A Year Without My Mom

So at pretty much this exact moment, one year ago,  I was standing in a bright hallway in srmc holding on as tight as I could to my wife, bawling uncontrollably as my heart crumbled. Danyelle had pulled me aside and told me my mom was gone privately before the doctor came in and callously shared the news ( I don’t know how, didn’t know it was possible, but how danyelle guarded my heart, and held me together, it made me love her more than I did before. Didn’t know it was possible, but it happened.)It wasn’t the 16, but it was the third Sunday in October, great marshes homecoming day. That day I had eaten lunch at Shogun with Heath McNease, Playdough, Manchild, Rachel Johnson, and Vincent Stephens. Once my girls were in bed I sat down to watch football. Around 11:30pm the night of October 17^th my aunt myrtle called me to tell me to go the hospital, mom had had a heart attack. I knew she was gone before I even hung up the phone. They called her time/date of death on the 18^th, but she really died on the 17^th. That night Danyelle was working, I was sitting in my recliner watching a football game with the colts and someone else. I felt the weight of her loss crushing my chest before I knew it to be fact. I got showered, dressed, and drove to the hospital, and the rest you know. I had seen my mom the day before. I had just performed Aaron Hillburn/Martin’s wedding, and stopped by to visit my mom.  I came in my suit, bear hugged my mom, and sat on her kitchen counter like a little kid, just like I had been doing my whole life. We talked for maybe 15 minutes. That was my last memory of my mom. Everything that happened afterwards was a whirl-wind of pain, and surviving on the grace of God and the compassion of people who loved me. I spent hours sorting through papers for an insurance policy that didn’t exist, trying to figure out what in the world I was supposed to do now, and just doing my best not to fall apart. The thought of trying to explain to Rosa that grandma  was gone and she wouldn’t see her anymore literally destroyed me. I sat there crying trying to lovingly explain to a joyful child why she wouldn’t see her grandma, she understood surprisingly well. In fact her frequent statements in the months that followed like “Grandma Jeanette is in Heaven” or  “Jesus took her hurt away” were both comforting and crushing. My heart was so heavy and so full that I didn’t want to sleep that night. My wife was a constant source of strength for me. 2 of the other things that really helped me were the movie “Elizabethtown” and it’s soundtrack, and then somewhere in the weak Heath McNease texted me and told me he wrote a song for what I was going through, and surprisingly enough it helped me process what I was feeling better than I could have ever hoped. It’s a song called “Selah” on his “The house always wins” album (I’ll put a link in the comments). I’m not gonna list all the friends that came to my aid, but I know who you are and I thank you. Somewhere in this experience I got the bright idea to preach my mom’s funeral, felt like the dumbest idea I ever had, but at the same time I felt like no one else had the right to. I loved my mom like no one else, I did my best to pour into her spiritually over the years, I lead her to Christ, I baptized her, I watched her grow in church, she ministered with me at camp grace and countless elementary schools. No one else was gonna do it. I think one of the things that was hardest for me that day was seeing Danyelle break. Right before we walked in the door for the service she grabbed me outside the church and let go, I know my mom wasn’t perfect but she was a good mom to Dan, and I hadn’t even took time to consider what a loss it may be to her.I picked “The Shelter” off Jars of Clay’s album of the same title (which wasn’t even out yet, got it with an advance order” to be played at the service. I love that song, but to this day I tear up every time I even here one note of it. I managed to preach my mom’s funeral, and I don’t remember a lot of what I said or how it went, but I’m told it went well. In the comic book “Identity Crisis” a superhero named “Elongated Man” goes up to speak at his wife’s funeral and literally looses the ability to hold himself together. I picture that’s what how I felt looked like. After the burial we came back and ate, and I remember this really peaceful moment where my kids, and my cousins kids, and all these little ones played in the church playground. Past that, it’s been hard, I don’t know how many times I reached for my phone to call or text my mom about something, only to stop mid dial when it hit me. How much I just wanted to hear her voice. How much I see her in bella’s face. How the little things remind me of her. I think that marked the day that I truly felt mortal, like I know my life is gonna end here on earth. It felt like a part of my soul was gone, that the innocence was out the window and I was faced with the cold truth. I’ve felt so alone at times since then. I have great friends, amazing family, lots of support, but I don’t have my mom. My dad’s condition doesn’t allow him to be there so I truly feel like an orphan. I didn’t lose faith, or become bitter towards God or anything like that, I have complete hope and faith that when I stand before Christ, so will my mom, and I’ll see her there. I’m not gonna pretend to know more about heaven than the word of God states, but I hope in my heart that when she gets a glorified body, she’s still super short. I miss my mom. There’s been a steady ache in my heart for the last year, I don’t have an overall reason for typing this other than the fact I never really took the time to say this stuff out loud, I have no idea if I stopped moving long enough to grieve over my mother, I know that I love her, she’s gone for now, but I will see her again. Thanks for reading, thanks for caring.

-          Hector