My Mama

About 12 hours after my last post, my mom did pass away.  It was a sweet 12 hours of singing and telling stories, and reading scripture and laughing and crying as her family gathered round her.  I alternated between wanting to be right beside her and needing to walk away from the reality of what was happening.  I wanted to stroke her face, her hair, her hands, knowing that soon they would depart from my touch.  Sometimes I nearly climbed in the bed beside her, simply wanting to drink it all in.  It was a day that I believe I will always remember well.

Looking back, God was so kind in the details of the circumstances.  She was only at the hospice facility about 25 hours, but it was the right place for us to be.  The rooms were big and beautiful and the staff was so kind.  We were able to fit lots of her family and friends into the room so that we could spend those precious hours together.  The staff informed us that she would likely be able to hear us to the end even though she remained unresponsive and so we said everything we wanted her to hear and tried to refrain from anything else.  It was a precious time.

Even the location of my own little family back in Africa was a gift from him.  While I missed them desperately and longed to have them beside me, I see that the way it worked out was truly the best.  My children didn’t need to see their Grammy as she was in those last days.  I needed to be able to fully dedicate my energy to the needs of my parents, not worrying about how my children were adjusting to this different culture.  The timing of their arrival was perfect.

They are here now.  I think Ryan probably got the roughest deal on the circumstances.  He wanted so desperately to be able to support me in the thick of it all.  But more than that, he loved my mom so much and he would have loved to be there.  In fact, he helped me see just how lovable my mom was.  In those post-adolescent years when Ryan and I were starting our life together, he could see the good in places that I couldn’t.  I’m so thankful that he continually helped me see my mother’s strengths.

He is the one who gave words to what I was feeling.  The night that they arrived, he and I were talking about how much we were going to miss my mom and he nailed it.  He said, “Your mom was the one who listened to us.  Not many people have the ability to listen like she did.  It’s a lost art.”  

He was right.  My mom didn’t like lots of unnecessary chatter.  She was a doer, not a talker.  But, when you needed to talk.  She would listen.  And she didn’t listen as one who needed to fix it.  She definitely didn’t listen as one who needed to give her opinion.  She listened as one who loved deeply and truly wanted to hear what was happening in your heart and in your life.  She was one of the only people who cared about our daily lives in Africa.  She tried to learn names of people we worked with and recall the details of our routines, even before she came to visit.  She seemed to be one of the few people who understood that even though she may not love the fact, that was where we were called.  It was where we needed to invest.  It was where her grandchildren were living out their days and therefore, she needed to try and enter into that world, rather than insisting that we return to hers.  She understood that just because it was different, that didn’t mean it was wrong.

Man, I’m gonna miss that.  More than words can say.  One of my mom’s friends described the way that the grief would come very well.  She said it would be like ocean waves that would simply wash over me at different times.  And it is, I can go hours and laugh and cook and put one foot in front of the other and then something will happen and I will realize she’s gone.  She’s really gone.  For the remainder of my days on this earth, my one and only mom is gone.  In those moments the pain is almost overwhelming and the breath doesn’t want to fill my lungs and the tears sting my eyes.  Then just as quickly, it fades away and I’m back to simply doing the next thing.  

When we moved to Africa and our family grieved so deeply, I used to tell the kids, “We can be so thankful that it hurts so bad because that means that we have been loved so well.”  I think it’s the same thing with missing my mama.  What a privilege it’s been to have a mom who loved me so well and who I am going to miss so deeply.