Gratitude

I haven't written since that day, and my heart still weeps, seeping blood like one of those plastic straws with a hidden crack. It still works, but never quite in the right way, with either air or liquid sneaking where it's not supposed to be.

She died during the night. The day before, she had me suction her trach, which terrified me (never having done that before) and somehow made me heartbreakingly grateful for her absolute trust. She was struggling to breathe, and decided to unfasten her water valve wide open to help rinse it. It flooded her breathing tube, causing her to clutch at the air, unable to catch a breath, drowning in the water. I ran around blindly in a small circle like one of those panicked cartoon characters finding themselves off the edge of a cliff, recovering just in time to literally lift her up with both arms, her chin over my shoulder and the water expelled with a gasp, like a baby being born. After laying her gently back down, she had such an expression of peace, looked at me, smiled and said thank you. It would be the last thing she would ever say to me.

Leaving children behind is often a mother's greatest fear. A mom knows there are some things no one else can quite replace—not because others aren't capable of loving her children, but because a mother's love is woven into a thousand ordinary moments that seem invisible until they're gone.

For her, it cut to the very center of who she was, because before anything else, she was a mother—fierce, devoted, and limitless in her love. Even with an incredible husband and father standing beside them, she worried about all the moments she would miss and all the things only a mother seems to know how to do. Who would fold the socks the way she did? Who would cry at graduations, be there for first days of school, first dates, weddings, and birthdays? Who would carry their worries, celebrate their victories, and preserve the small stories that become memories that knit the family together from generation to generation? Her fear was never of death itself, but of absence—the possibility that her children might one day feel alone in moments when they needed their mother most. The thought broke her heart long before it broke ours.

Know this: time is never promised, only given. Learn the greatest lessons from her sacrifice: love generously, show up completely, live with indomitable courage, and choose gratitude above all else.