Losing Her
What Losing Her Taught Me
Losing my mother was the hardest thing I’ve ever experienced.
The grief didn’t come in waves. It came like a collapse. The trauma cracked everything I thought was solid. The breakdown that followed wasn’t a moment. It was a season. I hit rock bottom, and rock bottom has a way of showing you what you’re really made of.
That was my ashes. Everything burned — the plans, the safety, the version of me that only existed because she was here to witness it.
Then came the cocoon. Quiet. Dark. Lonely. Healing isn’t loud. It’s you, alone with yourself, dissolving old pain and old fear. It’s crying on floors and writing in notebooks. It’s learning to breathe again when the air feels different because she’s not in it. In that cocoon, I wasn’t becoming someone new. I was returning to who I was before the world told me who to be.
And then came the rebirth. The metamorphosis. The butterfly stage. She would have loved to see these wings. Wings to soar. Wings to speak. Wings to leave the silence behind.
Losing her taught me the art of communication. First, through writing, when my mouth couldn’t form the words. I wrote to survive. I wrote to grieve. I wrote to remember her, and to find me.
Then the words moved from page to voice. I went from introvert to extrovert, but not for show. I became completely authentic. Real. No more editing myself for comfort. I can stand in a room now, look people in the eye, and tell the truth about where I’ve been.
The biggest gift, though, is that I can listen. Really listen to other people’s stories. Because I know what it’s like to think no one wants to hear yours. I know what rock bottom feels like. I know what it takes to climb out.
Her death broke me open. But it also opened me up. To compassion. To connection. To the version of me that can walk into a community, into a jail program, into a Toastmasters meeting, and just be human with other humans.
I miss her every day. But the woman I am now — the one who writes, the one who speaks, the one who soars — she helped build this.
From ashes to wings. From silence to story. From breakdown to breakthrough.
That is her legacy in me.
– Cathryn
