The pain is unbearable at times. I feel like my chest is going to cave in. I miss her. I see her in my mind and want to have her next to me and continue our conversations like we did so many times over my lifetime.  I see her face. I regret telling her she rarely smiled.  She did smile.  And she would radiate with joy and it was contagious.  Making her laugh was the distraction she needed to not think about her suffering over the last few years.

But just a little longer.  A few more months, another year or two … why now. Death never comes when we expect it. That’s death. Abrupt, sudden, hurtful, with no consideration for the people it affects. But this was my mom. The woman who cared for me and tried her damndest to keep me on the straight and narrow. This was the woman with who I fought and argued, and now, regretfully I remember … and wish I could change the past.

I haven’t fully cried or mourned completely for her yet. I’m avoiding it. I want to scream at God for taking her. I’m angry at times because she wasn’t the one that was supposed to go. She did so much good in her life. Helped so many people. Had an unshakable faith in God similar to that of Job in the bible, if not stronger. 

I remember that last few days sitting up in the middle of the night, byre bedside, listening to her moan while in pain as she cursed life and her suffering.  All I could do was hold her hand and console her knowing there was nothing that could ease the pain completely. I was so helpless. All my life I wanted her to be happy and smile and enjoy what we had become and in the last days all I could think of was how far I had moved away … missing the day to day joys of being close and fulfilling her desire of having her children nearby.  

My selfishness over my lifetime has caught up with me with the regret of being away from the woman who birthed me, protected me, and guided me as best as she knew how. The one woman who truly loved me selflessly and would go without to provide for me, for us. Now that she’s gone I want her closer and nearer than before and I can’t have her.  I want to say “I love you” one more time and hear her say it back as we did on every phone call … on every visit.  It hurts deep inside and I don’t know what to do about it. I want to say I’m sorry …

Covid tried so hard to kill her spirit. Keep her locked down, a prisoner in her own home. Not allowed to see or connect physically with her friends. The people that fed her soul … the energy that keeps us as humans alive deep inside.  She suffered from not being able to go out to her spot at ‘Parco delle rose’. A place where she felt safe and could sit with a stranger and speak about her faith in God. But she was never a stranger there. Everyone knew her. Everyone respected her for her faith because she truly walked the walk and talked the talk. And although we disagreed in some fundamental ways, I enjoyed bantering with her and sharing my ideas and listening to her and why in the end she would always be right … and I was ok with that.

Just a few more years … please God … why now?

So I quietly, privately mourn …  this is the first I share of my hurt and torment knowing that no matter what I say and do, I cannot change the past. I cannot hug her as I did so many times when I would come home. This will haunt me for a long time …