I Wonder

My mother passed Friday morning, February 6, 2015.

There are days, like today, I literally have to suppress the scream I feel brewing deep down in my soul.

The only thing which stops me is what the Lord told me when I woke up the morning of Saturday, February 7, 2015. He said, “She’s breathing easy now.” She was no longer struggling to breath due to COPD (Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease). Her pain ended when He called her home the morning before. With her last breath however, my pain began.

Some days I wonder if it would be better if I let it out. Is that a selfish act? Would it be perceived as a cry for her to still be here and suffering? She is in a much better place than I. Would letting it out serve a purpose? Quite frankly, I think I’m afraid to let it out.

I was told “It gets better”. To a degree, it has. The day she gained her rest in eternity I experienced a pain like none before. In the five years since, I’ve had that reoccur just once. Every other day, however, I feel her absence.

So much has happened in five years.

I wonder what advice she would have given me in certain situations.

I wonder if she knew how much she was loved. I told her. I tried to show her; but did she know?

I wonder if she would be proud of me. Yes, at 53 years of age, I am still concerned with whether or not I am representing my parents well.

I wonder if the day will come when I don’t reach for the phone to call her.

I’m not the only one. Many of you have lost a parent, or both. You understand the agony there are no words adequate enough to describe. We function because well, we have to. Yet there are days we just want to cry out from the depths of our soul.

I wonder if that feeling will ever go away.
I wonder about a lot of things. Yet there is one thing I know for sure; I am Val’s kid, always and forever. And her name will not be forgotten on earth!

Rest easy, Valerie Sterns.