March 20th, 2009
// To those who lost loved ones and reached out to me for advice or some sense of guidance on how to get through that devastation, I walk with you. Most importantly, Emmanuel, God with us. <3 //
Seven years ago today...
...I came out of Spanish class ecstatic to be done with my 3rd year, winter quarter of college, and finally on spring break. As I walked to the bus stop, my phone rang and it was my brother calling. When I answered, he was upbeat but I heard shakiness in his voice. The horrible possibility already crossed my mind within those 3 seconds of, "Hey Jessie!" and I said, "Hey Jeff! What's up?" The shakiness broke into a deep inhale and as he began sobbing, my dearest, most beautiful, and loving brother said to me, "Mmm...mom passed away."
So, when your entire world and the reason you live, work, breathe, and wake up in the morning is no longer in existence, it went a little something like this. Not only did I feel like my entire stomach and blood pumping heart were both violently ripped out of my body but my entire view of this world flipped upside down. My mind blanked while the pressure in my gut pushed me to collapse onto the ground. I dropped my entire stack of books, study guides, and #2 pencils. I began looking around and wondering, "What am I doing here on earth? WHAT do I do now? Who am I? Who are you? What are we?! What is school and this crap we're learning for crap jobs to live in crappy homes? None of this matters because we're going to die. She died?..." I think I held my breath for an entire 2 minutes and then started hyperventilating, getting an anxiety attack, and my blood pressure escalated so fast that I finally bursted into tears. I'm not sure how I got up but the next thing I knew, the bus drove passed me and I was walking home. I wanted to throw myself into the middle of the street as cars drove by going 50mph. I kept thinking, "No! No! NO!! This CANNOT be real. This can't be happening. This is fake. You're going to wake up and it'll be all over. It's not true. You're going to wake up soon. WAKE UP! Dammit! WAKE UP! I want to die and end this feeling. WTF! Wow, are you kidding me?! God, please help me! I can't do this."
That was the first time I ever spoke to God.
I never knew Him, but He always knew me. He was always calling me, but I never picked up. I never had ears for Him, but He was always whispering truth to me. Well, today was the day He hit me like a mack truck. It finally registered that someone is in control of everything in this universe and it definitely wasn't me. If it's not in God's plan for us, there is nothing we can do to change it no matter how hard we ask, wince, cry, beg, demand, or even pray for it. If His answer is yes, no, wait or question then the answer will remain, 'Yes, no, wait, or wrong question'.
It took me a long time to surrender the fact that we actually don't want to change His plan. His plan is ultimately our greatest desire and we want what He wants. We just can't see the whole picture because we're human and all we see is what is directly in front of us. God didn't 'take' my mom from me because she never belonged to me. She always belonged to Him and so do the rest of us. God doesn't cause suffering or inflict pain in this world, we do. He weeps when we weep. He's given us clear guidance to live peaceful lives but due to our own freewill and broken human nature, we rebel like children and are so easily distracted by worldly things to which we rightfully suffer the consequences for. Yet, God still picks us up when we fall and walks with us. He is not an unjust God who wants to hurt us or doesn't know what's best for us. He's not this uptight douche who will only reward us if we behave. Instead, He showers us with love, gifts, and welcomes us into His kingdom. Even those times of suffering are gifts because suffering builds character and brings us closer to faith; to Him.
“For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.”
“For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.”
Without God, my idea of healing and pressing forward with life was to accept what happened, move on, and not let anything hold me back. Sure enough, I didn't think before I acted. I left everything behind and moved to Barcelona for 4 months working in Fashion Marketing. As a result, I left my brother all alone to deal with everything from our house going through probate, family members attempting to sue us for my mom's will, the funeral, moving, etc. To this day, I still deeply regret doing that to him. Although I've apologized, asked, and received his forgiveness, it still shocks me how blinded I was by and to my own selfishness. I didn't see nor wanted to see how heavily my decisions impacted those around me. To be honest, I just didn't care.
I also didn't mourn the loss of my mom and definitely paid for that over the years. With all that clogged up sadness, it quickly turned into bitterness seeping out through other areas. Though I was good at covering it up, I didn't realize how oversensitive I was to everything, really emotional, and defensive all the time over nothing. I will never delay the mourning of a loss again because the amount of time it took to do it so many years later, multiplied. I had to go back into time trying to remember and re-process everything. It was so difficult because I wasn't the same person anymore. Not only did I need to mourn, heal, and reconcile my heart to God, but I also had to work through all the regret I felt for running away from what I needed to face in that moment in time, forgiving myself for all those reckless things I did to numb the pain, and also forgiving myself for never calling my mom back that entire last week before she died because all I focussed on was studying for finals.
My mom always gave me tough love and taught me how to be 'strong'. When my Grandpa, Great Aunt, Aunts, Uncles, all passed away, she held the family together and never once showed sadness until she was alone. She was the light and joy of our family and I wanted to be that for her. I couldn't fathom the fact that she was dying and would avoid hearing about her condition because it would tear me apart. She was my hero and always wanted me to put school first so I thought in doing that, I was making her happy. I actually uploaded her last voicemail to me below. This voicemail used to scare the crap out of me because of how weak she sounded and how devastated I'd feel after listening to it. It still saddens me but in a redeeming way. She stayed strong and fought until her last breath. She was so beautiful and I'm so thankful God chose her to be my mom. I'm proud to be her daughter, but mostly, I'm proud to be the daughter of the God who created her.
To this day, my healing process goes something like, first, immense sadness, longing to see her, missing her hugs and laughter, to then bitterness, shame, and regret, then anger at God for 'taking away' my best friend, to then being thankful that she is with Him and free from pain and suffering, to finally full of gratitude for every ounce of love in the people God's restored in my life on top of countless blessings. I still have my moments but each time I go through that process, a deeper layer of healing happens and transforms the hurt into gratitude for the redemption of her death. I think death is the hardest loss to ever overcome, but with God, even this is a gain and a redeeming testimony.
“May the God of endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together you may with one voice glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God.”
“But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.”
P.S. My mom died of Scleroderma. Scleroderma is a chronic connective tissue disease generally classified as one of the autoimmune rheumatic diseases. The symptoms vary and the effects range from very mild to life threatening. There was no known cure at the time but they are slowly discovering some for certain types of the disease today. She was given 5-10 years to live but we lost her in 1.5 years.
