This is my first Mother’s Day without my mother.
People tell you grief comes in waves, but nobody tells you how quiet the world suddenly becomes when the person who loved you first is gone. Nobody tells you how ordinary things — hearing her favorite song in the grocery store, seeing her handwriting on an old birthday card, passing by her favorite restaurant — can suddenly feel unbearable.
I used to think losing a parent was something that happened to “older people.” Something distant. Something you mentally prepare for over decades. But when it happened to me this year, I realized there is no preparation for losing your mother. None.
The hardest part isn’t just the funeral or the condolences or the paperwork that follows death. It’s the random moments afterward when your brain still reaches for them. When something good happens and your first instinct is to call her. When something terrible happens and you still want to hear her say, “It’s going to be alright.”
And then you remember.
That realization never gets easier.
Mother’s Day used to feel simple to me. Flowers. A card. Maybe dinner. A quick phone call if life got busy. I never realized how much I took for granted the simple fact that she was still here. That I could hear her voice whenever I wanted. That there would always be “next Sunday” or “next year.”
Until suddenly there wasn’t.
If your mother is still alive — and you have even a decent relationship with her — please appreciate her while she’s here. Not someday. Not when work slows down. Not after you make more money. Not after life becomes less stressful.
Now.
Call her. Visit her. Ask her questions about her childhood. Listen to the stories you usually rush through. Take more pictures together even if neither of you feel photogenic. Tell her you love her out loud, even if your family isn’t emotional like that.
Because one day, whether it’s expected or sudden, there will be a final conversation. A final hug. A final holiday.
And you usually don’t realize it was the final one until it’s already gone.
I think many of us move through life assuming our parents will always be there in the background like permanent fixtures. We don’t notice how much emotional weight they carry for us until that support disappears. A mother’s love can become so normal, so woven into daily life, that we stop recognizing it as extraordinary.
Until silence replaces it.
This Mother’s Day, social media will be filled with smiling photos, brunches, flowers, and celebrations. And that’s beautiful. But there are also many of us quietly surviving the holiday instead of celebrating it. People grieving mothers. Grandmothers. Stepmothers. Aunts. Women who raised us when nobody else did.
For some of us, Mother’s Day is now a reminder of absence.
And if I can leave people with anything after this loss, it’s this:
Please don’t wait until grief teaches you the value of someone who loved you deeply.
Appreciate them while they can still hear it.
