Better Whatever We Are

The Dalai Lama once said, "Don't try to use what you learn from Buddhism to be a Buddhist; use it to be a better whatever-you-already-are."  I am a Christian, a wife, a patient, a daughter... and I am motherless.  Strangely, through last night's hard time, a Buddhist principle came to mind that actually helped me to be a better, well... a happier, motherless daughter.

Feeling the emotional and physical misery that accompanied what I now suspect was a fever, I was longing for a mother's comfort.  That longing just added to the misery I was already feeling.  One of you responded that you had been feeling this way recently as well and that the decision to care for a rescued dog lifted your spirits.  My husband was having a miserable day and focusing on cheering him made me feel a bit better long before I realized that I likely had a fever and took some Advil.  I remembered two jobs that I had that made me exuberant on a daily basis, both of them focused on giving social services to those in dire need of them.  All of these things have in common putting the focus off ourselves and onto improving the lives of others.  All of these things had the byproduct of improving our own lives in the process.

This line of thought reminded me of a TED talk given by Uma Thurman's father, Robert, the first American to be ordained a Tibetan Monk by the Dalai Lama.  This talk, one of the talks focused on the Charter for Compassion, implores us to practice compassion beyond our inner circle of friends and family and discusses how that benefits ourselves as well as the rest of mankind.  It occurred to me that, perhaps, this is one way that we can learn to be better, happier, motherless daughters.  Perhaps this is one way that, though we don't have mothers to model or who can teach us how to deal with the difficult parts of raising girls into women, we can proactively decide to model the type of behavior that we want our daughters to emulate.  It is probably not that perfect of a band-aid for everything, but every little bit helps.

So that you can listen for yourselves and see if any of it helps your situation even a little, I have included Robert Thurman's TED talk below.

I Want My Mommy

I've been feeling like crap all evening.  I haven't been able to figure out what it is for hours.  I took my medicine on time, so that's not it.  I'm rarely lonely.  The benefit of being an only child is being okay with being alone with yourself.  But, there is something irritating me just under the surface and I can't figure out what it is.  There are bad things in my life just like there are good - that's just how life is.  However, I don't think it is the obvious bad things that are getting to me tonight.  I'm so irritable and so... not-positive-feeling that I don't even feel like reading.  It takes a lot to make me not want to read, so something is seriously wrong.  It's not really an illness thing today.  I actually feel fine right now, which for a chronically ill person like me should mean that it is a REALLY good day.  It's not a good day, though - at least not the last couple of hours.

Part of me wants to text message my dad... but he's a DAD.  He does that distinctly male thing where he fails to do the empathetic listening and just wants to solve the problem for me and move on to the next task at hand.  Plus, he refuses to listen to me if there is even the remotest hint of whining or crying.  99% of the time I'm totally okay with that.  Frankly, being raised by him has led to me being that type of person too.  Tonight, I don't want that.  I don't want a male.  I don't want any of my favorite people: my husband, my father or my male cousin with whom I'm really close.

I have a couple of "mothers" I could turn to; but, one is my mother-in-law who has NOT been happy with me since Christmas Eve (and who now refers to me as "that American girl") and the other is my stepmother.  Let's just say that I have a much better relationship with my mother-in-law.  My stepmother has blocked my e-mail address from being able to send her e-mails and this is a relatively good period in our relationship!  I have a very, very good friend who is very loving and motherly to me; but, she has far too much on her shoulders and has had too much on her for far too long.  I do not want to add to her burdens.  I don't relly feel that I have a "mother" to go to.

The short and the sweet of it is that I want MY mother.  Tonight is one of those nights where I really, acutely feel the lack of that comforting, unconditional, female presence that it seems like everyone else in the world has.  Tonight, I want to scream with the unfairness of it.  Tonight I want to roll up into the fetal position and finally have some relief from the going on 25 years of not having that thing that everyone else gets to have.  Tonight I really need it more than normal and the lack of it makes the intangible, irritable feeling even worse than it would be otherwise.

I want my mommy.

New Inductees

Yesterday I found out that one of the sweetest women I know died last week.  Since I was without a phone for over a week, I was late getting this most important message.  This woman had two daughters, both under the age of six.  Unfortunately, that means there two new very young inductees into our sad club.

I have been unable to think about anything but these two gorgeous little girls who have been unexpectedly thrust into the world of having one's identity shaped by being a motherless daughter.  By being one of us that is largely unacknowledged by a society that discusses single mothers and fathers that die or leave, but not our situations.  I have their father, a very admirable and nice man, constantly on my mind.  I remember the grief and pain of my own father, which was evident even to my young eyes, and hurt that such a great person is now in the same situation.

I spent last night crying, vacillating between vicarious pain for three people who would now understand that Mother's Day is a horrible, horrible holiday for some people in this world and feeling extreme admiration for how unbelievably well my own father handled it all.  I spent the night wanting to dispatch my father to their house to fix it all the way he always fixed my pain when things like my first pet dying triggered that buried pain about losing my mother.

As I got closer to sleep I remembered that, unlike me, these girls would not be ripped from the home of their only remaining parent.  These girls could have everything else they know remain intact.  They wouldn't have to spend years fighting along with their father to be able to live in their own home where they belong.  These girls already have more positives working in their favor.  Perhaps they can benefit from one of the Motherless Daughter Support Groups when they are old enough to attend.  I felt more peaceful and filled with hope that they have it better than some of us did.

So, even though there are two new inductees, here's to hoping they don't have the slightest clue how all of us feel.  Here's to hoping that their experience is so much better than all of ours and that they remain happy, healthy and whole despite their loss

This post is dedicated to JGL and everything she did to touch my life in such a positive way.

Our Causes

I have an extremely good friend who teases me about being a sucker for what she describes as "tragic, human-rights-atrocity" causes such as chronic hunger and homelessness.  While I am all for bugging people about those issues in other places, I want to stick to things related to the loss of mothers on this blog.

Some issues are the causes of becoming motherless and I want to highlight the need to support those causes as well as the effect of the loss.  If you have an issue or cause that led to you or someone you know becoming motherless, please let us know.  I plan on making a list of these including links to websites advocating these issues in the sidebar.  For now, look into the issues below which are the reasons that me and some of my friends are motherless children.

National Multiple Sclerosis Society
Young Survival Coalition (breast cancer)
Mental Health America
Susan G. Komen (breast cancer)
Ovarian Cancer National Alliance
National Domestic Violence Hotline
American Heart Association (heart attacks, strokes, etc.)
Joyful Heart Foundation (domestic violence)
UNAIDS
United Nations Refugee Agency
National Ovarian Cancer Coalition
Click to Empower (domestic violence)
National Association of People with AIDS
International Rescue Committee (refugees of war)
American Foundation for Suicide Prevention
American Diabetes Association

Underqualified

I didn't expect to write here again for weeks.  I expected to write next when I had something to say or felt that emptiness and loss again; but, since not having a mother is such a normal part of my existence, I did not think that it would be for quite awhile.  It has been more than 24 years since my mother died and even longer since she was gone as a result of disease forcing her into long hospital stays and having a deteriorating effect on her brain.  Really, my mother has been gone since the days when my personality and identity were still forming, so being a motherless child is and pretty much always has been a part of my identity.

In a lot of ways I am underqualified since the concept of that unconditional nonjudgmental mother's love is kind of foreign to me. I do not remember being 4 or 5 and experiencing that. I recognize that a father's love, even a super dedicated awesome one is different, but I couldn't explain to you how. I feel something missing, but I don't really understand it.  Since that is the case, I am trying to recruit friends who were older and more mature when they lost their mothers to also be authors on this blog.  I believe that having that love, getting used to it, getting to know your mother and then losing her creates and entirely different set of issues and feelings and circumstances that I am not qualified to talk about because I have not experienced it.  I also recognize that some of us have lost BOTH parents and that is another distinct group.  Plus, loss is not always caused by a death.  This blog is open to those who are estranged from, abandoned by, or have never met their mothers as well.  That loss is just as real as those of us who have experienced that loss because of death.

Creation

I am creating this blog because I have learned that there are far too many of us who lost our mothers before we were 21. Society seems to overlook us. You hear plenty about children without fathers. However, we only occasionally pop up in fiction, especially fairy tales as retold by Disney (ever notice how many heroines only have a father?).  Only one author that I know of, the awesome Hope Edelman, even acknowledges that we exist.  Yet, because I lost my mother very early in life, I have had many people confess to me about their loss.  We are far more common than one would think.

I don't know what it is.  I don't know if it is that society has a hard time accepting or acknowledging the painful truth that mothers die or leave.  I don't know if it is that those that always knew the security of a mother's love have a difficult time fathoming existence without that love.

Lately, though, I have learned that I am not the only one that sees herself as "the girl without a mother" or that hates Mother's Day passionately or that cries when the mom dies in "The Land Before Time."  I have decided that it is long past time for US to have a support group.  It is time for us to be able to discuss  disliking things like Mother's Day without having everyone else horrified by our feelings.  If you understand any of what I've said, feel free to follow this blog and comment.  I think it is time that we all found each other.