The Day My Mom Died

Overwhelmed, lost, anxious, heartbroken. These are but a few emotions I have experienced over the last few months. The hardest day of my life came on Oct. 24, 2018, when I answered my phone to the news my mom had died. The director of her assisted living residence waited patiently as I tried and failed to process the information. I was at a loss for words. Only now, almost three months later, am I able to put virtual pen to paper.  

I had just come home from an amazing workout, and I was riding the adrenaline high. Oddly enough, my husband had decided a couple days before to take a personal day at work. We were planning to hang out together after we picked up our son from half-day preschool. As I was getting dressed, my phone rang and set us off on a whole new course. 

My husband didn’t want me to drive to my mom’s place alone, so we notified the school that Noah would be absent, and after I pulled myself off the bedroom floor, we headed to Portage. The authorities said they would keep my mom in her apartment until I could make it there to see her. I had been taking care of my mom and dad’s affairs for the past year, so I grabbed everything I had — birth and marriage certificates, funeral arrangements and my mom’s Last Will and Testament. The next step was to notify the rest of my family. I made the calls as my husband drove. 

Knowing I was about to devastate each member of my family with just three words — “Mom passed away” — was not a responsibility I wanted, but it was the one I had. With every number I dialed and every mile we drove closer, my mom’s death became more real.  

Finally, after the longest 45-minute drive ever, we pulled onto my mom’s street. My heart broke yet again as Noah excitedly yelled, “We go see Grandma! We go see Grandma!” All I could do was turn my head as tears poured from my eyes. How was I going to do this?

When I walked into my mom’s room and saw her lying in her chair, I thought someone had made a horrible mistake. The Food Network was playing on her t.v., and she looked as though she were just about to wake up. How I wished that would happen. Please wake up, Mom. Please give me another shopping list. Please send me home with a bag full of stuff I don’t need. Please give me a hug goodbye. But she didn’t. It was surreal. Here laid the woman I had known before I was even born. The woman who talked with me, laughed with me, cried with me and loved me. She would never do those things again. My mom was still, she was cold and she was gone. 

Two of my sisters joined me in Portage, and I thank God for them because I could not have handled the next step on my own. After we met with the funeral director to pick out the casket, programs and make arrangements for the service, the one thing we had left to do was break the news to our dad. 

On a day full of dreaded tasks, this one ranked the highest. My dad has Alzheimer’s Disease. His short-term memory consists of about two to three minutes before he forgets everything that just happened. He still knows who immediate family members are, and he visited or called my mom daily. (He lives in a secure memory care building next to my mom’s building.) How would he take the news? Would he be able to remember it? We didn’t know. Or maybe we did, and we just didn’t want to believe it. 

The first time my sisters and I told my dad that Mom had passed away, he actually took it pretty well. He teared up and spoke well of their life together. We were relieved. He seemed to be retaining the news better than expected. Then after we talked for a few minutes, he asked us what time Mom was coming home. We told him again, and he was completely devastated. He sobbed and shook as he held tightly to us. After a while, he calmed down, and we thought maybe this time he’ll be able to retain it. But after he asked about Mom for the third time, we knew we would have to tell him every day for the rest of his life. 

The day after my mom died, life continued. I’m not sure how, but I got up and worked out, then my son and I made a trip to the store as we had planned to do that day. It felt odd to be doing things so normal after the biggest loss of my life. As we rounded the corner to the produce section, I saw a display of caramel apples. My mom loves caramel apples! I instinctively picked up a pack to take to her as a surprise, but then I remembered, and I put them down. This would take some time. 

But I realize now that there will never be enough time that goes by. I will miss her every day of my life. I still have the instinct to call her when something happens, or if I see something she would like, or even just to talk. The last conversation I had with her, just three days before she died, she told me how exceptional she thinks Noah is and how much she wishes she could watch him grow up. I know how badly she wanted that. It must have been so hard for her to know she wouldn’t get that chance. That day on the phone, it was almost as if she knew her time had come. I wish I had known.  

Losing the person who has literally been there for you your whole life is shocking. It’s heartbreaking. It’s life changing. But I find it helps to take the perspective that I didn’t really lose her. I know exactly where she is and where she’ll always be. She is alive in my memories and in the stories I tell Noah. She is the angel on my shoulder, because as my dad said, “Mom deserves every doggone bit of heaven she’s getting right now.”