Conversations with my mom everyday bring out different aspects of her and my life. Today it was all about what grief really is.
My mom lost her nephew today, he was 61 and the newest victim of COVID in our family. Why did I not call him my cousin ? Because in our conversation today that’s who he was - my mom’s nephew.
We are all dealing with the overwhelming nature of this pandemic, many have lost family members , jobs , financial security, relationships and some have found new a perspective in life. This grief is not just what it meant all our life, it is complicated. Today I witnessed it first hand.
My mom lived with her cousins during her school years. She grew up with four brothers and 2 sisters-in-law. The other two SILs came later. But her teen years memories are all about these 6 people and then their children. She loved being the “bua”(Aunt) to those kids.
This morning she was busy doing her stuff and missed some phone calls and lots of WhatsApp messages . When she finally got the news she was just devastated. I didn’t know what to say and then I realized nothing will help her. She is miles away in Bangalore from everyone and even if she was close by she couldn’t have been there anyway. The complete lockdown and Covid related deaths have changed how we grieve.
So I did something different - made her recall her happy memories and then she did turn into the bua she always was. How she had played with him, loved dressing him up, taught him to walk and talk, what a happy and wonderful child he was, how happy she was when he started calling her bua and how she always admired the soft-spoken man he turned into.
It’s funny how she made me remember my own time. I lived exactly like that for a couple of months with this cousin’s son. I stayed in my Mama’s home for some time and did the same with my nephew what my mother did for her’s.
I told her it’s okay to cry and relive these memories. It’s okay to feel anger and frustration. She has seen a lot of losses in her life but untimely deaths are the hardest and also the inability to grieve with family makes it harder. This is a year of mourning, we are not able to say our goodbyes to our loved one, not able to touch them and whisper in their ears how much we will miss them. Not being able to hug who are left behind.
I know she went to bed crying and remembering everyone she has lost in the last few years. All her brothers and their wives are gone. But this loss from the next generation I think hit her the hardest. I will grieve for my cousin some other time. Today I am grieving for my mother’s loss.
Wish I had something better to say to her but for now all we can do is hold on to each other and somehow get through this time of our lives.
Mami with her son and daughter and me
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