My Mom’s Birthday was this month. She would have been 84. She died at age 60, an age I am rapidly approaching. I have her high blood pressure and can get bad migraines, but Lord willing, I hope to make it past 60. Her death was sudden from a stroke and very un-expected, I will never forget the evening when I got the news. I remember trying to comprehend it, I looked around me and suddenly everything in the world felt trivial and material things totally insignificant.

Prior to her death I remembered at times lying in bed talking to God and telling Him that if anything happened to her, I would have to be confined, like in a mental institution or something. It was something I never thought I would be able to handle because we had such a close-knit relationship. So when it happened, I was devastated, but it was also a time when my faith grew significantly. The circumstances were a little odd, my mom was supposed to meet my sister and her husband at my grandmothers house in my hometown, and when my mom was late, my grandmother knew something was wrong. She called my Step-Dad’s son to check on her and when he got to the house he found his own father dead in the bed and my mom in the bathroom dead. Autopsies were done because it was a little strange and it was determined that my Step Dad died of a ruptured stomach aneurysm and my mom of a stroke.

I couldn’t eat for the first few days because I was so concerned that she suffered all alone on that bathroom floor. My sister and I had just been back to visit like a week or two before, I wondered if I had been there, maybe I could of got help for her before it was too late. I am sure it is normal to think through all of those things, but God gave me many things that brought me a great deal of comfort. I was thankful that there were no regrets with my mom, we had not left anything un-said. I was quite the brat in my teen years. She was a single mom trying to pay the mortgage and all the bills and working and I just wanted gas money. I have a whole lot more compassion for her now that I am in that same position. I did not get along with my step dad and knew I could not live with him. I saw some warning signs that she did not want to see. Once she had been married a few years, I become her confident as she needed to have some support. She was not happy in the marriage.

I had moved away shortly after she re-married, to Arizona to live with my Dad and Step Mom. Once I got on with the airlines I flew back several times a year to see her, it was hard to see her suffering but we always had a lot of fun together. As my faith grew, her faith grew along with mine, our talks became more deep and rich. Once I was married, my talks with her helped me with my own difficult marriage. She was my emotional support. She had seen me at my worst and still chose to love me. We had talked through all those things of the past, when I was a bratty teenager, when she did not stand up for me when my step dad confronted me and I in my anger told him where to go. I was thankful that we did not have unresolved issues. Even my x husband said he had never seen a mom/daughter relationship quite like the one we had. It was special and I knew it. I don’t know if God just prepared me for her death, but in a way I felt like He had. I had a spiritual mentor at the time who told me “God has prepared you for such a time as this” when I had called her to tell her the devastating news.

I had given my mom a book on Christmas of 1996, it was called “Reflection’s From A Mother’s Heart”, she gave it back to me the Christmas of 1997, our last Christmas together. It was a book full of questions that she was to answer. She had answered most of the questions. I used that book to plan her funeral. I had never thought to ask her what her favorite hymn was, in the book she had written that it was “Amazing Grace”. I went off to the Bible bookstore to get a cassette with that song on it. When me and my sister had gone back to visit last, we had been to that same store, buying new music. The gal that greeted me when I went to buy that cassette had been there on our previous visit. At first she led me to several different artists that had recorded the song “Amazing Grace”, but then all of a sudden she said “Wait just a minute” and rushed off. Coming back with a cassette my mom had special ordered on that last visit, it was a cassette by Larnelle Harris, someone my mom had seen on a show. That cassette had the song “Amazing Grace” on it. It may sound like a coincidence but at the time it was comfort. I felt like it was God’s way of telling me that this was all part of his timing and not some freak accident. We ended up using that song from the cassette that she ordered at her funeral.

I had taken my mom to a Women’s Retreat in California just 6 months before her death. It was a really special time and we had a conversation on the way home that was not real comfortable, I had challenged her on some things. I do not regret that conversation. I touched my moms hand on the day of her funeral as I said goodbye to her. She was cold to the touch, and in an odd sort of way that brought me comfort. What made her who she was, so full of love, silliness, and warmth was not there. It was just her shell. I knew what made her who she was, her essence, her soul, was in Heaven. I had given my Mom another book the year before she died, it was the book “Heaven, Your Real Home” by Joni Eareckson Tada. It was a beautiful book I loved so much I kissed the front of it and wrote Joni a letter gushing about her book. I received a letter back signed by Joni herself that was dated on my birthday, she said it made her smile that I kissed her book. I still have that letter!

My mom had been touched by a poem in that book that was about death, my grandfather had passed away just 4 months before my mom did and it gave her great comfort. We read that at her funeral as well. My grandmother died just 2 months after my mom. Yes, 1998 was a year of death for me, but the next year, 1999 was the year of life. We had been trying for quite awhile to have kids, after mom died I wasn’t even sure if I wanted kids, loving a human can be so painful. My mom wanted to be a grandmother so bad she had given me a baby outfit on our last visit, showing her anticipation. The first day home from the hospital with our first born son, Seth was the one year anniversary of my mom’s death. That felt like a gift from God. When I was pregnant with Seth, I was mourning my mom and I made a big scrapbook tribute for her as part of my therapy. I think Seth has a little extra empathy in him because of that.

I am thankful for the time I had with my mom. Her love for me enabled me to love my boys, I would even say her love flows through me onto them. I am sad that she never got to meet them, but someday she will. I know not everyone has this kind of relationship with their mom so I do not take it for granted. I have had my share of hurtful relationships too, I think that is why my relationship with her stands out. May we love well with those we are able to. I made a video tribute of my mom several years ago, it is very dated now, but it is still special to me because I want everyone to know a little of who she was. The link is here if you want to watch it: https://youtu.be/XmKDIF36dvk - Mom's Tribute