Over the last few months, there’s been a lot of bad news impacting some of the people that I care about. People dealing with sick parents that are losing their battles and moving towards their final days. People losing close relatives and other’s that have been diagnosed with cancer at a very young age and struggle to think about a future for their young children that may not include them. Now that I’m in my “mid-life” I feel like it never stops and it’s all heartbreaking. As a bystander, I sit back and feel helpless. Most of us can relate to grief because we’ve all felt it in some small or major way in our lives. I am a true believer that pain is not relative, it just is, which means that we can’t compare our pain to others. We don’t get to decide that certain people have it better or worse, it just doesn’t work that way. Whatever we’re suffering with is our battle to fight and when we try to compare it, we diminish what we all desperately need, and that is to be seen, heard, and loved in times of loss. But this doesn’t mean people can “fix” how we manage grief. The hardest part about grief may be the loneliness we feel regardless of how we are being supported; managing grief is a lonely business.

My first experience with grief was probably like many. I lost several pets and felt how disoriented our house would feel when one of our fur babies was no longer with us. Misty, pictured here, was the first dog I loved and lost. My parents would typically handle this with a small amount of time to feel the loss and then shortly after they’d introduce a new sweet puppy or kitten into our family and our hearts would be full again. It wasn’t until I got older that I realized how difficult pet loss can actually be. As a child it was fleeting, but as I’ve become more attached to my pets it’s devastating when you lose one of these loyal members of your family.

The next loss was of grandparents and this was, in many ways, underwhelming for me. For one, I wasn’t very close to any of my grandparents so I didn’t have a relationship that would be missed or unresolved. And, typically, grandparents are an expected loss. When they live to be in their 80’s or 90’s it seems inevitable to lose them. My Dad’s parents were his foster parents and they were much older. “Uncle Fred” as we referred to his foster Dad was born in 1899 and “Sister” as we called his foster Mom was born in 1903. They were very kind people and all of my memories of them are positive but I wasn’t around them much and I was very young so the loss was associated more with how hard this was for my Dad. The people that took him in at the young age of three, when his own parents were unable and unwilling to raise him, were now gone and he had lost “his people”. This was hard to watch and I hurt for my Dad but had very little of my own pain. Then my Mom’s Dad died, this was very painful for her. I wanted to be there for her but had few of my own emotions tied up in my grandfather. Eventually, my grandmother would pass after years of fighting dementia. She was often unkind to my Mom due to feeling unworthy her entire life and even more so in the years that followed her dementia diagnosis. I don’t think I skipped a beat when she died. I actually felt relief that my Mom was free of the woman that treated her so badly at times. We never had a service for her which felt odd but I was more shocked at how indifferent I was to this. It felt wrong to feel this way or in this case, not feel the grief.

The most difficult moment of my life was when we lost my Dad to a sudden heart attack at the prime age of 51. It felt surreal, like I would wake up and it would be a terrible dream. But I never woke up and I still find myself, to this day, weeping after 20 years of him being gone. Grief hit me like a mac truck and in some way, I never fully recovered. I was 23 years old and my life was already spiraling out of control before the loss. Grief now consumed me and I struggled to breath when I was alone with my thoughts. So I got busy and I got focused and I never stopped. Accomplishment and success became my coping mechanism and I was going to run like hell to escape the pain of losing my Dad. I suppose there are worse things I could have leveraged to cope but after 20 years I’m just starting to undo the need to be busy in order to avoid the pain.

More recently the loss of both of my in-laws in many ways matched the pain I felt when I lost my Dad. There are so many reasons it was different, I was not only devastated by my own feelings of loss but for Greg, his siblings and my children who were loved so deeply by these people. I remember the same feelings of intense sorrow and begging to bring them back but I didn’t have any of the “baggage” or rich history that typically comes with a parent/child relationships. My feelings of loss were wrapped up in empathy for all those around me that were experiencing the loss of a parent for the first time. I delivered my Mother-in-law’s eulogy and felt honored that the family trusted me with this task and grateful that I had the opportunity to share everyone’s feelings about this amazing woman. I still cry to this day when I think of her and how deeply she loved my husband, my children and me.

Up until recently, I’ve always associated grief with death. The loss of someone you deeply care about, and this is for sure the epitome of loss, there’s no coming back from death. But for several years I’ve felt this deep sense of loss in my life. This loss is centered around the lack of control over what’s happening to Greg and my Mom, both suffering from incurable diseases. My Mom, who is the woman with all the answers and a true intellectual, is slowly losing her mind to dementia. And then there’s Greg, the man who never stops trying and has a talent for fixing and building things is slowly and painfully losing his ability to move. I’ve spent many hours in therapy talking about these two people and my inability to manage these very heavy challenges. I am an incurable optimist so I have done my best to out smile, out work and deny that watching these two extremely strong people suffer loss every day has not had a profound impact on me. This is when I started to understand that I was dealing with “chronic grief”. This is not to say that I can’t move past the stages of grief but that I’m watching loss every day and the people that I’m losing are still standing right in front of me; still accessible, still present, still fighting and both still loving me fiercely! It’s not like either one of them is giving up. Quite the opposite, they both approach each day with a mental strength that is not only astounding but admirable. And it is their ability to move through the world still figuring it out, even with constant obstacles that I feel the need to suck it up and get over myself. Who am I to feel the pain of their loss? It’s a question I ask regularly and then I have to remember my own words. Pain is not relative.  It is our own. I believe this but the urge to just smile past it, work harder and bury myself in “busy” in order to avoid the pain seems so much easier than facing the “what’s next” and the “what ifs”.

Truthfully, we are all just taking each day as it comes. No one knows what tomorrow will bring. I know this first hand. One day you wake up to a normal extra-ordinary day and the next you wake up to a very sick pet or news from a doctor that your life has changed forever or a phone call letting you know that your very young and healthy Dad has suffered a catastrophic heart attack and died instantly. We just don’t know.

So I choose to keep moving and to keep smiling and try to accept each day as it comes. I also choose to allow myself to feel the pain and the loss and to feel deeply sad at times. I am forever grateful for the number of family and friends that are always just a text or call away. Often the universe speaks to us and people reach out at the most necessary moments because we are all connected by this greater purpose to support one another. If there’s one thing I have figured out, it’s that we can’t do this alone. And alone I am not.

After spending a great week in Colorado with my Mom I returned home to change suitcases and pack for the family beach trip that we’ve had planned for months.  This would be the first trip to the Outer Banks that we’ve done with friends, versus the extended Webb family, and I was excited to be on an actual vacation opposed to the week in Colorado that was a mixed bag.

This was going to be 7 days of relaxing, playing, eating and socializing with friends at our favorite place, the beach. We went with two amazing families from our old neighborhood. The Litz’s have been some of our best friends for almost 15 years now and even though we moved away almost 5 years ago we manage to make time to connect and support each other still. The Morgan’s have been in our lives mainly because of Madison but we have grown to love and appreciate them as a family. Ella, their middle daughter, is Madison’s best friend. Ella’s Mom, Missy, has been their Girl Scout Troop leader since they were around 4 years old. Missy has been like another mother to Madison and I’ve enjoyed having another woman in her life that cares for her so deeply. We were excited about the week ahead!

It’s been 4 years since we got a house on the beach in the Outer Banks because it’s so pricey in the summer but I was determined to get us back there knowing it’s one of my kiddos favorite places on the planet and happens to be where my life long best friend lives. They were over the moon excited to leave on Saturday morning and I was doing my best to pack and prepare in the 20 hours I had after returning home from Colorado. As usual Greg did all the heavy lifting to get our “stuff” in, or on top of, our car while I was gone. He packed all the beach essentials and his seven fishing rods, which he seemed to think was not that many….hmmm. Anyway, the car was, for the most part, packed and I just had to get some of the basics, check the kid’s suitcases, and get my own stuff together. Greg made this really easy and we pulled out of our driveway only 40 minutes later than I’d hoped. Huge win for us!

In the beginning of a road trip the anticipation is typically contagious and the kids are super nice to each other as we make the 6-7 hour drive to NC.  We’re agreeing on movies and snacks and even bathroom breaks. Okay….time out. This is when I think I should reset my expectations because it’s all too good to be true. The excitement of what’s to come is so overwhelming that we care less about irritating each other or getting “our” way than normal. It’s a beautiful thing, but it also makes me sit back and think….this is probably about as good as it’s going to get all week. Don’t get me wrong, I’m caught up in it as much as they are and I’m imagining days on the beach in the sun and surf. Drinking yummy drinks and eating anything I want. We are all in this euphoric place and it feels great.

We’re the second family to arrive with the Litz crew close behind us. It immediately hits me that I hope everyone is happy with their room situation. I know how this goes, there are more ideal rooms than others and someone often gets the crappy end of that deal. In general the rooms all seem nice but it’s the anxiety, since I made the final decision on the house, that everyone might not be as content with their arrangements. If that was the case everyone kept it to themselves and made the best of it. Greg and I always take the top master that’s close to the kitchen so he doesn’t have to ride the elevator as much due to his MS. For those that don’t know my husband, Greg, was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 2007 and has been fighting the battle ever since. He is winning in mindset but losing physically every day.

With Greg’s challenges I know that the kids and I need to do the heavy lifting to unpack and get things in the house. We are not there 15 minutes and Chris, Ella’s Dad, essentially unpacks our entire car. I’m floored. Greg hasn’t even come up to see the house and Chris has all of our belongings in the right rooms. What a relief to have so much help upon arriving. I’m thinking if this is an indicator of the week we are good to go. Dan and Marnie arrive soon after and decide to order subs for everyone, another to do off my list. Marnie and I head to the grocery to stock up for the week.  It’s pretty much chaos but we are trying not to buy all the same stuff and be smart about it. We succeeded for the most part, outside of bananas, there were a lot of bananas….hahahaha! First night was a success and I was feeling surrounded by some amazing people that were willing to make decisions and help out, feeling thankful and excited.

When you vacation with people that you know relatively well but have never lived with it’s a bit of a dance on how to co-habitat with them. For instance, do they want to chat in the morning? Do they like to make the coffee a certain way or prefer it to be ready? Who needs to own the remote? It’s just silly stuff, but you try to figure it out real quick. And I think we did. This group was so easy to be with for a week and I was amazed almost every day that everyone was willing to help out and make things simple. I’m a late sleeper on vacation and I’d wake up and look out on the beach to check things out. The gang would have already set everything up including a cooler full of drinks. Things were going well and I felt like I could just relax.

So this is where it takes a slight turn. On Tuesday Greg was becoming increasing agitated that he could not move around on the beach the way he wanted. Even worse he couldn’t even get to the beach because the stairs that led to the beach didn’t have a rail on the pool side. So Greg would do his best to scoot up and down the stairs but it was frustrating to say the least. Then once he got on the beach he couldn’t manage walking on the sand. He also couldn’t get close enough in the surf to cast his rods into the water. He would spend hours setting himself up to try and fish just to fail or tangle a line or fall. I knew he was becoming more and more frustrated but Greg tends to manage himself well and make the most of it so I kept my distance and offered help when it made since. We hit a tipping point when he couldn’t get up the stairs on Tuesday. He let me know that I had rented the “worst possible house” for him because of the rail situation and I was very hurt and angry. I went to the beach and left him to manage himself. He considered finding a way home and leaving us to enjoy the beach without him; which felt like a terrible and selfish solution from my perspective. But if that’s what he wanted than I guess I couldn’t stop him. This is the “real” vacation. It’s all the things that happen when Facebook isn’t looking and it can be painful and hard and sends me into an emotional spiral. I post a lot of pictures and I continued to show the world the fun we were having, and there was a lot of fun. But then you go hide in your room and cry because nothing quite works out the way you hope it will. This picture, the one I captured of Greg struggling to get back on his feet from the surf is what we watch all day long. You catch the awesome moments too but these are the more frequent moments that make up the reality in our life. It’s painful and hard and thankfully we were surrounded by extremely caring people to help.

But in the end Greg didn’t leave. He stayed and on Wednesday the guy that can’t get on the beach or up the stairs is the one that built a temporary railing so that he could. This also helped Missy’s Mom who was struggling with the same issue. He bought PVC pipe and rope and erected a full blown railing (you can see it on the right side of this picture). Took him almost all day and Chris did his best to help but Greg was determined to solve this problem, and he did. How is this possible? I watch him overcome extraordinary circumstances every day and I’m still not sure how he does it. This is my husband. He is unstoppable. There are people that are fully capable physically that can’t hold a candle to Greg. Once he let go of the anger and moved into how he could fix it, he was an entirely new man again. So then we got drunk and had an amazing evening on the beach with our friends:-) He did need four of us to carry him off the beach, due to a slight buzz, but no one cared and willingly lifted him up and towards the house. After this evening of celebration things were not perfect. Greg continued to show signs of frustration as he struggled to enjoy his time at the beach. He did go to the pier one day to try and catch fish but still had no luck. At least he got to fish and wasn’t struggling to manage the sand.

Now for me, I struggled throughout the week. Like most, I feel tired of having to make it all work and on vacation I was feeling especially selfish. I wanted to enjoy my time too. I don’t get but a few weeks of the year to just relax and enjoy the family without the interruption of work and other demands. But it just doesn’t work that way. Life keeps coming, there’s no pause button. If I thought I could get a full week of bliss I was delusional. I realized that I have to take the moments just as they are, moments.
Maybe that’s the amazing picture you capture of your kids laughing and playing and then you put down the camera and jump in the ocean with them. Because it’s all just moments and they aren’t set up to be strung together so beautifully, like a string of pearls, but probably broken up by real life because it’s hard and complicated. On the day Greg blamed me for the terrible decision on the house that I picked I was given the gift of connection and acceptance. I was sulking after his words and went to drift in the ocean and think. Missy could tell I was down and comforted me with kind words of affirmation that assured me that I was doing the best I could and that the situation was impossibly hard. I felt seen and heard and I’m grateful for that moment as well. She saw me and that was all I needed at the time.

The crazy thing with all this adult stuff going on behind the scenes is that I’m pretty sure my kids had no clue what was going on. You see, they are used to seeing their Dad struggle every day and they didn’t even bat an eye when he spent one of his vacation days building a railing to solve his issue. That’s just what their Dad does. They were preoccupied with friends and waves and kites and sunsets on the beach and thank God for that. I want my kids to enjoy those moments for as long as they can because one day they will come to understand that the “real” vacation can be messy and emotional and hard. But it’s seeing them laugh and play and enjoy themselves that makes it all worth it. There were a lot of rainbows while we were at the beach and every time I see one I’m in pure wonder and amazement. It helps me stop and appreciate something so magical that you can forget, even for just a moment, that “real” life is not always magical but it is what we decide to make it. So now if you blend this with what I share on Facebook you can see the “real” vacation for what it is, beautiful and hard all in the same moment.

I’ve heard the saying, “Expectations are the root of all evil”. This resonates deeply for me.  When I have an idea of how people should behave, react, engage, and then they disappoint me I find myself feeling frustrated, even angry. And guess what? People almost never behave the way you expect them to, and if they do, you might find yourself feeling shocked, or at least, pleasantly surprised. When expectations are not met this typically leads to resentment. So, why not just stop doing this? For me, it’s the hope that it could be different. But it’s the letting go that I can’t seem to grasp.  I can’t get out of my own way on this one.

This idea of expectations is haunting me as I prepare for a trip home to see my Mom this week. There are no greater expectations than the ones we hold our parents too and my Mom lets me down time and time again. The sad thing is that I’m conditioned to be let down and I still manage to sucker myself into believing that it might be different this time. It’s never different, and these days it’s even worse than different, it’s impossible. Don’t get me wrong here; I’m not putting this on my Mom. She has her own baggage to deal with and her own story to tell and it’s a story of suffering and sacrifice and triumph. So this isn’t about my Mom being a bad Mom, because she’s not. The anxiety is about me wanting things to be a certain way and the selfish view that it would be nice if that way positively impacted me.

Growing up my Mom was the sun, the moon, and the stars. My world revolved around her, she was the light and the warmth and she helped me to see how big the world was and encouraged me to make my place in it. My Dad was this ridiculously cool and interesting guy that seemed to be good at everything he ever did (expect marriage and not leaving). So when I was nine and he moved out, my Mom was left to be the daily parent and when he died in 1997 she was left to be the only parent. My Mom was the strongest person I knew. She was beautiful, intelligent, warm and ambitious. She had overcome some major adversity as a child and survived to “do better” with us. I thought she was invincible. As a child, I thought I would live with my Mom forever. I considered her one of my best friends and she was for sure “my person”. When something went well in my life she was the first person I would call and when something went really really bad she was my lifeline. She was the person that would never judge me or turn me away. She was always there. I felt so grateful to have her since I knew what losing a parent felt like and I was well aware that my friends didn’t have the same relationship that I was so incredibly fortunate to have.

When you put someone on a really high pedestal, the fall is devastating. In 2004 when I had Madison my whole world changed. Everything shifted in me and for the first time in my life, I loved something, someone, more than I loved myself. My Mom was there to help me during the first two weeks and when my friend Angela came to take her to the airport I wept. I begged her not to leave me and she fell apart not knowing how to walk away. She did go back to Colorado and I realized I was more capable than I thought but that was one of the last moments that I remember being 100% vulnerable with my Mom.

Once I got the hang of parenting, which basically meant I could keep Madison alive, I started to get cocky. I was going to prove to the world that I was in control and could handle this massive responsibility. This is when the judgment started and I could see all of my Mom’s parental flaws. Now that I understood parenting, my expectations were higher and when I looked back I had a lot of questions for my Mom. All of these questions were accusatory and unproductive but now I understood what it felt like to be a Mom, I felt like it was my responsibility to impart my new found wisdom. The reality is that the pressure of raising a child was so heavy I was looking to avoid judgment in any way possible and holding my Mom to an impossible standard seemed just as good a way as any to soothe my insecurities.

With so many miles between Colorado and Maryland, I could temper my behavior and bite my tongue when we were visiting until I couldn’t and then I’d usually show up like a giant asshole. Mentally I found myself discrediting my Mom to protect myself and slowly I felt us drifting apart. She was now, only “my person” for the good things, and I reserved my failures, for well, pretty much no one. This was the slow road to loneliness and my inability to ask for help was more evident than ever.

Fast forward to 2015, I now have three children, ages 12, 10 and 7 and they are all thriving; which means they are alive, doing well in school, and have some interests and some friends. Not the highest bar;-) My Mom and I are more disconnected than ever and I’m having a very hard year. So many things in my life seemed to be out of sorts. Greg, my husband, continues his battle Multiple Sclerosis and was struggling with his mobility. My brother was in need of help and living with us that summer to work on his recovery. My best friend was a new Mom and in need of a lifeline and I had my first real scare with potential breast cancer (which I did not have). I was in over my head and wanted more than anything to have “my person” but my Mom was fighting her own battle. This was the summer she was diagnosed with Dementia. When my Step Dad told me it took my breath away. I Googled, I cried and I felt completely helpless. The good news was that my Mom did not have Alzheimer’s, the most common form of Dementia, but it was Dementia and that was enough to bring me to my knees. The first thing I thought was how is this capable, confident, independent and completely in control woman going to handle losing her mind (literally). Then, probably too soon, I thought about myself.  This solidified that my Mom would never be the person I wanted her to be. Truth is, there really was no chance of this in the first place, based on my expectations, but I still had the hope that it could be different. I was devastated, for her and for me.

You would think with this news I’d be more kind and understanding and start to support my Mom in a different way. I’m embarrassed to say it didn’t happen that way. I acted like a child that wasn’t getting their way. We’ve had some of the worst fights ever in the last couple of years because I’m struggling to rise above my own needs and expectations. There was this part of me that just wanted to hug her and cry and tell her it was going to be alright. But I was angry and I was grieving and the person I was losing was standing right in front of me, how are you supposed to do that? I wanted her to tell me that everything was going to be alright and she couldn’t. So I made sad attempts to resolve old issues and I started to villainize my Mom to justify my anger. It felt awful and I felt ashamed. It was not getting better, I was not getting better. I stopped reaching out to her and buried myself in my own life in Maryland, which was not hard to do.

Then one snowy day this last winter I pulled out these DVDs of some old home movies. The kids and I sat down to watch but they quickly got bored of seeing their baby selves lay on a play mat for 25 minutes or play with a sweet potato in their highchair for what seemed like an eternity and they left the room.  I, however, was mesmerized and I watched and watched and watched for hours. I was so grateful for those videos and the beautiful memories they held. They were from 2004-2010, prior to my Facebook addiction, and having a camera on my phone, which is hard to remember. Suddenly, I find myself watching a scene of my Mom playing with the kids. I think it was in the summer of Madison’s 3rd birthday so Liam wasn’t even a year old. She was singing and laughing and playing and engaging and they were LOVING her. THERE SHE WAS, my Mom, that was her, the Mom I forgot about that was so fun and easy and warm. I immediately began to weep and couldn’t stop crying. It hit me like ton of bricks. I had forgotten her. The Dementia had been so slow that I didn’t even realize the impact it had on her, and me, until this very moment. My Mom was right there, but at the same time it was clear, the Mom in that video was gone. It was devastating but at that moment I completely altered the way I was seeing the situation. No, my Mom would never live up to my expectations; she never could have, even without Dementia. She was different now and I could choose to see that person differently. This meant I also needed to be different; I needed to change and come to terms with this new reality. It all made sense.

So the story continues. I’m heading to Colorado this week to spend four days with my Mom. It will be just my Mom and me FOR FOUR DAYS. My Step Dad had a conference in Vegas and was concerned about leaving her for so many days alone. My Mom doesn’t need full-time care but she has a lot of anxiety and her short-term memory is almost all but gone. I’m nervous because my Mom deserves to have someone that shows compassion and support during this difficult time. She was my sun, my moon, and my stars; the least I can do is provide a safe place where she feels love.  I want to be better and do better. The funny thing is that I don’t think she expects anything from me, not now.

What’s really scary is that I’m sure my children all currently have unrealistic expectations of me and I will inevitably let them down. I think this is just how it works with parents and children. We think our parents are supposed to have it all figured out, be better than the typical human. I hope that I can be vulnerable enough with my kids for them to see me as the broken imperfect person that I am. I know there’s a chance that they will hold me to great expectations, as I did with my parents, and I’m afraid they will also be greatly disappointed. All I can do is my best and maybe just maybe they’ll give me a hug one day and just let go.