I woke up in the middle of the night with my mother on my mind. No, I wasn’t dreaming about her (I haven’t yet, I don’t think). But I was having trouble regulating my body temperature (too warm despite the air conditioning) and awoke thinking about the advice my mom had given me about menopause. I had specifically asked her for that advice, despite the fact that I’m still likely a few years away from it. I asked on the counsel of a friend who said she wished she’d known to ask her own mother questions like that before her mom was gone and she was left to face menopause without her. My mom was happy to tell me—stay away from the hormones. She took them for eight years and they totally helped with the symptoms, and then she developed cystic breasts and got scared and stopped taking the hormones and all the symptoms she thought she’d avoided came roaring back. Turned out she hadn’t avoided the hot flashes and the sleeplessness and the moodiness (I just literally snorted—sorry, Mom); she’d just postponed it.
Anyway, I’m up at 2:30a thinking all of this and thinking I’m glad I asked her (it was good advice, both my mom’s and the friend’s who advised that I ask Mom’s advice), but I still wish she was here. All the advice I got while my mother was dying from all the motherless daughters in my life who held me up and held me together was good, really good, and I listened. I took it all. And yet it doesn’t change the unchanging fact that I still wish she was here. And I know I’ll keep changing, keep evolving, and keep growing. I’ll keep learning without my mom here to teach me, but what won’t change is that I’ll still always, always wish she was here.
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