The Mom I'm About to Lose

I was 31 years old with a 3 month old baby in my arms sitting on a coffee table in my parents living room when I found out my mom had brain cancer. We didn't know at the time that it was terminal but somehow, we knew. Weeks later when we would learn that the life we had before was over and this new life would be full of pain and sorrow, my mind began searching for every memory of her I could hold onto.

I thought about the time she came to visit me for my 21st birthday and panicked the next morning that I had died from alcohol poisoning. She was banging on my apartment door at 7 a.m. and she may as well have been banging on my actual brain matter for the pain it caused my head. She was so sweet and nervous, motherly instincts on high alert, loving me in every way she knew how.

I remembered lying to her for months about a guy I was dating when I was 17, only to find her sitting outside his house staring at my car one Tuesday afternoon. The rage and heartbreak on her face as she confronted my deceit makes my stomach roll over. She only wanted to protect me, to keep me safe, to hold me close as long as I'd let her. I pushed away as hard as I could.

I was 14 when she helped me secretly adopt a puppy my dad had forbidden. We co-conspired and even though my dad wouldn't talk to me for 3 days, eventually he loved the puppy as much as he loved seeing us happy. My mom caught between her youngest daughter and husband, forever playing Switzerland in our debates, smiled sneakily as I snuggled up to the furry new family member.

I was 10 years old when I got my period and had to learn all about how to affix a pad to my underwear. She was calm and reassuring and always made me feel at ease, even when my body was maturing far faster than she was ready for.

I was 7 years old when we moved to a new state and I spent weeks hiding behind her legs as I was introduced to a new world. I'd sneak into her bed every night and lay still as a board so as not to wake up my dad. She would always stay with me or let me stay with her and my whole body knew that it had once belonged with hers. The safety and warmth I felt snuggled in close was all I ever needed in the world.

Her hands, once magic as they drifted across my back, now sit limp in her lap. One is strong but struggles to wheel her chair across the room while the other may as well belong to a doll. Her legs, once always moving from here to there and there to here, now dangle from a seat she barely leaves. One is strong with memories of miles walked, bikes ridden and dances in the kitchen. The other is stiff and stubborn, refusing to conform to the signals of the brain, rejecting her need to just take one more step, buckling under her weight and bringing her to her knees. The left side is my mom, the right side is a stranger.

When I was a kid my mom always worked full time but still managed to volunteer in my classroom, go on field trips, take me to appointments, and show up to all of my extracurriculars. She was powerful in a subtle and humble way that I never truly appreciated until I was a grown woman working in the corporate world. She could run an entire enterprise from the background, cheeks flushing whenever the attention was on her, and still make it home for dinner. She would greet me with a hot towel straight from the dryer whenever I got out of the shower, leave me post-it notes to remind me of chores, and wash my favorite shirt the night before I needed to wear it. When I grew up and moved out of the house, she was the one stocking my apartment with essentials, taking me grocery shopping and cleaning my messes. She pushed me to take chances and give everything a solid effort, knowing I could always come home if I needed to. She was the voice on the other end of the phone asking me how my day was and truly wanting to hear the answer.

When the signals in her brain took away her mobility, they moved their conquest over to her language center. She stares at me now, eyes begging me to hear the words she cannot speak. She gave me a lifetime of love and now as I stare down 33 and statistics from her medical team, I know this will be the year she leaves me. May all the years I live beyond the one I'm in be spent making her proud.