The saddest moment of my life was losing my mother. She died of cancer on January 7, 2015.
On that morning, surrounded by her husband and children she took her last breath and passed away.
It was a sunny morning for January and I remember warm rays of sunlight entering the window next to her bed. They bathed everything and everyone in warm light, except for her. My mother was gone. We all embraced and cried and some smiled. It was done.
While watching her die that morning was sad and difficult and in some way infuriating, that wasn’t the saddest moment of my life. The saddest moment in my life happened weeks before when I was surprised by a phone call telling me that she was already dead.
Someone called me, I don’t remember who, and told me she was on her way home and would be placed in hospice care. I didn’t know what that meant exactly, but I understood the gist. The doctors couldn’t help her and whether it was her decision or others, she was going home to die on her bed.
My mind was trapped like a broken record circling back to moments that my mother and I had just had together. Moments when she was whole and happy. We had made plans to go have fun together soon, to go on a trip or just strike out and be spontaneous. This was our bond, something we had shared our whole lives. We were an inseparable pair of happy adventurers.
The saddest moment of my life wasn’t losing my mom, it was losing control. The saddest moment of my life was facing the fact that all the people in the world who I love will someday die. The saddest moment of my life was knowing that I will die.
Life is so short and life can be taken so fast.
Since that day I have tried to live as hard I a can, to be a son that she would be proud of. I have refused to push my sadness of her passing down deep where I don’t have to think about it and don’t have to deal with it.
I keep her with me in my heart and in my thoughts and if I get sad. I let myself feel sad. Then, I look at her photo on my desk, she is smiling up at me, and I feel happy once again.
