There were a handful of days in my head that I knew would be hard for me after Kenny died. I know that every person that’s ever lost someone they love has the same kind of list.
The first Thanksgiving, the first Christmas, our anniversary, the day of our first date, Father’s Day, his birthday, and the day that he died.
Those are all the days that I expected to be especially hard to get through. Days where the grief would wrap itself tightly around me and make me feel like I was suffocating. Days that the depression would be extra hard to deal with.
I expected all of those days to have a deeper sadness hanging over them because those are the days you feel your loved one’s absence so much more than you do on any other given day. It’s on these days that the emptiness left by their death swallows you into a dark vacuum.
One day that I was not anticipating being equally as hard as the ones above was Mother’s Day. I knew Father’s Day was going to be tough because that’s the day our children and I would celebrate his role in our lives. But, I didn’t think that the day we celebrate all the mothers in the world would be so difficult to get through.
But, it was a hard day. My first Mother’s Day without the man who made me a mother was difficult. I went to bed the night before realizing that this day would be just as sad as all the other significant days after a loved one’s death that I had already gone through. I cried when that realization hit and my pillow was damp from my tears as I went to sleep.
This was the first Mother’s Day I spent not hearing the words “Happy Mother’s Day” from Kenny as soon as I woke up. This was the first Mother’s Day that I didn’t hear Kenny say thank you for being the mother to his two beautiful children. This was the first Mother’s Day that there was no card from him that said “Love, Kenny”, written messily in his distinct mixture of upper and lower case letters that became so endearing to me over almost 36 years together.
This was my first Mother’s Day spent as a solo parent, and well, it hurt. It hurt so much more than I was anticipating it would and I wish I could fast forward through all of this hurt. But, I can’t, because it’s all part of the grief process.
I can’t pass go until I’ve moved around the entire board. There’s no shortcut. I have to land on every square and work my way through each and every one before I complete this healing journey. If I do try and get to the ending point without doing all the work on each square, I’ll end up back at the beginning and it’ll be like I never started the process in the first place.