Becoming a Mom Without Mom

This post has taken a while for me to write. I’ve started writing it over and over again in my head the past two weeks but hadn't been ready to share until now. I was always hesitant to share because I worry about how much I should share about my mom and how her loss has affected me. I definitely don’t write this looking for sympathy, but rather to share my feelings about losing her at a time when I need her and share some insight into what an amazing person she was. I know for certain I am not the first or the last to lose their mom so close to becoming a first time mom, but what I do know is that it really sucks and I have the utmost respect for any other mom out there who has dealt with losing their mom during a time when they needed her. It’s really hard to believe she’s been gone almost 6 weeks already.

My Mom has always been my pillar of strength, cheerleader and number one fan. My parents separated when I was 12, I won’t get into details but she became a single mom at this time.  She sacrificed so much during our teenage years to make sure my brother and I always had the basic necessities, often sacrificing her own needs and comforts and working countless jobs to ensure we had a roof over our heads, food in our bellies and clothes on our backs. She was so happy when she finally had enough money saved to buy a little house and build a shop on the property to work in. Other than Cody and me, her house was her pride and joy and it showed. She was also passionate about gardening and her backyard displayed that immensely. She loved her backyard so much she offered to hold any party that came along back there in the summer months, from birthday parties to random just for fun parties. We thought it only fitting that we hold one in her honour to celebrate her life on August 20^th (it was a lot more subdued than the one we had a month previous to celebrate my Grandma’s 80^th and my step-Grandpa’s 90^th birthdays).

She was one of the first people we told about the pregnancy. I had been calling her shortly after every ultrasound or follow-up appointment with my OB/GYN since my fibroid degenerated in January to give her the latest news. When we initially got our positive pregnancy test in late February, I didn’t tell her. Most of my family and her close friends knew that once you tell Gwenda something, the whole town of Erin knew. I was definitely selective with what I shared since I knew news traveled fast once my Mom got a hold of it. I figured she was always too excited to keep the news to herself. In 2009, Dave got to learn this firsthand how well my Mom could keep a secret when he called to ask if he could ask me to marry him. We went to Jasper for the weekend to finally see the Rocky Mountains before we moved home from Alberta and to celebrate me almost being done physio school. I had no clue that there was a marriage proposal coming, sometimes I am oblivious to the obvious, but Mom knew as well as most of my family and, I am sure, her close friends, neighbours, strangers on the street, etc. So, we didn’t tell her the fateful night when we got our positive test. We decided to wait until our ultrasound came back and confirmed that the pregnancy was viable.

Our viability ultrasound was March 17^th. When I called her with the update, I knew she could tell something was up as soon as I said “Well, there was something else that showed up”. There was a little concern in her voice as she said “Oh really?” I followed this by “you MUST keep this one a secret though”. I didn’t have to say anything else, she knew and she was ecstatic! As far as I know, she did keep this one a secret until we told everyone a couple of weeks later.

My Mom was so excited for her first grand-baby. She was pretty certain she was destined to just have grand dogs, especially after we added Stella, our adorable Boston Terrier rescue, to our family in June 2015. I had a deal with Dave that we were either having a baby or a dog. Dave went the path of least resistance and decided the dog was the better route to go in 2015.

She was so excited that we decided we would invite her to the anatomy scan at 19 weeks so that she could “meet” her new grand-baby and discover the gender with us. She was pretty certain that she was having a granddaughter despite me thinking I was carrying her grandson. When the ultrasound tech finally finished her measurements for baby A, she pulled Dave and Mom into the room with me for the big reveal. She celebrated with a big “YES!” when she heard it was a little girl. Off we went into the parking lot to go our separate ways home. I felt a little guilty making my mom drive all the way up to Collingwood for 5 minutes in the ultrasound room, especially since she usually has about 500 other things on the go and had to take time away from them. Dave reassured me that she wouldn’t have driven all the way up if she didn’t want to come. In hindsight, I am so glad she came. She won’t physically get to meet A, but she did get to see A and grandma’s memory will live on through all the crazy stories we will share of her adventures.

The last time I saw my Mom was the Sunday of Civic Holiday weekend. She had come up to help us move a crib and glider chair from our co-worker’s house to ours. It was a great day. I made breakfast for the three of us, she played with the dogs, she got to check out the crib and chair (she gave the Gwenda head nod of approval), she wandered around Home Hardware while we had a key made to our house for her (she was scheduled for babysitting the dogs when Dave and I were down at the hospital having A). She found these beautiful stars that she wanted to get to put on her shop. I made a mental note that this would make a great Christmas present and almost went in to Home Hardware the week before her death to buy them for her. I decided against it that day as she had said she wanted to measure the space on the outside of her shop first. Overall, we had a great day together and she got to see the nursery coming together and the grand dogs got to play with her one last time.

The last time I talked to my Mom on the phone was August 14^th, she passed the next day. We chatted twice that day. Our first conversation, she was telling me all about the family reunion she attended in Tobermory the day before. She had somehow become traffic control in the harbor after noticing a family was having a hard time getting out of their parking spot. Of course she directed traffic while eating an ice cream cone. She also wanted to make sure I was ok. Dave had gone to a friend’s wedding in Ottawa. We didn’t want to risk me being so far away from Toronto due to the high risk nature of this pregnancy, so Dave went stag.  Later that evening, I had gone to meet a friend in Barrie to pick up some baby clothes (some actually turned into 3 garbage bags full). She had left a message on our answering machine about a relative’s girlfriend being in the Olympics which I listened to when I got home. I called her back to let her know where I had been and tell her about the massive bags of baby clothes. It sounded like I had gotten her up from bed, so it was a quick phone call but I am so thankful I called her back that night and we had one last chat. Little did I know it would be our last conversation.

It’s been hard imaging living the rest of my life without her. She’s always been there when I needed her to either offer advice, a shoulder to cry on or to cheer me on. I knew a time would come that my parents would no longer be around, but I didn’t envision it being in my 30’s or when such a huge life change was happening. While being in the hospital I have been somewhat sheltered from the realities that await me on the outside without her. As the executor (I hate the term executrix) of her estate I have to make a lot of decisions once I get out, I am basically closing one life while bringing another into the world. It’s a very strange feeling; one I am not entirely comfortable with. 

I know if she were still here on Earth she would be in my hospital room all the time. At the hospital, they give the birth support person a yellow band with the mom-to-be’s hospital number on it. I am certain she would be wearing that yellow band instead of Dave (sorry Dave, I am sure she would give it up when the big birthday came). Dave and I actually joke that she probably would have made a new cushion for the chair, a new comforter for the bed and designed her own cot to sleep on by my bedside. The crazy thing is she probably would have and we would laugh hysterically about it. The nurses would have loved her. I still miss her like crazy every day and suspect I always will, but the love she had for the granddaughter she doesn’t get to meet gives me strength and hope that this baby will get us through anything that might be ahead of us.