Seasons changing
I love spring, a time of renewal and life.
I’ve suffered from SAD (seasonal affective disorder) for many years now, so spring is also usually a sign of hope for my mental health — the light at the end of the tunnel, if you will.
But this year, as daylight hours got longer and the outdoor breeze softer, I’ve been feeling a complicated sadness whenever I catch myself feeling hopeful.
It pains me that seasons can go on changing while my mom is still gone.
It takes me back to the anger I felt when I first lost her, when I thought to myself several times a day: How could the world go on as if nothing’s changed, while I’ve irrevocably lost my mom forever? It made no sense to think that way, but the world continuing on also made no sense to me.
I was angry, but more than anything else, I was frustrated because there was nothing and no one I could be angry towards.
For about a week after my mom passed away, I’m not gonna lie, I was angry at the hospital — the doctors and nurses that allowed my mom to catch a deadly infection, after a very successful surgery that was gonna give us all more time.
For about a month, I was angry at my dad for not keeping a closer eye on her medications leading up to the surgery. Maybe she didn’t take one medication that could’ve saved her life.
For months and even today occasionally, I’ve also been angry at myself. Maybe if I didn’t advocate for the surgery, she would still be here today. Without the risks of the surgery, she would’ve at least had a better death.
But I also understood that my anger towards the medical staff, my dad, or myself made no sense at all.
At the risk of being insensitive to new grievers, because I don’t know how else to put it: I know very well that everyone we’ve ever loved will die at one point. It’s not a risk, it’s a fact. So nobody is to blame, and having a source of blame isn’t going to bring anyone back.
And so I’m still angry, but at the randomness of the universe. I’m not religious, but my mother was Christian, so yes, I did think about God as well. If God was so good, why did he do this to her?
The gods are assholes, I wrote in my diary.
I’ve always been a problem solver. Identifying problems to solve is what I do, but of course, I don’t have the power to change the randomness of the universe. So I felt frustrated and helpless because for once I couldn’t just “fix it”, for once there wasn’t anything I could do to make it better. I just had to accept it, as a cold harsh fact.
The death of my mom made a very thick line between the before times and the after times. Every event is now marked as before my mom’s passing and after.
This is the first spring without my mom.
Last year this time, both she and myself were starting to grow seedlings for our gardens. We talked to each other about when we were going to plant what, and excitedly traded seedlings with each other.
Last weekend was Easter.
Firsts are hard because not only do they remind me that mom isn’t here anymore, but they remind me of the rest of our lives that she won’t be here for. All the futures we’ve planned and hoped for.
We still get together on these holidays and spend our day mostly enjoying ourselves, but at the end of the day, I always think to myself, I wish mom is here to be a part of this.
I want to end this update on a positive note. Knowing that this is probably very random, I want to share a screenshot from Woebot, an app I installed this morning, that uses AI and CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) tools to support the user’s mental health.
I’ve put off working on my grief exactly because I’ve felt guilty, like a betrayal, like if I worked on my grief I’d be trying to get over it — so what this lovely robot sent me came at the right moment for me.