Today is my mother’s Yartzeit, the anniversary of her death according to the Hebrew calendar. It’s been nine years since she passed away, but it’s always a hard day. I still have memories refreshed and renewed every year of that day and the days preceding it. I remember the events leading up to her hospitalization, the time agonizing over whether or not she would ever get any better, and eventually tearing my shirt on learning that she had left this world. It’s a hard time, my mind is only partially occupied with anything I’m doing, the other part of me is nine years in the past and thousands of miles away.
I decided to leave my mental health program early for the day, I couldn’t focus on anything; I just wanted to go home and be alone and watch the few home movies DVDs my dad sent me a while ago. I haven’t had a DVD drive for my computer since I made aliyah, so I bought one so I could finally watch them. I learned so much just from watching them and seeing what my, or our, past was like.
Remembering Her
I asked for the videos to remember everything that time has taken from me when it comes to memories of my mom. It was a few years after she passed away that I forgot what her voice sounded like, and a few more years after that when I lost the ability to recall exactly what she looked like without having to look at photos; and for a long time even looking at the photos just brought too much pain to be worth the remembrance.
When I lived in Houston, I hardly had any photos of my mom in my apartment, it was too much to bear. Even though years had passed, the trauma of those final days were burned into my memory. For a long time, I could only associate my mother with feelings of loss and regret, the tragedy of her passing consumed all of the pleasant memories I had. Even when I would think about happier times, it would eventually make me realize she wasn’t there anymore. There was nothing more painful than picking up my phone to instinctively make my nighttime call to her only to realize their was no one on the other side.
Watching her through these videos I see so much of my mother, and my father and the rest of my family, that I had forgotten; as well as parts of her I would have never remembered her if not for these videos. Besides finally being able to hear her voice again, I got to see her living life in a way that was long gone by the time my furthest memories go back. I don’t remember much before my parents got divorced; and I think that my parents’ divorce colored a lot of what I remembered, as if the negative aspects pulled themselves together in my mind to dominate whatever hard drive space I have.
I got to see them happy, and happy together, something I can’t remember on my own. I saw my mother’s amazing smile and heard her laugh that laugh that was so infectious. She truly lived life in the moment and to the fullest, and I can see it in how she is constantly smiling.
The other thing that I got to see from the videos was just how much my parents loved me. It’s easy for me to remember the fights and arguments I had with my parents and the ones they had between each other, but it’s difficult to remember those times when they showed unbridled love for their only son. Whether it was my doting on me at my birthday, picking up the mounds of wrapping paper from Christmas gifts, or even just bragging about the interests I had as a child. There was one video of me getting ready to take a bath (glad that wasn’t shown at my wedding), and the sheer joy my mom showed doing something as trivial as bathing me impressed on me just the sheer amount of love she felt towards me. You can see it in her eyes, how I was the most precious thing in her life.
Changing my perspective of today
Over the years, my thoughts on this day and Mother’s Day have changed and grown, reflecting both my growing maturity as well as the distance of time. In the immediate years surrounding her death, I was inconsolable on this day. I had to take the day off, because I couldn’t stop crying no matter what I was doing. The pain was just too real and recent, I dealt with the aftershocks of her passing for a long time. My therapists think that one of my memories of her in the hospital contributed to my post-traumatic stress disorder, and I remember it being the one memory that triggered complete disassociation when I was in a recall session in the hospital. Those were rough years when I couldn’t look at a picture of my mother without bursting into tears.
Slowly, slowly, things have changed. It is still a hard day, but I can cry tears of joy alongside the ones of sorrow. I used to spend all of my time just missing her, wishing she was there by my side when I needed her. I passed by so many life milestones, like getting married and graduating law school, without her in the audience. In grief counseling, they told me that a person imagines their future with certain people in it, and when they pass away, the shock of that altered future shakes us to our very core. Watching those home movies, I imagined a world where instead of playing with me, my mother was playing with a future grandchild (G-d willing). I imagined her being at my thirtieth birthday party, coming to visit me in Israel. I imagined what it would be like to see what her children’s lives had become.
I don’t have to imagine though how she would feel. I know that she would be proud of me, even now in my mental treatment program, and that she would love me all the same. I know that I would stay up until midnight or later just to talk with her, but that I can really do that anytime I want. I can access her love without having to feel the pain and the despair, because her love was stronger than any of that.
I’m lucky that my mom got to know my future wife while we’re dating in the last few years of her life. She passed away before the wedding, but she knew that she was the one for me. When my mother was on her deathbed, my future wife (then girlfriend) was studying abroad in China. My wife ended her study abroad early and took the next possible flight to Houston once she found out what had happened. The day my mother died was when my wife saw her in that state for the first time. I was in the hospital room by her side, alone in the room, when my wife came into the room. Suddenly, a doctor called my name and I left my future wife alone with my mother in the hospital room. My wife said to my mother that she was there for me and that she was going to take care of me. My mother was completely not functioning at the time, she was barely clinging to life. Her brain had serious and irreparable brain damage. She was in hospice care, and we were all just waiting. When my wife said those words, my mother took her last few breaths, and my wife came out into the hallway to tell me that she was gone. My mother waited until she knew that someone was there for me when she was gone; that’s how strong her love was.
What lies beyond
I can’t promise myself that one day I won’t feel any pain on this day, and I think that’s all right. My psychiatrist said to me today, it’s ok to be sad, and it’s ok to be in pain; it’s just what we do on these days that matters. My mother wouldn’t have wanted me to just sit and be a wreck over missing her, she would have wanted me to smile and laugh like I did today, albeit with a tear, watching old movies. She would have wanted me to do something to honor her. So, today I donated to the Houston Zoo, a place she and I used to go to a lot and some of my better memories with her were as a kid going to the zoo with my mom, and later with my sister too. If you’d like to support the Houston Zoo, there are several ways (I adopted my favorite animal, the red panda), and you can check out the different ways to donate here. No pressure, just thought I would share.
If I could take anything from today and tell it to you, it’s first off to appreciate the time you have with people; because you never know when it’s going to be gone. However, I always say that, and I think I found something more profound today. Days like these where we remember our lost loved ones don’t have to be dominated by sadness and mourning lives lost and unlived, they can be points of light where we find new meaning in the lives of people we loved. People cannot be boiled down to their ends, it doesn’t do them justice to only remember the sad parts of their lives. Each person has so much beauty in them, and my mother was no different. She lived a life that I try and emulate, to live with the kindness and willingness to help others that she embodied. Our love doesn’t have to end in tragedy, it can go on in our memories. They are always with us, and their support is everlasting. I remember my mother’s life today, not just her death. To do anything else is unthinkable, because she wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. Always loving you mom, and thank you for the gifts you gave me.