Yesterday was Mother’s Day and it’s a holiday that I have had a tendency to gloss over until recently. Just over eight years ago, my mother tragically died from a drunken binge that ended with her falling down the stairs and snapping her neck. She had just turned the age of 61.
For the longest time I was very angry about my her death. Ironically, I was just as angry about her life, especially the last few years of it. And I was extremely angry as well about how she treated me especially when she had been drinking. After her death, I played the avoidance game with my feelings about her passing. When the first mother’s day rolled around a few months later, I was extremely active in my sex and love addictions. While I might have often initially played the sympathy card to try to get something I wanted from those I knew, I wasn’t really trying to grieve nor do I remember crying much. There was a part of me that wanted to remain numb to it all.
I spent most of the next six years following her death engaging in the same toxic behaviors and continuing to avoid at all costs having to deal with the suppressed anger and rage surrounding my relationship with her. Every year another Mother’s Day would pass and I acted like I didn’t care. A few years ago though, I started having to face the pain I had shoved deep down about her. In some ways I think my body forced me to face it as the emotional side of me was too shut down. I believe that the trauma from her began to manifest itself instead in my physical body with chronic pain.
Through therapy, prayer, meditation and more, I worked hard to open up and heal all those wounds I had endured from her alcoholism and sicknesses. Today I’m not angry anymore about my mother in any way, shape, or form. Instead, I am beginning to remember the good things, and the good times, that I did spend with her throughout my life. They were always there but the anger kept me from seeing them.
In some sense, this entry is dedicated to my mother who I loved dearly. I know she did the best she could to raise me and I know she loved me as best as she was able to. While there are many memories I try to forget now as I don’t want to live in my painful past, I do want to reflect on some things I remember that I loved most about my mother.
Mom, if you can read this, wherever you are, I want you to know I love you and I miss you. I hope you had a good Mother’s Day this year and are able to see how far I’ve come in my life because of so many of the things you taught me for the better. I know you did the best you could to take care of me, and I know you raised me with the best of intentions. I honor you for that. While you had your faults, so did I. I forgive you for them and ask for your forgiveness for my own. And I look forward to the day that I see you again. I want you to know how much I miss doing things with you. Here are just some of them Mom.
I miss playing cards with you.
I miss watching movies and talking about their plots with you.
I miss going out to dinner to new restaurants with you.
I miss traveling and sightseeing to interesting places with you.
I miss sitting and taking walks on the beach with you.
I miss having ice cream sundaes and cones with you.
I miss your famous Chicken Marsala.
I miss calling and talking to you about the things we were both doing in life.
I miss getting a hug from you.
I miss hearing you play the guitar and the piano.
I miss making you laugh and hearing your laughter.
but most of all…
I just miss you.
Mom, Happy Mother’s Day. You are the best mother I could have ever had and I’m grateful to God for having me be your son. I love you.
Peace, love, light, and joy,
Andrew Arthur Dawson