Thank you dear Tina. I hope this does not sound trivial, but I too are in mourning; in mourning for the life I had before cancer. Now, I do not drive and feel isolated. I sound selfish, but mourning is mourning, and I;ve done it before when my George died, so very young. It all comes rushing back.
I am pretty sure that article led me to you as I’ve read it. And this time reading it, it hit a different part of my heart~ a part I thought I’d left behind. That is why it is such a gift to read about a fellow mother’s grief~ I could massage “the last time” with greater tenderness for myself. Thank you Tina.
Dear Sally, I am glad you mention feeling "greater tenderness" for yourself. I have that sense sometimes too. Sometimes I feel sadness for what I've endured, the person I've had to become in order to live with grief. Not in a "why me" way, but more in the way that my empathy has expanded to include my raw and devastated self of a year or two years ago.
I'm not sure if that's what you mean, but certainly connecting with other grieving mothers has been part of that expansion of empathy. Thank you for being here.
I am one of those who subscribed after your NYT piece. We lost our 34-year old daughter to an ultra-rare cancer in January 2024. While her death wasn't sudden, watching your child "go downhill" is another form of torture. Our family was able to enjoy this Mother's Day with our other daughter with an exploration of nature in a new place, but it's still tough... Thank you for your writing and sharing your emotions that many of us experience.
Dear Sandy, I am so sorry for the loss of your daughter. I imagine torture is the right word for what you lived through. To be helpless to save your child.
I am glad you found a way to enjoy Mother's Day. It's funny how "enjoy" doesn't necessarily mean what it used to mean. For me, there is often sadness in the background, but sadness can coexist with happiness or even, sometimes, joy.
What a heart wrenching story that comes on the edge of "the best Mother's Day ever" as coined by my daughter. She told me as she left, "Don't expect all Mother's Days to be this good." We laughed, though I had a deeper knowledge of just how fleeting moments can be. May your heart find comfort in the platform you give to others to remember and grieve.
Hi Cindy! Your comment made me laugh, it sounds like something my daughter would have said. I'm grateful to have had a bunch of those "best days ever" – and the best part is when you recognize it while it's happening.
I sometimes think about what it would be like if my Mom lost me instead of the other way around. If I was the one to die unexpectedly, with just three months from ideation to implementation, if it was my brain that was riddled with cancer and therefore couldn't remember, couldn't answer, just...couldn't. It's an odd experiment, I know, but I miss her in so many weird ways and not in the big ways, the ways you might expect, like on Mother's Day. I have my own daughter now, so the day's meaning has shifted a generation, but what if it were me that were gone and her here to celebrate...alone? Grief travels through us and with us. It is not bound by marketing calendars that align with arbitrary holidays, and yet it is aware of those days and their Hallmark hurt all the same. Thank you for resharing this, for noting so eloquently with your story-telling how raw the hurt is, like an exposed nerve at the surface where something as simple as hot or cold could send it zinging. I think that might be what Mother's Day does...exposes the hurt...reignites the raw. I don't know what you do about that other than hold space for it. And maybe avoid ice cream. I hope Kiki visited you yesterday, in whatever form she felt called to inhabit. As a daughter missing her mother, I imagine she picked whatever way she could get closest to you.
Dear Jess, thank you for this thoughtful reflection.
I have often thought with gratitude of the fact that my mother was not alive to endure this loss, and how she would have suffered, seeing me suffer.
I know what you mean about missing your mom in weird ways. My mom died almost 10 years ago and I think of her more frequently than I used to. I didn't expect that. I think there's the expectation that our loved one feels farther away as time goes by, but I feel closer to my mom in spirit now than I did in the years right after she died.
You are right, grief travels through us and with us.
I really appreciate your beautiful comment, thanks 💛
Grief has its own language. There are times when I’m actually grateful it keeps talking to me. It reminds me of how real my relationship with my mom actually was. Thank you for sharing your own grief journey…with your own mother and with Kiki
Thank you for sharing this again, Tina. I've been thinking about you lately and was going to look it up and read it again. Wishing you all the best this Mother's Day and looking forward to hearing about your latest travels. 🩷
Hi Rosemary, it's good to hear from you. I've haven't been keeping up with all my Substack reading lately so I will have to catch up with you! Thank you for the Mother's Day message, I hope yours was good. 💛
Oh, thank you for writing your deeply meaningful thoughts of grieving your horrible loss. So achingly personal. Kiki sounds like an amazing young woman. My heart aches for you and all who miss her.
I’m so sorry for your loss; I know how empty those words sound. I know the feeling of not being an obvious mother on Mother’s Day. I hope you find peace and joy in your new beginning.
Dear Kathy, I don't hear those words as empty at all. I say the same words to others. They're often code for something we might want to say but can't put into words.
I appreciate your empathy. Thanks so much for reading and commenting. 💛
In the interest of *not* speaking in codes, then, we lost our first at 23 weeks. She was stillborn due to a chromosomal abnormality. DH and I are very open about our loss, but it often felt like *my* loss, not *ours*. I asked him about his reaction to Annie’s death and he said that if felt like yet another medical thing he had to get me through — so he did. He drove me back and forth to the doctor in the Big City (I was high-risk due to some strokes) stoically. He said that’s how he felt he could get through it. Now, 15 years later, I kind of understand his response, though I don’t like it ;)
Thanks for sharing this with me, Kathy. I am sorry for your loss of your daughter Annie. I understand now what you meant about not being an obvious mother.
Seems like it's common for couples to have completely different responses to grief although of course knowing that doesn't make it feel any better. 💛
I sometimes long for those days when Happy Mother's Day was blithely offered but then again, I wouldn't be the most honest version of me if I'd stayed in them.
It says it’s expired.
Hi MaryRuth, try this one –
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/03/style/modern-love-we-didnt-know-it-was-the-last-time.html?unlocked_article_code=1.Rk8.QFlj.HX9wWJ6lwlhq&smid=url-share
Thank you!🩷
Thank you dear Tina. I hope this does not sound trivial, but I too are in mourning; in mourning for the life I had before cancer. Now, I do not drive and feel isolated. I sound selfish, but mourning is mourning, and I;ve done it before when my George died, so very young. It all comes rushing back.
I am pretty sure that article led me to you as I’ve read it. And this time reading it, it hit a different part of my heart~ a part I thought I’d left behind. That is why it is such a gift to read about a fellow mother’s grief~ I could massage “the last time” with greater tenderness for myself. Thank you Tina.
Dear Sally, I am glad you mention feeling "greater tenderness" for yourself. I have that sense sometimes too. Sometimes I feel sadness for what I've endured, the person I've had to become in order to live with grief. Not in a "why me" way, but more in the way that my empathy has expanded to include my raw and devastated self of a year or two years ago.
I'm not sure if that's what you mean, but certainly connecting with other grieving mothers has been part of that expansion of empathy. Thank you for being here.
Yes an expansion into the vulnerability of it and a compassion for myself to meet the pain with more love. I think that’s what I meant💕
Tina, your piece was so beautifully written. Thank you for sharing! I hope you got (and continue to get) signs from your Kiki. ♡
Thank you Niquelle! I appreciate you reading it. And I'm always looking for (and finding) signs!
I am one of those who subscribed after your NYT piece. We lost our 34-year old daughter to an ultra-rare cancer in January 2024. While her death wasn't sudden, watching your child "go downhill" is another form of torture. Our family was able to enjoy this Mother's Day with our other daughter with an exploration of nature in a new place, but it's still tough... Thank you for your writing and sharing your emotions that many of us experience.
Dear Sandy, I am so sorry for the loss of your daughter. I imagine torture is the right word for what you lived through. To be helpless to save your child.
I am glad you found a way to enjoy Mother's Day. It's funny how "enjoy" doesn't necessarily mean what it used to mean. For me, there is often sadness in the background, but sadness can coexist with happiness or even, sometimes, joy.
Thank you so much for reading and commenting.
What a heart wrenching story that comes on the edge of "the best Mother's Day ever" as coined by my daughter. She told me as she left, "Don't expect all Mother's Days to be this good." We laughed, though I had a deeper knowledge of just how fleeting moments can be. May your heart find comfort in the platform you give to others to remember and grieve.
Hi Cindy! Your comment made me laugh, it sounds like something my daughter would have said. I'm grateful to have had a bunch of those "best days ever" – and the best part is when you recognize it while it's happening.
Thank you so much for reading and commenting.
Thank you, Tina. I’m always touched by your writing and look forward to reading the NYT piece.
Thank you Holly!
Lovely ✨
You are always and forever a Mother. And a good soul.
Thank you for being here.
Thank you Deborah, I appreciate you saying that. 💛
Thank you Tina! Happy Mother’s Day!💕💐
Thank you Emily!💛
Oh, Tina. I had some moments yesterday. Thank you for sharing yours, ours. And otters, my favorite. 🦦❤️
Thank you Lucy! Yes, some moments. They happen.
💛otters!
the sweetest message from the sweetest person
Thank you Sandra! 💛
I sometimes think about what it would be like if my Mom lost me instead of the other way around. If I was the one to die unexpectedly, with just three months from ideation to implementation, if it was my brain that was riddled with cancer and therefore couldn't remember, couldn't answer, just...couldn't. It's an odd experiment, I know, but I miss her in so many weird ways and not in the big ways, the ways you might expect, like on Mother's Day. I have my own daughter now, so the day's meaning has shifted a generation, but what if it were me that were gone and her here to celebrate...alone? Grief travels through us and with us. It is not bound by marketing calendars that align with arbitrary holidays, and yet it is aware of those days and their Hallmark hurt all the same. Thank you for resharing this, for noting so eloquently with your story-telling how raw the hurt is, like an exposed nerve at the surface where something as simple as hot or cold could send it zinging. I think that might be what Mother's Day does...exposes the hurt...reignites the raw. I don't know what you do about that other than hold space for it. And maybe avoid ice cream. I hope Kiki visited you yesterday, in whatever form she felt called to inhabit. As a daughter missing her mother, I imagine she picked whatever way she could get closest to you.
Dear Jess, thank you for this thoughtful reflection.
I have often thought with gratitude of the fact that my mother was not alive to endure this loss, and how she would have suffered, seeing me suffer.
I know what you mean about missing your mom in weird ways. My mom died almost 10 years ago and I think of her more frequently than I used to. I didn't expect that. I think there's the expectation that our loved one feels farther away as time goes by, but I feel closer to my mom in spirit now than I did in the years right after she died.
You are right, grief travels through us and with us.
I really appreciate your beautiful comment, thanks 💛
Grief has its own language. There are times when I’m actually grateful it keeps talking to me. It reminds me of how real my relationship with my mom actually was. Thank you for sharing your own grief journey…with your own mother and with Kiki
Thank you for sharing this again, Tina. I've been thinking about you lately and was going to look it up and read it again. Wishing you all the best this Mother's Day and looking forward to hearing about your latest travels. 🩷
Hi Rosemary, it's good to hear from you. I've haven't been keeping up with all my Substack reading lately so I will have to catch up with you! Thank you for the Mother's Day message, I hope yours was good. 💛
Oh, thank you for writing your deeply meaningful thoughts of grieving your horrible loss. So achingly personal. Kiki sounds like an amazing young woman. My heart aches for you and all who miss her.
Thank you so much Colleen. She was amazing! I appreciate your empathy 💛 thanks
I’m so sorry for your loss; I know how empty those words sound. I know the feeling of not being an obvious mother on Mother’s Day. I hope you find peace and joy in your new beginning.
Dear Kathy, I don't hear those words as empty at all. I say the same words to others. They're often code for something we might want to say but can't put into words.
I appreciate your empathy. Thanks so much for reading and commenting. 💛
In the interest of *not* speaking in codes, then, we lost our first at 23 weeks. She was stillborn due to a chromosomal abnormality. DH and I are very open about our loss, but it often felt like *my* loss, not *ours*. I asked him about his reaction to Annie’s death and he said that if felt like yet another medical thing he had to get me through — so he did. He drove me back and forth to the doctor in the Big City (I was high-risk due to some strokes) stoically. He said that’s how he felt he could get through it. Now, 15 years later, I kind of understand his response, though I don’t like it ;)
Thanks for sharing this with me, Kathy. I am sorry for your loss of your daughter Annie. I understand now what you meant about not being an obvious mother.
Seems like it's common for couples to have completely different responses to grief although of course knowing that doesn't make it feel any better. 💛
I sometimes long for those days when Happy Mother's Day was blithely offered but then again, I wouldn't be the most honest version of me if I'd stayed in them.
Wishing you a beautiful time on the coast.
Thank you Bridget! 💛