Today I let it all out as I drove. It wasn’t my intention but before I knew it, the trickle of tears turned into a waterfall. It is a mixture of anger and disappointment. I am angry at this horrible disease that preys upon people. No one “loses” a battle against cancer. It is not possible. It is not a battle when we are not given the tools to be able to fight fairly. Yet, cancer affects so many people, and brave they are for giving it there all. 

I am disappointed that I wasn’t able to decide how my mom’s life would end. I prayed. I pleaded with God. I called upon him to do something. I got angry, then cried. Then, I did it all over again. No matter how things looked, my heart remained still, just like my mothers. We stood beside her, believing. But my miracle didn’t portray itself the way I expected.

In my experience with grief, the emotions are always unpredictable and I never know what will be a trigger for me. But today, as I drove, I realized that I have been coping by not thinking about it. And although it may be difficult for you to understand, I’ve been waiting for my mom to walk through my door. If I sit in my living room, I can look outside and see her sliding down the jungle gym slide, with her huge smile, holding on tightly to Nate and Aria. When I get in her car, I can hold my breath, as I wait for her to open the door and slide into the passenger seat. I can hear her say, “Ay, Lita” to something we both find peculiar. It takes a couple seconds for my heart to realize she won’t be coming in.

My feelings are justified. Every single feeling. Often times, society expects one to “recover” from the loss of a loved one but after such an immense loss, is it a fair expectation to expect anyone to ever go back to the person they were? Years ago I wrote a piece on the process of being broken and repaired with gold (Kintsukuroi). This gift, of being able to repair a piece with gold and make it more beautiful then it was to begin with, is difficult to do, but it is quite the sight. Its brokeness, once thought to be the end, only increased its value.

I can see the melted gold, moving slowly like lava, filling every crevasse, every hole, every crack, mending even the tiniest fracture. There isn’t anything more perfect than gold- a precious element not vulnarable to oxidation or corrosion. God is my gold. Jesus is my gold. The Holy Spirit is my gold. And though I can’t feel the precious yellow metallic element moving through my brokeness, I know it is there and it is coming. I await its eruption onto my broken soul. There is no doubt in my mind that I will be made whole, again.

XO