk about writing blogs and then people comment on them. What are you writing about?”

So, I told her. I told her that throughout my journey, I have had so much love and support from family, friends and a grief counsellor but the one thing I wish I could’ve had access to was a support group for widows. I would’ve liked to have had the opportunity to ask widowers if they ever got angry at their partner, and how they were coping through some of the things they were feeling. I told her my feelings were complicated and did she really want to hear about them when it was her son-in-law I was talking about? 

She said she honestly didn’t but she would’ve. And she understood what I felt I was missing. 

I told her I was writing the blog to speak specifically on my new road as a widow. I let her know that my hope was that maybe my experiences would connect with others and maybe they, too, would feel a little less alone on what they were feeling. I told her that I would love to see grief conversations become open and normal, not hidden away. We are all connected.

She thought about it and said she understood. She wanted to know if she was in it and I let her know she was mentioned with nothing to identify her. She said that was OK. “Obviously,” she said, “you weren’t hatched.”

We ended that part of the conversation by me offering to send her a link to my blog and her declining, for the moment. I get it. She has and will continue to live it. She doesn’t need to read about it.

I love my Mom. She’s simply the best.

As we left the restaurant, I hugged her, told her I love her and thanked her for being the amazing woman she is. And then, because she’s her and I’m me, I grabbed her arm and said…

“I’m having a fantastic sexual affair!”

(No, I didn’t walk back to her house because I’m the driver. And, no, you’re never too old for a swat on the booty from your Mom.)

❤️