When I was in middle school… okay and all the way through high school, “Your Mom” jokes were pretty popular.
For example, your mom is so old she took her drivers training test riding a t-rex.
But my favorite thing to do when people would tell me a Your Mom joke was to just look them straight in the eyes and tell them my mom was dead.
My mom was diagnosed with breast cancer when I was only two years old, fought hard, but ultimately lost her battle when I was eight years old, July 15, 2001.
Besides two years of my life I had a mom with cancer, I was the girl at school known for having a sick mom. I cannot even imagine what my mom and dad had to do to try and explain to my sister and I that she was sick… really sick. As a young child I knew people got sick, after all I did get the flu every once and awhile, but it just took a few days of rest and some soup to get better. That obviously wasn’t the solution for treating my mom’s cancer.
I remember sitting in the hospital waiting for my mom to finish her chemotherapy, I watched her lose her hair and lose weight. However it never changed the way I viewed her though, she was always my loving, caring, and passionate mother.
During July of 2001, it was just my mom and I at home, I was playing downstairs when all of a sudden I heard someone saying my name. I thought it was just coming through the TV speakers but I decided to go upstair just in case. I found my mom on the floor of living room unable to get up. Being an eight year old, I did the one thing I was told to do, call 911.
That was shortly before she lost her battle to cancer. The days following her death were a blur to me, but I remember her funeral, where I wore a bright orange dress and I didn’t even cry.
Because why would I need to cry, she’s coming back right?
I cried weeks after when it finally hit me that my mom will never come home again.
I cried when I had to go to counseling three times a week at school and other kids made fun of my for it.
I cried when instead of hanging out with friends on a saturday, I had to go pick out my mom’s grave stone.
I cried when I woke up in the middle of the night scared and my mom wasn’t there to lay next to me.
I cried because I was angry at God who was suppose to love me but instead he took away my mom.
My mom fell in love with Jesus so much during her battle with cancer, she learned about his love, and forgiveness. And she wanted my sister and I to know just how much she loved him and how much he loves us.
My mom, what an incredible woman, wrote my sister and I letters. One right after her death, for our 13th birthday, 16th birthday, high school graduation and the last one will be when we get married. Each letter explained how she wants us to live our lives honoring God.
The first sentence of the first letter said “Don’t be mad at me or God”. But I was, I was so mad at him for taking away my mom, that just wasn’t fair. I was so mad at him, I walked away from him for years.
I didn’t live my life as my mom wanted me to, I abandoned my faith. I did come back to my faith, as I told in previous blog post, but it took my along time to find closure with my mom’s death.
In 2014 there were two things I learned about my mom’s death.
1) My grandparents came to visit me when I was working at SpringHill that summer. They were so proud of me for taking the time out of my summers to teach child about God using my story. They even told me my mom would be proud of me. Then my grandma said something, that I knew it was just God speaking through her. “Your mom prayed for healing, she may not have gotten the physical healing she and everyone else really wanted, but she did get the spiritually healing that she really needed.” God answers prayers, with what he knows we all need. I of course still wish she was here with me, but with her knowing God, and with her helping me to find God, I will get to see her again, and how amazing is that?
2) I attended a conference in December of 2014, the IndyCC, where I got to hear Roger Hershey speak. He talked about what the ultimate reward was, which he said would be the Kingdom of God in Heaven. In Heaven there will be no suffering, and your loved ones will be there, so of course I agreed with him on that. Another thing he said, which I have circled about 50 times in my journal, is “sometimes our prayers for healing doesn’t happen on this side of Heaven.” My mom was healed spirtually before she died, but she she got to Heaven she stopped experiening pain, maybe she even had her whole head of hair again.
God gave my mom the best present, his undying love and eternal life. After years of hating God, I finally understood the way he answers prayers, and what else is to come.
Now when I hear Your Mom jokes, I don’t say my mom is dead, I ignore them, because she has eternal life, and I’ll get to see her again in the Kingdom of God.
