The Day You Died

On April 15, 2003, you died, but I died too. The girl I was up until that day, died. She died in a car crash along with her mother. A part of grief that hurts so much is that you’re dealing with a loss and the loss of yourself, because you really do not know how to go on without the person. After that day of loss, I lost myself too. I had to rebuild myself and adjust without you on Earth. The new me, is missing a lot of parts; only ones a mother could fill.

Everyday I hear your voice come out of my mouth, not what you’d say but your actual pitch and tone—It’s terrifying and amazing but it makes me fearful of speaking at times.

Sometimes I see your face in the mirror when I’m putting on my make up, and I briefly gasp and look away. I’m turning into you more and more.

I hear your voice in my head all day-saying what I think you’d reply to my usual million questions. I have conversations with you, and imagine the advice you’d give. I have searched (and will continue to search) everywhere for that feeling only a mother could provide-that calming feeling of relief that “everything will be okay.” To say I miss you does not apply. As miss means “fail to notice, hear, or understand.” I always understood you the most. My entire being aches from your absence. I cry and scream, and hold my two hands together, pretending one is yours, to comfort myself, as you taught me.

Hearing your voice in mine, seeing your face in mine, is all I have left of you.

Hearing and Seeing My Mother, In Me.

Since my mother has died, I have spent my life trying to find someone or something that gave me comfort and solace. The feeling only a mother could provide. You know, “that everything is going to be okay” feeling. It is very hard to get through life once you have felt that way and then have had it ripped away from you.

The past few months, when I speak, I hear my mother’s voice. Not something she would have said, but her actual voice. I sound like her. It’s terrifying, but also soothing…if that makes any sense. Sometimes I’m afraid to speak, as I don’t know if her voice will come out. I’ve also noticed that I’m starting to look like her, as I remember her. I was putting on my make up, and I saw her face staring at me. Another terrifying moment. I never imagined anything like this would happen. I’ve been to many psychic mediums, and I’ve prayed and asked for signs. This has propelled me into a “re-grieving” stage as my therapist says. I don’t buy it. I don’t think we ever end grieving. We just live with it, in pain…like a tumor. We find ways to work around it, even though it’s always there. Some days it hurts and we can’t take tolerate the pain, so we cry and scream. Other days, it’s manageable.

You’re Just Like Your Mother

Growing up, my father would constantly use this statement as an insult towards me. As if being like her were the worst thing in the world. Sure, she was mentally ill. It was difficult for her to multitask and she was extremely codependent. But, she was also extremely intelligent, funny, and beautiful.

One day, after another session of berating me, I turned to my father and said “good, I hope I’m like her, she’s amazing.” He never said it again after that day.

Despite my rebuttal, this still effects me everyday. When I’m too emotional, I question if I’m acting like my mother. I’m constantly comparing my life and hers. It’s an awful process, and there is a lot of guilt involved. The truth is, I’m terrified of becoming “like my mother.” Towards the end of her life, she was prescribed Thorazine to get through the day. She couldn’t work, and she was living in a rented room. I would like to think I have her best qualities.

Depression is Work

I don’t choose to be depressed. I list out all of the things I’m thankful for. I’ve had a rough life, but I always remind myself it could be a lot worse. Anytime someone asks me “Why are you depressed?” I feel like slapping them. You don’t need a reason to be depressed. Do you ask people “Why do you have diabetes?” No, you don’t! You don’t ask, because it’s not something they could control. They didn’t ask to be sick. I didn’t ask to be depressed. It just happens.

Weekends are a time where I can act like my true self. I don’t have to get dressed, put on make up, and pretend I’m happy. I can stay in bed all day. It’s exhausting to get yourself through the day when you’re so down. Depression is more work. First, I have to talk myself into getting out of bed. Then I have to talk myself into getting ready. When I get to work, I have to convince myself to do work, and “act” happy. No one can know how miserable I am. Even if they did, it would not change how I felt. So, the weekends are a time when I can just be, depressed. I don’t have to fight it.

In Hiding

The neighborhood that I grew up in was and still is predominately white. Everyone was white, catholic and Irish and/or Italian. We weren’t. I guess that’s what made me start to hide our realities, starting at a very young age. Our reality was poverty. We were on welfare. We received Medicaid and food stamps. My mother was mentally ill. She needed massive amounts of medication to function. My father was so angry and bitter about their divorce that he did not provide her with much child support. It was difficult for my mother to maintain a job. We were Jewish, but my mother loved Christmas, so we celebrated that, maybe she was into hiding too?

How did we hide? I would clean our entire apartment. I would organize and redecorate. I would spend my babysitting money on anything to improve our apartment: new curtains, tiles, artwork, paint, and more. I would hide all of my mother’s pills. I would drape a blanket over the couch and arrange our throw pillows. I staged a “normal” home. I made our outside look “normal” too. I’d make my mom bring me to buy flowers, bushes, and gardening supplies. Then, I would spend hours gardening. I started “staging” our life when I was 9 years old. Have you ever seen a 9 year old use hedge cutters? I did.

This facade wasn’t just physical. I would lie when anyone inquired about my religion. I would insist that my mother was catholic and my father was Jewish. My mother didn’t care, she was so depressed and anxious, she’d do anything I told her to do. She knew I meant well. Keeping up this facade, was so exhausting. I didn’t have time to be a child.

I’ve only admitted to myself recently, even after I put myself through Catholic religious classes and received sacraments, that I am actually Jewish.

I’m not sure I have a religion, but I’m happy I was finally able to admit who I really am, 35 years later. I’m done hiding.

Bad Week

I wish I could have written more this week, but it’s been rough. I’ve been crying for no reason, practically on cue. I Googled, and it’s a symptom of my severe depression. Someone gave me a compliment the other day and I cried in the car. I thought about how far I’ve come, how I’ve had to do everything on my own, and how I’m actually proud of myself. I thought about how I had the task of “raising” my mother. I thought about how I tried to hide her mental illness. How I spent my first paycheck, on re tiling our kitchen floor, so that it looked like we lived in a “normal” house. How I hid in a corner when she paid with food stamps at the grocery store. I thought about how we hid that we were Jewish. It made me cry to think about all of these obstacles I had battled and overcame, and how I received a compliment, a really nice compliment. Something I wasn’t used to receiving. So I cried.

Anxiety

My first anxiety attach occurred when I was 8 years old. I think. I was at a restaurant, and I remember feeling strange. My heart raced, I couldn’t breathe. I told my mother about it, and she insisted it was an anxiety attack. I had already been in therapy, so it was just something else to discuss with the therapist. Why do children get anxiety?

I remember my father blaming my mother. She had been anxious in front of me, so some how I caught it. HA! Yes, there is some truth in that, based off of my Google research. Children are taught these behaviors, but there has to be a pre-existing genetic link as well.

My anxiety is rough. My psychosomatic symptoms should win Academy awards. I have felt physically ill, on so many levels. Besides hyperventilating, I have had feelings of dizziness and sensations that I am on a roller coaster or falling. I’ve had phantom pain, practically everywhere. When I was in 5th grade, my father told us he was moving far away for a while. Rather than sharing my sadness, I had intense headaches for weeks and blurry vision. For a time in high school, I had a fear of urinating on myself. So, I had bladder pain. I can go on and on. My psychosomatic symptoms have tricked me into visiting the doctor many times. It wasn’t until recently that I’ve become tired of them, and actually started to avoid the doctor.

My anxiety turned to panic when I was 15. I had just started my 2nd year of high school. Maybe it was hormonal, but I could not sit through one class. I would start to panic, my hands would tingle, my vision would be blurry. I had an urge to run. I had to leave. I would ask to go to the nurse. I had to get out of the situation. I would later learn that my fight or flight response was broken. My panic button was pushed on-always. I started missing school. I lied to my friends and told them I had mono. I would try to go to class, and end up in the nurse’s office. She grew tired of me, fast. She got nasty too. My mother would end up picking me up from school, everyday. I was missing class, tests, assignments. My life was falling apart.

At the time, I did not think it was anxiety or panic. I was convinced I was dying. I stopped eating. We began going to doctors. My bladder pain was so intense, my mother took me to a urologist. We went to 4 different specialists, I had sonograms, bloodwork-of course everything was normal. It took about a month of this charade at school for my mother to realize, this wasn’t physical. This was completely mental.