Happiness

We have moved into our new house and things have settled. With a less chaotic life, thoughts of my mom have been heavy again. I have so many questions. Not the same questions I struggled with for so long. I have finally truly accepted that I will never know what happened in the final moments of my mom's life. I will never know if she suffered or died instantly. I will never know if she was numb. I will never know if she would have heard my voice that day, would she have still taken her life. I am at peace with all these questions. I know that having the answers would not have changed the final outcome.

I still have questions, though. Why did this happen? Why was this my mom's journey? Why do bad things happen to really good people? My mom was good. She was so, so good. What am I suppose to do with this? There has to be a reason this happened. What is the reason? I Know you are not suppose to question God but, I have. Why, why, why? Why do so many people hurt? Why do mothers lose their children? Why are innocent children molested and abused? Why is cancer even a thing? Why can some people have a drink, sit it down and walk away? Why does it destroy others? I think our tiny little human brains would not be capable of understanding the magnitude of His plan, even if He told us.

A few weeks ago I was thinking about the fact that I have wanted to change the world with my mom's story. Maybe her story has helped someone, maybe it hasn't. Then it hit me like a bolt of lightening. The quote I love so much by Mother Teresa, "If you want to bring happiness to the whole world, go home and love your family." It is really that easy! Love is always the answer. I am loving my family, really loving them. I am putting my phone down. I am turning off the television. I am slowing down and living in the moment. No more looking at facebook at night while lying next to my husband in bed. No more missing a sweet flip my son busts out because I am reading some silly article on my phone. Love, really love. Live in the moment. I believe with everything in me, that is the key to happiness. Let's be unusually happy! *see what I did there ;)

           

   

Happy Birthday, Mama!

Here it is. Your 62nd birthday. It's hard to believe you have been gone for eight months. With your birthday creeping up, you have been on my mind a lot. 

I am mostly happy. I am happy that you are no longer living in your hell here on this earth. I am happy that you are surrounded by the purest love, one so pure my mind can't grasp it's beauty. I am happy you are with your grandma. All the stories you have told me about her, you loved her so much. I am happy you are with her again. I am happy you are at peace. I am happy you are no longer fighting the battle that slowly destroyed you. I am happy you are no longer living a life full of shame. I am happy that you are watching over Shane and I. I am really happy.  

I am sad, too. I am sad that you lived so many years as an addict. I am sad you lost your way. I am sad that my husband and son never knew who you were, before addiction. I am sad you forgot who you were, before addiction. I am sad Satan chiseled away at your soul, he is evil. I am sad you felt hopeless. I am sad you never really knew all your grandchildren, they would have brought you so much joy. I am sad you were so desperate that the only way you saw out was killing yourself. All that makes me really sad. 

I have been thinking about your birthday last year. I wish wonderful memories flooded over me, but they don't. You were a chore. I had to call you, all I really wanted to do was run from you. I knew you wanted me to give you money, but I finally knew better. I liked giving you money, I got a payoff from it. You would call me so happy. You would gush about what a wonderful daughter I was. You would tell me how great of a mom and wife I had become. You would tell me how much you loved me and how proud you were of me. It felt good to hear those things from you. When there was no money, you were cold. You made me feel selfish, greedy, and judgmental. I didn't give you money last year, just an empty card. I didn't want to talk to you. I didn't want to hear the disappointment in your voice. You were a chore.

I have done so much learning and growing in the last eight months. I am finally getting a small grasp on what you were going through. I have read blogs, stories, articles, and books about addiction since your death. It's funny, my whole life I have ran from your addiction, now I read about it every chance I get. I wonder, if I knew then what I know now, would I have been different? Would I have ran from you? It was the only way I knew how to survive and not let your chaos consume me. I had to be the best mom and wife I could be, your chaos made that hard. 

So many people told me I would find relief after you died. I didn't like hearing that. I would never be relieved that you died in the most lonely way imaginable. I guess I don't like the word relief, to me it means comfort. I will never feel comfort that you committed suicide. I get what they meant, now. I am calm. I had more anxiety than I ever realized. My heart doesn't stop when the phone rings anymore. I don't have a ton of bottled up energy. I don't pace the floors. I don't keep my house perfect. I don't feel the need to control every single thing I possibly can. I don't stay up at night planning your funeral in my head. I don't breathe down my son's throat making sure he is "spot on" with every single thing he does. I have taken a few naps! That is HUGE! I don't think I have taken a nap in 20 years. I saw a picture of myself after you slit your throat a few years ago. Man, I remember all the junk and chaos that came with that. I was so skinny. I would forget to eat, and when I did it made my stomach hurt. My stomach doesn't hurt anymore and I sure don't forget to eat! I have relaxed. I am calm and I have found inner peace.

Happy Birthday, Mama! I love you so, so much. I imagine you now, what you must be like in your perfect heavenly form. The vision in my mind is breathtaking. I miss you so very much, but it is getting easier. Thank you for the white feathers. Thank you for the small, simple signs you have given me letting me know you are okay. Thank you for coming to me in my dreams. Thank you for all the talks we had, you had so much wisdom. Thank you for building me up when I felt like the world was tearing me down.  Thank you for all the sacrifices you made for me. Thank you for loving me. You have made me who I am, I am eternally grateful for you. For your birthday this year, I am giving you my heart. It is one that is over-flowing with love for you, sweet mama!

XOXOXOXOXOXO

  

   

   

Making Mama Happy

"Life is amazing. And then it's awful. And then it's amazing again. And in between the amazing and the awful it's ordinary and mundane and routine. Breathe in the amazing, hold on through the awful, and relax and exhale during the ordinary. That's just living a heartbreaking, soul-healing, amazing, awful, ordinary life. And it's breathtakingly beautiful." - L.R. Knost

I love talking about my mom. I could talk about her all day everyday. I keep it in because I don't want to make people uncomfortable. I don't want to bore them. I don't want to be a downer. There are a lot of reasons I don't talk about her. But, I love it. I love listening to friends advice. I love when a stranger says something sweet. I love words of encouragement. I have seen more love and good in the 6 months since my mom took her life than I have my 37 years. I'm sure it has always been there, I just wasn't looking.

Three months after my mom passed away I had something amazing happen. I met a wonderful lady, Kandy. She lost her mother to addiction three months before I lost my mama. We had lunch together for the second time yesterday. She might be my favorite person, other than my brother, to talk about my mom with. She gets it. Like, she really gets it. I love to hear her talk about her mother. She has guilt, questions and heartache. She also laughs at things that most people would find inappropriate. I love that. I laugh/laughed at things my poor mama did often. They really weren't funny. Sometimes you just have to laugh, I get it. She said something to me yesterday that I can't stop thinking about. She told me that Satan is working his way into our heads. He is enjoying watching us suffer with self-doubt and guilt. I needed to hear that... from her. Because she gets it. 

You see, I dropped the ball. A few months before my mama took her life, I got real with her. I was honest and told her things she needed to her. It made her mad and we ended up yelling at each other. She told me I was judging her. She told me she felt like my love for her was conditional. She told me she loved me unconditionally. She also told me she would take a bullet for me. I can still hear her saying those words. I now know it was more difficult for her to not take a bullet for me. I told her if she would really take a bullet for me then she would go to treatment for me. She hung up. A few days later she called me back and agreed to go. She promised she would go as soon as her foot healed. Well, her foot healed and I didn't push it. I didn't feel like fighting. I knew it would take every ounce of energy I had, emotionally and physically. I just dropped it. I took the selfish and easy path. That haunts me. 

My brain tells me it wouldn't have made a difference. She had gone to treatment a dozen times. She has had more opportunities than any other addict I know. My heart tells me things would have been different. Why did I quit on her? What if it would have worked this time? What if I would have pushed her? Satan is loving this. That makes me mad. I know God doesn't want me doing this. I know my mama would set me straight if she could. I am going to think about the show I am giving Satan every time the guilt starts sneaking in. I am not going to make his evil heart happy.

I am going to do something good with this. I don't know what, just yet. I will not let my mama's death be in vain. Something wonderful is going to come from this. Kandy feels the same way. We both shared a few of our ideas with each other. I believe in us. We have both had signs that our mom's are with us. I know they are. We are going to make them proud. I am going to give my mama a show that makes her sweet heart happy. Satan can suck it.    

           

The Wind

This morning a gust of wind woke me up. I couldn't go back to sleep. It's funny how the smallest things, like wind, will get your mind rolling.  

The flowers at the cemetery...

Has the wind messed them up?

I should make a trip out there today and check.

But bad weather is on it's way.

Maybe I should wait until that storm system rolls through before I go.

What if the flowers bleed?

Maybe I should make a back-up arrangement just in case.

Nope, I'm not going to obsess.

I laid in bed and my mind kept going. Thoughts of my mama can be so beautiful but they can also haunt me. This morning a new thought popped in my head. One I haven't thought of at all until this morning. I can't shake it.

When my mom first started taking pain pills she was still very innocent. She had to steal a prescription pad from the Doctors office and write her own prescriptions. She got caught. The judge went easy on her. He took one look at her and recognized she was not a danger or threat to society. He made her attend NA meetings. My mom was incredibly embarrassed and remorseful. She got clean. She started going to NA meetings regularly. That is when she became friends with those people. I did not like those people one bit. I thought they were trashy, I had the right to think that. I knew they were using my mom. She had a car, she had money, and she had a huge heart. She wanted to save those people. It wasn't long and my mom was caught up in the drama and chaos of those people. It wasn't long until my mom started using again. Now she had connections. Connections to much more than pain pills. 

One friend of hers, I really hated. This lady was horrible. She instantly had a thing for my mom and she came around ALL THE TIME. This woman, I will call her Mullet because it's the nicest word I can come up with to describe her and she naturally had a mullet, was the worse thing that ever happened to my mama. Mullet was the lowest of the low. She could't read or write. She was a thief. She got in fights. She was a drug addict.

My mom and Mullet lived together after mom and bonus dad divorced. I couldn't stand it! My mom was left in good shape after the divorce. She got the house that was paid for, her car that was paid for, and a large sum of cash. She also received alimony for two years. I would love to tell you how much she got to give you a clear picture but I am going to respect my bonus dad and not say. I will tell you this, it was a dangerous amount for a drug addict. In a short two years my mom had nothing. She didn't have a house or a penny to her name. It was all gone, IN TWO YEARS...GONE! Trust me, your mouth would drop and you would have a hard time believing me if I told you the amount.

Mom and Mullet found a tiny house in the city and that is where they lived for the last ten years or so. Those ten years were pure and utter hell. I loved my mom, I could deal with her. When I had to deal with Mullet I would lose it. She would call me and cuss me out. She would say things to me that I would't say to my biggest enemy, they were evil. I would sink to her level and the fight was on. Have I mentioned I hated her?

In January of 2015 my mom found Mullet dead. She overdosed and died in her sleep. When I got the phone call from my uncle telling me that Mullet was dead, I started crying. I wasn't one bit sad that Mullet had died, I hated her. I sounds bad to say I hate a dead person, doesn't it? I was scared. I knew this was going to be rock bottom for my mama. This would make or break her. Deep down I knew it would break her. I knew my mama's time on this earth was short. That is when I started writing my blog.

I laid in bed this morning and thought of everyone my mama would be spending Thanksgiving with tomorrow. She will be with her mom and dad, her baby grandson, her sister, her grandmother that she loved so deeply. Out of nowhere, for the first time since my mom passed away, Mullet popped in my head.

Noooo, don't let my mom be spending Thanksgiving with Mullet!!

Surly Mullet isn't in heaven, she was evil.

I don't want them together!

But if I know God is compassionate and has forgiven my mom then shouldn't I expect the same for Mullet? 

Today I am praying for Mullet. I am praying for her soul. I am praying that she is at peace and in her perfect form. I need to do this. I need to do this for my mama but more importantly I need to do this for myself. I am going to make peace with Mullet. I will not try to play God and pick and choose who deserves forgiveness. As I pray for Mullet's soul, I will be helping to heal mine. 

      

  

Thankful & Grateful

I have been dreading this since the day my mom took her life. I love the holidays. This year is different. The thought of them give me anxiety. I didn't spend very many holidays with my mom. She always had some tragic emergency excusing her from coming around. Something always prevented her from showing up to family gatherings. Sickness, car trouble, drive by shootings, break-ins, muggings, and so on. None of which were true. I, of course, went along with her stupid stories. I am frustrated with myself for that. Why didn't I call her out? Why didn't I fight harder? I lived in fear. I was terrified of my mama. I was scared to death that the minute I called her out she would kill herself. When my brother would tell me he was going to confront her, I got scared. I would give him the scenario  of him having that hard truth talk with her and then she kills herself. I was worried sick he would have to live with that. He would change his mind and keep quiet. He was scared, too.

I spent Thanksgiving with my mama two years ago. I was a nervous wreck. My husband's family was at my house. My mom was beat to hell. She told me a man with road rage pulled her out of her car and beat her. I knew that wasn't the truth. I knew that wasn't what happened. Once again, I went along with it. I acted like I believed every word she said, even though her story changed a few times. I am dealing with that. I hate it. Why was I such a coward? The very thing I was so scared of happened. Why didn't I get real with her? If I would have had that hard come to Jesus talk with her she might be spending this Thanksgiving with me. I hate this. I already said that, didn't I?         

I think I unknowingly sabotaged this holiday season. I put our house on the market with no plan. We have no home to buy. Who does that?! Our house sold in three days. We are closing on December 18th. Do you know what that means? No decorating for the holidays. This year instead of enjoying the holidays we will be packing up and moving. Very clever, huh? Until the moment I had a small breakdown. Out of nowhere I started crying. I blurted out to my husband I am leaving my mom! I am leaving the house that she knows I live in! What if she needs me? She won't be able to find me! I was stunned when those words came out of my mouth. I started laughing and crying at the same time. I knew what I said was crazy. Where did that come from?

Even though I am dealing with a lot of stupid guilt and self-doubt, it is easy to recognize how blessed I am. I have the most patient, kind, giving, loving, and handsome husband. I have a son that would make it easy for me to be of those annoying bragging moms. He is wise beyond his years. I have a brother that is my best friend. We decided a long time ago that we would stand united through everything and we have never swayed from that. I have a bonus dad that has been my rock. He is the most compassionate human I have ever known. I can count on him 100% of the time. I have his new wife and her family. They are good people. I consider them family. I have my dad's family. They have stood by me every.single.step of the way.  I have in-laws that I could have searched the world over and not found better. Most importantly, I have a compassionate, loving, and forgiving God. Because of Him I will see my mama's beautiful face again. Because of Him I know my mom is healed and complete. I am thankful and grateful. Happy Thanksgiving!

   

   

Hope

Four months ago today I was woken by a 4:00 am phone call. I had no idea what was in store. I had no idea that my heart would be ripped out of my chest. I had no idea my mom was in such a state of desperation. I had no idea I would never speak to my mama again. I had no idea I would be planning a funeral. I had no idea I would be shaken to the core. I had no idea.

If you love an addict you know that awful things happen. You know things happen that you know nothing about and honestly, you don't want to know. You know the anger, confusion, disappointment, frustration and love you have. You also know when things are really bad there is this small amount of hope you start to feel. You think maybe this is rock bottom. Maybe this is what it will take. You always have hope. You quit admitting to people you have hope because the people that love you want to protect you from being let down... again. But deep inside you have hope.

On July 3rd, I had hope. I was so frustrated with my mom. Her bad choices were incredibly frustrating. I knew there was a good chance my uncle's were going to kick my mom out of my grandma's house. I wouldn't blame them, my grandma was too old. I knew my mom would be backed against a wall. She would have nowhere to go. I told my mom she was always welcome at my house but she had to go to treatment and complete it first, my brother felt the same way. My mom was out of options. This could be her rock bottom. I had hope. 

I knew my mom was suicidal. I knew she had those thoughts. At times she would speak openly to me about them. I didn't think she would actually do it. She attempted so many times. We all know if you really want to kill yourself, you can get it done. She had never gotten it done. I didn't think she would actually go through with it. When my uncle called and told me about the suicide letter and that the gun was missing, I knew I was wrong. I knew my mom had done it. For the first time ever, all of my hope was gone.

I keep waiting for the "relief" everyone talks about. I am not relieved that my mom committed suicide. I am finding peace with it. I am coping with it. I am soaking in the small things. I am loving my friends and family harder. I am loosening up. I am truly living life. I believe in happiness. I have my hope back. Hope that my mom's story will help someone. Hope that her grandchildren have seen what drugs do and they will never take that road. Hope that people will change their views and opinions on how to treat addicts. Hope.      

Learning to Adapt

It has almost been 4 months since my mama passed away. The last few weeks have been "magical". My emotions have seemed to level out, I am feeling like my old self again. I have worked really hard to stop some obsessive, unhealthy habits I have developed since my mom took her life. I am not sure if the things I found myself doing are normal or if I was losing my mind a little, I am hoping they were normal. I couldn't wait for my husband to leave town (he travels a lot for his job) and for my son to go to school. I loved being all alone so I could do all my new "rituals" without anyone knowing. 

I created a playlist of the songs that were played at my mom's funeral. I would listen to them in perfect order that they were played at mama's service. One small interruption and I would start all over, from the beginning. I would close my eyes and really feel the music. This could go on for hours, tears streaming the whole time. I have deleted all the songs from my playlist. Okay, I kept "Hands" by Jewel. I love that song, I don't want to delete it. All the others are gone. This was a big step for me. I think know it has been a good thing.

I have a box of my mama's things. She didn't have a lot but there were a few things I became obsessed with. I have her Bible. I would read the scriptures she had highlighted. I would try to figure out at what stage in her life she highlighted them and what exactly they meant to her. I guess in some funny way I felt like it would show me her soul. I would read and re-read the poem on the flyer they handed out at her service. It was beautiful and in my mind so fitting. And then there was her suicide letter. You can only imagine how obsessed I became with that thing! It didn't give any true answers but I guess I thought if I read it a million times I would find something I missed all the previous times I read it. I was letting myself become a crazy person. About a month ago I had my husband take that box and put it in the attic. I had to stop. The guilt I felt was huge. I felt like I was just throwing my mama in the attic. How could I just throw her in the attic? It was the right thing to do.

I miss my mom so much. I wasn't prepared for how much I would miss her. Sometimes I wonder if I was a little addicted to the craziness she brought into my life. There was always drama. I always needed to help her. I felt like her mother. She needed me. I always had a crazy, unbelievable story. I don't anymore. The craziness is over. In the blink of an eye it was all over and gone. I am learning to adapt. I love her. I miss her.