Feeling Cheated

Forgive me today, as I wallow a bit.  Like a pig  who digs deeply into a pit of mud and soaks up every bit of mucky goodness, I will take the low road and soak in my mucky despair.  I have found the more honestly I describe my feelings the better I feel.  It is as if I was given a bag full of bricks to carry upon my mother's death.  That bag has been heavy and it has made me tired.  Every muscle aches and I long for strength again.  I have found that with each prayer or post I write a brick from that bag is removed and my muscles regain a bit of strength.  So here I go with the intent to lighten my load. 

I have heard people speak of the cheated feeling one is left with after the loss of a loved one.  I do feel cheated.  I do feel that future memories were ripped from under my nose and past memories are almost too painful to enjoy.

The night of the accident as we prepared for bed I felt the first wave of it.  My husband and I were back in that RV we had lived in for six months just a year earlier.   We had not packed a bag or brought any clothes so my step-father had given me a pair of my mother's pj's. When he handed them to me I gladly took them, ready to take off the clothing I had been wearing at the funeral home hours earlier.   My mother and I often shared or swapped clothes but as I pulled the pajama pants on that night it was as if the anger from the situation rose as the pants rose up my legs to my waist.  It struck me that a simple thing like putting on her pajamas, something I had done so many times before felt so trememdously different.  That night I knew it would be the last time I would wear her clothing.  I could just not imagine ever wearing them again without crying. And, I felt cheated because that just didn't seem fair. 

I posted yesterday about how the shock allowed me to move along without crying but I admit that that night I cried.  Hard.  The pain and weight of it all was and still is undescribable.  The focus of the tears that night were for the future we would not get to have and for some reason my children were fresh on my mind.  I cried for the future they would not get to have with their ShaSha.  My mind actually  flashed forward to random days yet to come in my children's lives with everyone they loved there but my mother. 

My mother was such a fun grandma.  She was nurturing and compassionate.  She was a strong teacher. She didn't care if the kids got her house dirty or broke something.  She knew that each day was about the trouble fun she and the kids could get into together and the memories that could be made along the way.  That night I cried because I felt my children were getting cheated out of their amazing grandmother.  I cried because I felt cheated out of the new life we had carved out as mother and daughter.  I cried because I realized that Monday morning was grandparent's day at our son's school and she had planned to be there.  I cried because anytime I needed her to help with the kids she never said no.   I cried because we had lived out of state for so long and she didn't get to help with the kids until our boy was almost 4.  I cried because we had not been given long enough together.  I cried because I knew in the morning I would pick up my phone like I did every morning and would try to call her but she would not answer. 

I cried because I felt cheated.  For me there is no better description.  She was too young to die.  I was too young to loose my mother.  My children were too young to loose their grandmother.  I. felt. cheated.

I also felt angry because I now knew that simple things in life would never be the same.  I could never again belt out the words to one of my favorite hymns, Amazing Grace.  Within a moment my mother was taken and with her went the joy in simple things, like my favorite song.  In a moment life became more painfilled than I ever imagined. 

Like that pig that eventually tires of the mucky goodness I too am ready to climb out of the mud and find the joy.  I have been trying to find the joy.  Our Lord has been good to me and He has held me like no one else can.  The night that I wore my mother's pajamas for the last time I laid down with my husband and he held me.  Hard.  Strong.  Tight.  I did not want him to let go.  I just wanted to fade into him and never come out again.  Four months later I have come to realize that while my dear husband was the earthly vessel, it was my Lord who was holding me so tightly that I could barely breath and I loved it.  I didn't want him to let go and He has not yet.  He holds me as tightly today as he did the night my mother died.