Every year when I was little my mom and my Aunt would go Christmas shopping “downtown”. Eventually my aunt stopped going and it became the 3 of us, my mom, Stacy and I. We are creatures of habit. We park in the same parking garage, we go to the same stores, we buy the same things, we eat at the same restaurant, and we do very little Christmas shopping. Every once in a while we would invite an “outsider” into our “inner circle” but it would be short lived and the next year it would again be just the 3 of us. Probably because they felt like an outsider in our very elite “Christmas shopping” adventure. Or maybe it was the fact that they never got to make any of the decisions. This was never a democracy here the 3 of us called the shots! We hated and still hate when stores moved or shuffled their departments. The 3 of us never appreciated change!
Then all of a sudden the biggest change of all happened. The 3 suddenly became 2 and it will never be the same. Like I said we are still creatures of habit and we still do the same thing. The first year we tried something totally different and it was a disaster. We took Dad instead. What a debacle! A Dad just can’t replace your Mom. I think we thought by doing something different it would make it easier. Wrong! We still talk about that year!
My mom has been gone for 4 years almost exactly and I ask myself, will it ever get easier? For some reason this Holiday season has been extremely bad. Thanksgiving comes first and I think back about what that last Thanksgiving was like with her still with us. Black Friday is always bad because that was also a day with many memories for the 3 of us. Not only was it Black Friday but it fell on the 25th this year which is the day that she went home to be with Jesus. Then we roll right into my birthday which, let’s just be honest, will never be the same without her. What I wouldn’t give for a marble layered cake made by her for the day. How about the Valley Christian School Christmas program where she was always sitting on the front row so proud of her grandkids. Then the Christmas turkey which I have no idea how to make! The list of days with special memories this time of year continues.
I thought that each year would get easier but for some reason this year seems to be the hardest. So this is what I have learned. Grief does not get easier with time and eventually go away. It comes and goes and gets easier and then harder again. It may last a moment or a day or a week and then disappears like the clouds from a storm and then suddenly returns.
I have learned that when someone passes away, that the first year is sometimes a false sense of reality when it comes to grief. I was embarrassed to admit at first that it was a huge relief when she finally died. Now I am ok with saying that. The pain of watching her die the way she did was worse than the way I felt after she went to Heaven. I went through the motions the first year and each milestone was hard but nothing like the milestones now. So I assumed that the grief was gone. Nope!
I have also learned that you can’t stop doing the things that you enjoyed most just because the memories hurt. I thought finding a “new normal” meant I had to stop doing some of things that I enjoyed doing most with her. Or I needed to change them and make new unique memories. Now I enjoy the memories so much more of those good times. Yes, sometimes they hurt but that is OK! It is ok to have pain sometimes.
So today we went shopping! We parked at Pacific Place. We went to Macy’s, Nordstrom, Old Navy, See’s, and a few other random stores. We ate at PF Chang’s. We bought very few Christmas presents. And we had a great time. Did we talk about the fact that we missed her, yes. But, the fact is we still went. Do we want to try something new to make the pain less, no.
So tomorrow I will put on my “big girl pants” and talk my very sweet, understanding husband into helping me decorate for Christmas. Because just because it hurts doesn’t mean I am going to stop doing it!
P.S. I might want to let him sleep in past 6am before I spring this on him! He thought he had escaped it this year!