30 years

My heart swells. My eyes fill with tears. My throat tightens. I am both amazingly happy and terribly sad.  

As a child you learn from your people and your surroundings how to deal with your emotions. Babies cry because they don’t know how else to express their emotions. Toddlers cry because although they have words, they still don’t know how to use them. Teenagers cry because they have too many words and no one is apparently listening. And we all cry because it just hurts. Words or the lack there of, loss, emptiness, pain, anger,misunderstanding, ridicule, failure, laughter, connections or the loss of one, goodbyes, hellos, fear, anxiety, and many other triggers cause us to shed tears. It’s human nature.

We’re born into this world, blindly. Everything is new. The first connection we make is with our mother. We cry. She cries. It’s an emotional connection that is there forever. Nothing compares. From that moment on nothing will even come close to being as important as that bond, for the mother or the child. The mother is the vessel, the strength, the comfort, the solace, the world.  

30 years ago, today, my mother was taken from me. Though heaven received it’s most beautiful angel that day, I lost mine. At 8 years old, death is not something you understand, tolerate or accept. What 8 year old should have to deal with this kind of loss? Life can be very unkind and unfair, especially for an innocent child.

In the last 30 years I’ve not only grown emotionally but I’ve reached a point in my life where I deal with death differently than I did at 8, or 15, or 25, or even 30 years old. When I was told that my mother had passed, it was devastating, as I’m sure you can try to imagine.

August 19, 1984. I was in my room at my dad’s house in Lambertville, Michigan. My step mother, Jody, called me downstairs. She was upset so I knew something was wrong. Something told me it was very, very bad. I walked into the front room and my dad was sitting on the end of the couch, elbows on his knees, wiping away tears. I believe my aunt Robin was there in a chair in the corner, also crying. There was a bible on the coffee table. There was a very thick air about the room. I was confused, but I didn’t know why, and I started to cry.  I didn’t even know why I was crying. I just knew something bad was happening. I knelt down on the floor in front of my dad, by the coffee table. My dad asked me to open the bible. I did….and I opened it to the 23rdPsalm. My mother’s favorite. She used to recite it to me at night before bed and at 8 years old, I had already memorized it. Instantly…I was terrified because I just knew my dad was about to tell me something bad about my mother. “Come here….,” he said, and he lifted me up on his lap and just hugged me super tight. He started sobbing and muttering something unintelligible and I followed right behind him, my own tears flowing like a river. All I could understand was “I’m so, so sorry….I love you so much”. I was sobbing…but I was still so confused. I pushed back a little to look in his eyes and the sadness was just completely overwhelming him.  I could feel his sadness….but I just didn’t know why. So I asked him.  “Why?” He told me my mother was killed in a car accident the night before. He said she was gone forever, in heaven, with Jesus. I don’t know what 8 year olds are expected to do with this information…or how they are expected to react…but I’m pretty sure they are all scared, confused, and of course, sad. I truly didn’t understand what he meant. After a few minutes of holding me so tight I could hardly breathe while he sobbed and soaked my shirt, and his with his tears, I asked him when we could go see her.  I just wanted to see her.  Why couldn’t I see her? I remember I felt like I was in trouble or something…I didn’t understand why he wouldn’t just take me to see her. I just wanted to see my mommy.

When I reached my teenage years, as if they weren’t complicated enough, I had something happen to me that changed me, emotionally. I had a minor car accident where I was rear ended by a guy who was speeding and ‘not paying attention to the road’. My friend, Carla, was in the passenger seat. My dad was out of town and I was driving Jody’s car because mine was out of commission. I was scared out of my mind because I thought Carla was going to die….and I thought I was going to die when my dad found out I had an accident! After EMS arrived and started working on Carla I called Jody. She was surprisingly calm and had a neighbor bring her to the scene. My emotions ranged from scared, to worried, to extremely pissed off in that few hour ordeal. I was scared for Carla, mostly but also scared that my dad and Jody wouldn’t trust me to drive their vehicles any more. Jody reassured me that wasn’t the case and that she knew the accident wasn’t my fault. She was very sweet and concerned and I’m certain that is the only reason I wasn’t arrested.  I was pissed because the guy that hit us was…a jerk, to put it mildly. The cop had to ask me several times to calm down because I was failing miserably at maintaining composure while the guy pleaded with the cops, admitted he was drinking and driving someone else’s car without a license while not paying attention to the road, and smiling directly at me the whole time. I believe this was the first experience I had with anxiety. That night, I woke up around midnight and sobbed uncontrollably for hours. Jody came to my room to comfort me. All I remember her saying, and I’ll never forget, is “I’m so sorry, sweetie…I know you need your mother right now and I’m not her…and I wish there was something I could say or do to help you get through this. I just don’t know how.” I don’t know if I ever told her how much that meant to me. For what seemed like months after that my head and my heart were a mess.  I had spent 7 years trying to pretend that I was doing ok with the idea of not having my mother around. Although I missed her, I was a good kid and she would be proud. But that day….a million other thoughts flooded my mind and I was never so overwhelmed with sadness.  Did I need my mother? Why would Jody say that? I started remembering times when my friends would say, “ask your mom if you can stay the night”, and “are you going to the mother-daughter dance with your mom?” and “I’m telling my mom!” It was like suddenly I had a split personality and I was hearing all these voices in my head…and I just cried. I cried for months. I realized one day that I had been crying for so long that I couldn’t quite explain why any more. I couldn’t put it into words. And I also realized that I was forgetting things…about my mother. I went through all the pictures I could find trying to find something to spark memories. Some things came back to me quickly, others just baffled me. I used to have a cassette tape that my aunt Angie gave me that had my mother’s voice, reciting a poem she had written. I listened to it at least a million times as I went through the pictures. There were some memories that I uncovered that I wish I hadn’t because my mother’s life wasn’t all roses and laughter. Those memories seemed to come back very vividly and rapidly...and were impossible to forget.

At 25 I was not only a mother, myself, but I was also married, divorced, attached and expecting my second child. Maybe my hormones were mostly to blame or maybe it was some ongoing issues I was having with my father that caused me to melt down. It was a great 9 months, for the most part.  Around the 6 month mark, right after Christmas, I had a terrible nightmare. I jumped from my bed shaking, sweating, crying and I couldn’t talk. My voice was hoarse and I was scared to death! Barry held me, brushed his hand against my face over and over asking if I was ok and hugging me tight. I think it must’ve taken me a few minutes to realize I was awake and that it was all just a dream. There are few details I remember from the dream itself, but that’s not important. What’s important is that for the very first time in my life I knew I was right where I was supposed to be. I was safe. I was loved. I was alive. With my first born, Caleb, I was the best mother I could be but I confess, not the smartest. I felt like a failure, a lot! I can’t even count how many times I said to myself, “Ugh! You’re doing this all wrong!!”. Motherhood, that is. Waking up from that dream was like waking up to reality. Caleb was already 6 years old, almost 7 at this point. Lying in bed, held tight by my loving husbands big, strong arms, crying…I realized that I wasn’t doing it wrong. I was doing the best I could to be a good mother…without my mother there to guide me. Though I truly believed she was and always has been watching over me, she wasn’t physically there. I couldn’t call her. I couldn’t cry on her shoulder. I couldn’t even blame her. She wasn’t there. But she was watching. And at that point in my life, I’d hoped that while she was watching…she was smiling.

At 30 years old I was embarking on another gigantic journey in my life…becoming a first time home buyer. Terrified? Understatement. I found myself wondering what my mother would say if she were there. Would she tell me it was a bad idea? Would she be excited for me? Would she like the house we picked? A few months after moving in I had another terrifying nightmare, another very vivid, very real and absolutely terrifying nightmare. Maybe I worried too much that buying a house was a bad idea so it caused me to have nightmares. I don’t know. Again, I woke up shaking and crying and Barry was there to comfort me. This time, I remembered every detail. I was being chased…I thought. I was running, trying to escape from something that wasn’t even there. It was very dark and I was very alone. I was just running and running for what seemed like forever and no destination in sight, just darkness.  I could hear things…like rushing water and horns and leaves rustling.  I could feel my heart beating and the wind on my face. The ground beneath my feet was uneven and I tripped a lot but never fell down.  It almost felt like something…or someone…was catching me. I kept calling out, asking who was there.  I had hundreds of dreams about my mother that started not long after she passed but one thing remained the same in all of them. I could never see her face. I could see her hands and I could hear her voice and that was the only way I knew it was her. When I woke up…or at least, when I sat up in bed I saw my mother’s face…right in front of me. I swear I could reach out and touch it. It was so real! She was there! I sobbed into Barry’s chest because in some way, I was still scared, I think. Maybe I was just having a hard time gripping my emotions because I wasn’t completely awake yet. I don’t think he knows to this day, where my tears were actually coming from. I don’t think I told him…and I don’t know why. That day (night?), my mother saved me. She didn’t just save me from whatever was chasing me in my nightmare. She saved me from me. For 22 years I had battled my own mind and my own emotions over how to feel about not having her in my life. I was angry at how unfair life was to my 8 year old self. I was sad that Jesus would allow her to have me…and then take her away from me. I was confused because I didn’t know if I was acting like a normal kid…since I didn’t have my mother around like all my friends did. I was scared because I thought not having her would make me a bad…or at least a very different person than a normal girl that grew up with her mother. That made me spiteful at times, too. I was glad that my mother was in a better place and that heaven was undoubtedly treating her better than this Earth ever could. My emotions were all over the place while I walked around with a smile, listening to my friends and relatives tell me how everything would be ok, my mother loved me very much, my mother would be so proud, I’m so much like my mother, my mother was an amazing person….yadda, yadda, yadda. I’m glad they knew all that. I only knew it because they told me, and sometimes, that just hurt. That day, waking up from that horrible nightmare and seeing her beautiful face…I had an enormous sense of calm come over me. She really was there, watching over me, all this time. Even though I couldn’t see her, or touch her, or hear her…she was there. And I knew that all those people, all those years that kept saying all those things….were right.

30 years ago, today, my mother was killed in a tragic car accident. She was 30 years old. Her name is Kathleen Ann Runyan. She was absolutely beautiful. She was smart, talented, funny and a genuine lover of all things. She had gorgeous blonde hair (most of the time). She had an hourglass shape and was an absolute knock-out! She had a size 4 ½ foot and boobs for days. She crocheted. She wrote poetry. She was very artistic. She could hustle the best pool player and give Fred Astaire a run for his money on the dance floor. She was adventurous and kind. She was sarcastic and witty. She was hard-headed and bold. She had a loving, forgiving heart and would give the shirt off her back to anyone in need. She was a living, breathing angel.  Most of what I know of her I learned by getting to know myself. My aunts and uncles would tell me how much I act like her, talk like her, stand like her, and sound like her. I may not be able to remember her holding my hand, brushing my hair, kissing my boo boo’s, or tucking me in bed…but I know who she was. I know she was an amazing mother. She was also an amazing daughter, sister, aunt, cousin, friend and neighbor. It may have taken 30 years to realize that I am in fact NOT doing it wrong…but that’s only because I realize that with a mother like her, I now know I’m doing it right.

I love you, mom. I miss you more than anything. I’ll always love and miss you….until we meet again.

To my step-mother, Jody…thank you.  You took on a job that you were not prepared for when I came into your life. You loved me. You cared for me. You protected me. You were my mother. And I love you for that.

To my aunts, uncles and cousins…you have always been there for me, listened to me cry, gave me advice, sheltered me, cried with me, loved me and taught me everything I know. You were all my mothers. You stood by me when I needed you. You scolded me when I needed it most. You taught me things that my mother would’ve taught me if she were here. And I love you for that.

For the last 30 years I thought I was the girl who grew up without her mother. When, in fact, she was always there, her love and her guidance shining through all of you.  Thank you. I love you all!!!