A really unique experience happens to young girls who are faced with the anticipatory loss of their mother during early adulthood, especially for those who have younger siblings at home base.

It presents a conflict that reaches into every corner of our lives.

For me, it almost feels as though my being has been split in half, and I’m left straddling two worlds that refuse to collide. In the first, I exist as a twenty-four year old law student, with an unflinching determination, who knows exactly what I want and where I’m headed. But in the second, I exist as a big sister who is called home to be helpful.

When you are an older sister, you inherit a responsibility. You are handed a life that becomes more important than your own. And it is your job to protect that life with everything you have. It doesn’t matter what you have to put on hold or how many things you have to dismantle to keep something else from falling apart. What matters is that you stay standing, even when you’re worn thin. Because little eyes are watching, trusting you to prove that strength can exist right alongside weakness.

While my mother’s ALS diagnosis was far from a spot I had marked on my map of young adulthood, it has taught me the true power that lies in continuously showing up for myself, and my siblings, even when I have absolutely no stomach for it.

When I was younger, I used to dream about becoming some big shot attorney in the city. I’d always joke with my mom that she’d never stop raising babies, because by the time she finished raising hers, she’d have to start taking care of mine. I never thought I’d be the one coming home to help care for her, and hers.

While it deeply saddens me to recognize that the second half of that dream will never come true, I’m so blessed to have learned the heart of motherhood from her.

When I think about what a full life looks like, I don’t immediately think about my career anymore. Instead, I think about all the love that surrounded me and my siblings during childhood. And all the love I hope to surround my future children with someday.

It was my mother who made sure that love was always around us. She jam packed it into the Yukon XL that still somehow managed to never have enough seats. She hid it under piles of folded laundry. She carried it with her to every possible sporting event. She poured it into our morning cups of coffee. She ran around with it all over Town Beach. She cooked with it in the kitchen. And she circled us with it during our evening prayers.

My mother filled us with a kind of love that doesn’t end.

I think sometimes we get so caught up in focusing on what we’re going to miss that we forget about all the miracles we’ve already been given. And the life my mother has created for each of us seven children has been nothing short of a miracle.

The greatest gift my mother ever gave me was the privilege of being an older sister. My siblings are sewn into every thread of my existence, hiding in every memory, and it is because of them that I know unconditional love is real.

So while I may be uncomfortably caught in between two worlds right now, I’ll forever thank God that I have my siblings. And I’ll sink into the role of big sister, willingly, because my love for them outweighs any pressure this life could ever place on me.

With love,

Car

I read somewhere once that to feel anything deranges you. And to be seen feeling anything strips you naked.

I don’t think I fully understood the meaning behind those two sentences until I finally confessed to others that I will have to watch my mother’s able body slowly wither away until she eventually dies of respiratory failure.

If there’s one thing having a dying mother has taught me, it’s that people do not want to see you stripped naked. They prefer you remain covered so that they themselves don’t have to be exposed.

…

When you have a terminally ill parent, it feels as though there’s this giant dark cloud hovering above you, constantly, relentlessly. And no one else can see it unless you tell them it’s there. But once you do, they can’t unsee it. And sometimes that cloud breaks open into a torrential downpour. So you do your best to hold up this giant oversized umbrella to keep yourself, and everyone around you, dry. But then the umbrella gets heavier. And eventually it collapses. And everyone gets soaked. And a lot of people, who were originally standing with you under the umbrella, are afraid of the rain. So they run for cover elsewhere. But you’re stuck in the mud. So you can’t run, no matter how desperately you want to. And some people are stuck in the mud with you because, like you, they don’t have a choice. But then there are the rare few who aren’t stuck in the mud, and they could run if they wanted. In fact, they could escape the storm entirely. But they don’t. They choose to stand next to you. And they get wet with you. And they hold your hand as you all do your best to enjoy the storm. I hope you know that it is these people who will save you, time and time again, if you let them.

…

To my very few people, thank you for teaching me that I’m not broken just because I can’t keep the umbrella lifted in every moment. For allowing me to feel the rain. And for never letting me sink too deep into the mud.

Because of you, I now understand that all of this is what makes me real, honest, and capable of love.

And love, in all its forms, is the reason we ever grieve at all.

xx, car