To the Motherless Daughters on Mother's Day

Dear Motherless Daughter on Mother’s Day,

We've never met before but we share the same story. We also share a day that we both want to avoid, skip, and sleep through each year since losing her. It’s Mother’s Day. Once the day is over, I count down the months until the next one. You wonder what life would be like if she was still here on Mother’s Day. For a split second, you plan your day around what she might enjoy doing only to have the wind knocked out of you by realizing she isn’t here. You see the posts of friends with their moms: baking, going out to eat, buying presents, and celebrating joyfully with a smile on their face. You see the mother-daughter pictures and notice the resemblance, and you wonder what she would look like standing beside you now.  

This holiday is an instant reminder that she is not here with you. It’s the moments when the Mother-Daughter Banquet is announced at church; you wish you could go, but you can’t. It’s the time in church when they ask the mothers to stand up so we can honor them. For once, you wish they would ask those with mothers already called home to stand so yours can be celebrated as well.  Will someone remember that today, while joyful for most, for Motherless Daughters can be painful?

I’ll never get to spend another Mother’s Day with her and take a special picture of just the two of us together.  We might have stared at my children and talked about all the special memories she had of me growing up. Instead, I will talk to her out loud and tell her how much I miss her, send her a special balloon to Heaven, and hug my children extra tight.

Motherless daughter, you are not alone on this Mother’s Day; she is with you. She’s in the curve of your smile, the warmth of your hugs, and that funny way your nose wrinkles when you laugh too hard like hers use to do. She’s there when I long to help others… that’s her, always has been. Those are things that can never be taken away even though she is gone. Our mothers may have been called home sooner than we were ready, but they never really leave us. We are part of them, and they are forever part of us. You see, my mother taught me everything I know: from loving others to laughing when things are tough. But, she was never able to teach me how to get through a Mother’s Day without her.

Sincerely,

A Motherless Daughter