The Dreaded Mother’s Day

Your Mother is Always With You

For My Mom
(A Mother’s Day reflection)

“Your mother is always with you…”

That’s how the poem begins.
And today, twenty years later, I realized those words still break me open.

I thought I’d finished grieving.
I thought I’d cried every tear.

But then I saw that poem again, the one I read to her on a Mother’s Day when all I had were words.
The one I read again at her funeral.

And just like that, I was there again.

Holding the phone.
Holding my breath. Holding her memory.

I miss my mom.
Not in the abstract way people say, not in a postcard or a holiday.

I miss her in the air.
In the way I reach for the phone before remembering she’s not there.
In the songs I skip because I can’t take the ache.
In the smell of fresh lilacs, or the way a spoon scrapes a bowl.
In the middle of a laugh I want to share, but can’t.

Some days, the missing is quiet.
Other days, like today, it crashes in out of nowhere,
with a poem I once read when I had nothing else to give her.

She cried when I read it.
Said it was the best gift she’d ever received.
I thought I had already said goodbye.

But here’s what they don’t tell you about grief:
You don’t say goodbye once.
You say it again, and again, and again,
when you see her handwriting,
when you hear someone call their mother “Mama,”
when your own child looks at you the way you once looked at her.

It’s never over.
It just becomes part of who you are,
a love that outlives its container.

I don’t want to hate Mother’s Day.
But I do.

And not because I don’t believe in celebrating moms because I do.
I am one.

But every year when it comes around,
I feel the ache sharpen.
My mom’s been gone twenty years,
and still…
Still, I miss her like I just lost her yesterday.

Sometimes I think the world forgets what this day feels like for the motherless.

And maybe that’s what I’m writing for,
for anyone out there who feels like they’re supposed to have moved on,
supposed to be smiling,
supposed to be “over it” by now.

I just want you to know:

You’re not alone.
You’re not broken.
And you don’t have to love this day.

But maybe, just maybe, this sadness means something.
Maybe it’s proof that love leaves traces.
Maybe it’s the echo of a mother who meant everything,
a mother whose voice is still tucked somewhere in mine,
whose laugh still shows up in moments I didn’t expect,
whose kindness lives on in how I hold my own children close.

Maybe the point isn’t to stop feeling the ache.
Maybe the point is to remember her well.

So this Mother’s Day, even if I don’t buy flowers
or smile for brunch photos,
I’ll remember the way her hands felt when they held mine.
I’ll whisper the words of that poem again.
And I’ll let myself cry, not because I’m weak, but because I remember.

And remembering is a form of love, too.

To anyone else out there missing their mom,
whether it’s been two days or twenty years,
I see you.

This day isn’t easy.
But you’re not alone in it.

Our mothers live on in us…
In the way we love,
in the stories we tell,
and in the tears we still cry.

So if you’re feeling it all,
the sorrow, the beauty, the longing, the love,
just know: you’re allowed.

This is grief.
This is love.
This is remembering.

And it means she mattered.