Normalcy

This time of the year is hard. Christmas is approaching us and everyone is talking about all the fun things that are ahead, & while I'm excited for it all, in the back of my mind all I can think about is how it will never be the same. These next two weeks in particular are hard for me. You see, three years ago, during this week, I was living my last week of life as I had known it since I was born. And I had no idea how much it was about to change.

I remember everything about November 14th perfectly. It's like a movie that I can play over & over again in my mind. It was a Monday morning. I was getting ready for school. Mom called me, which I immediately thought was odd because I knew she was supposed to be at work. I answered the phone, & she told me she was at the doctor's office getting her headaches checked out. She sounded fine.. I knew that my mom had been having headaches for about two weeks & I knew that her speech had been a little messed up lately but it wasn't anything that I really stopped & thought twice about. So the second that she told me she was at the doctor, I got this weird feeling in my stomach that something just wasn't right. We hung up, I went to class.  It was 2:23 pm when my mom called me next. I had just been inside the post office in Martin. I was in my car at the red light beside the police station. She said, "I don't want you to panic, but they found a spot on my brain and they want me to come right back to Jackson to get more tests ran." A spot?? What kind of spot? Like a tumor? And while I could tell that she was trying to act like everything would be fine, I could hear her voice cracking & I knew she was scared. 

Jackson General kept my mom for the next two days, and on Wednesday night I finally got a phone call saying that I needed to come home from school because mom was being transferred to Vanderbilt. 

The next day, Thursday, we found out my mom would be having major brain surgery. 

Friday, November 18th, at 9:30a.m. My mom went back for surgery & at 7:00p.m. We were told by her doctor that it was brain cancer & that my 38 year old mother would need chemo & radiation. And that moment is when my life officially changed forever.

For me, that was the moment I lost her. That moment was harder than the day she passed away. Because that was the day that my fun, beautiful, hilarious Mom was stripped away. After that day, she was never the same. 

So that's why this week is so hard for me. I wish I could go back & relive this last week of normalcy before it was all taken away. You just never know when something could happen & your life as you know it is gone in an instant. 

Now that it's been almost a year & a half since she passed away, I am at peace with everything & my family & I have created "a new normal." There are days that I get down.. Moments when I hear a song, or smell a smell, or see one of her friends out.. Those moments that come every now & then hit me in my stomach & I almost feel like I can't breathe. But for the most part I can live my life happily. I don't cry everyday. I'm not sad every day. Time has healed it all & I can finally talk about her & not feel sad. I'm happy with where I'm at. But I look back on that time three years ago, and I think WOW. HOW DID I DO THAT? How did I make it through? How was I so strong? That time was the worst time in my life & I wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy. 

Every bit of it, now & then, was God. I always heard that in situations like that people say that God gives you strength that you didn't even know you had & that is SO true. Before I lost a parent, I would look at people who had lost parents & think... How are they even still alive? I couldn't survive without mine. But somehow, someway, God gets you through it. He's there & He's good. He helps you find a new normal. He never fails.