OhHeyGriefSucks!

On April 23rd, 2013 my mom died, after a grueling 6 year battle with stage 4 breast cancer. She was 61. I was 24. Watch me cope!

[ohheygriefsucks]

Last Christmas

I should write here more often, but if I’m being completely honest, the more time that passes without my mom, the less it feels socially acceptable to hurt as much as I do. I know that’s not the case, but, still, I see people around me every day functioning so much more smoothly than I, having gone through the same thing as I’m still emotionally limping from. Also, with COVID-19, I’m well aware of all the loss being felt in the world, but especially my country right now, so I feel like theirs are the voices that need listening to. This whole year has been a confusing mix of PTSD, sadness, helplessness, fear, depression, anxiety, and time. Like God went nuts at Burger King and mixed all the fountain sodas together. 

Anytime the virus, the vaccine, the anything is mentioned, it makes me think of my mom. The precautions we had to take with her weakened immune system instilled a lifelong respect for public health and taking care of others as well as myself. I’ve always dealt with germ-related OCD and emetophobia, so I’m used to being on high alert during cold and flu season. Adapting to avoid germs comes naturally (read: compulsively) to me, so seeing people struggle with the concept right now blows my mind and hurts my heart.

Christmas 2012 was the last Christmas I had with my mom, and it fucking sucked. I got to come home for a nice long visit from Chicago. I’d just gotten a job, but pushed my start date because I wanted to spend Christmas with my mom (having spent the last 5 fearing they’d be the last). My family used to have an annual Christmas Eve party that brought 40-60 friends/neighbors into our house every year. We’d spend the three days prior making ~60lbs of lasagna from scratch and cleaning the house to prepare it for guests. Every year, we would work right up until evening mass, and then resume immediately upon our return to be ready for guests to arrive around 7. People loved it. I hated it. For plenty of reasons, most of which I’m only now realizing were sensory-processing/anxiety related, having spent the previous 31 years thinking was just because I was a bad kid. It sucked because it was a chore. When we’re in school, the work would start the day Christmas break did. You didn’t get to breathe until that Christ child popped out. It felt like so much work for others to enjoy. At least we got new pajamas at the end of it.

That year, our family’s workforce was short staffed. My older sister was spending Christmas in Italy with her husband’s family, my dad was still working (very long hours) at the time, and my youngest sister was in college and wouldn’t make it down til the 23rd at the earliest. So it was mostly me and Mom, with the occasional help from Dad and Cristina. My mom was on oral chemo at that point, I believe, and it was just before she started using a cane for occasional mobility and oxygen as needed. But, she was still very much my mom, and would not come off as sick if you didn’t know it. But she was. 

One night, Cristina woke up crying, and started getting sick. Throw-up sick. The worst kind. This lead to such a spiral. My mom ran to take care of her. I wanted to help, but I couldn’t get through my panic, and my dad slept because he had work. My mom. The woman with a wafer-thin immune system was sacrificing her potential health to care for her sick child. If my mom got the bug, she would have to be hospitalized. It wasn’t an “if”, it was a “come in the second you get sick so we make sure it doesn’t kill you” order. If my mom was hospitalized, Christmas Eve would be canceled. For the first time ever in my 24 years of life. The next day, my dad caught it (a milder, but more complainy bout) . At that point I was likely alternating between Xanax, saltines, pacing, and crying. It really was just down to me and my mom- fearing the moment one of us became the next. While Dad and Cristina recovered, Mom and I prepped. With each task it was understood that we could and would cancel at a moment’s notice. But we didn’t. We pulled it off. We had the damn party and people had a blast. My mom and I evaded the bug by the grace of God. 

The Perfect Christmas.

But it wasn’t. As the most annoying of the neighbors finally trickled out around 11pm, I crashed. I went into my room and started crying in bed. I had come home because I wanted to spend time with my mom because I knew she didn’t have much left, and instead I spent it in visceral fear of illness and under immense stress for the enjoyment of others. I realized I had never just had a Christmas Eve to celebrate with my family alone. Ever. Like normal families do. To be the guest, not the host. I felt like a selfish spoiled child, but I was just a scared one.

My mom came to find me in my room after a few minutes to see what was up. I wanted to tell her what was wrong without bringing up her imminent death, but there wasn’t a way around it. It was about it, but it wasn’t. So, I let it all out. I told her I hated that I had to spend time entertaining others instead of spending time celebrating with her. I wept. I told her how exhausted I was with it all. How fucked up and unfair it all seemed. She rubbed my back. She listened. She comforted. She promised me we wouldn’t have to do it the next year. 

And we didn’t.

Because she was gone four months later.

[ohheygriefsucks]

Missing you is getting tiresome

And that’s not the best news, because lord knows I’m always tired anyway.

This year, I forgot that April comes after March. And March, being the month we’re currently in, is almost up. April must be just around the corner.

In some ways, I feel like I’m giving up. Waving the white flag of exhausted apathy. The first few years, I was emotional the entire month. Now, just thinking about spending the energy like I have the past five years: obsessively comparing where I am to where I was in 2013 day-by-day, overcompensating socially as to not come off as a buzz-kill, wondering which flaws in myself were birthed out of her death and which are entirely my doing makes me feel anemic.

People say grief gets better with time. If you’ve read this far, you know that’s bullshit. It changes, sure, but it remains constant in its existence. An ankle sprain gets better with time because tendons and muscles heal. Time, to my knowledge, will not morph my deceased mother’s ashes into a reanimated Momma-golem ready to make up for lost time. I believe there are specific laws in physics/ethics that prevent it.

Time makes grief wear away at you like a file. A large (albeit, metaphorical) file that can scrape off your whole back in one fellow swoop. It whittles down the flesh, it leaves the nerves exposed. Then the world goes on in spite of it. Eventually, your entire existence is a wound, exposed. The air hurts, the sun hurts, even bed hurts. Yet people expect you to wake up every day and run through sprinklers spraying lemon juice like it’s nothing. Don’t wince while you do-- it implies weakness.

At this point, my story feels stale. As I’ve gotten older, more of my friends have lost loved ones, and my own experience isn’t making it any better. It’s hard seeing people you love hurt, extending yourself in the way you wished people had to you, and being dismissed. I don’t like being unable to help, but I have to respect it. My grief isn’t serving anyone, but it’s also not going anywhere. I don’t know what to do about it, but I now know that I will likely do it alone. I’d ask my mom if the whole “committing to a life of isolation” is just a part of being a woman in her 30s, but she’s dead, and the answer won’t be of any use by the time I get to talk to her again, so I guess I’ll just let Google be my guide.

[ohheygriefsucks]

An anniversary, but not *that* anniversary

Three years ago, on this day, I moved to LA.

That means I’ve survived three years in LA. 

I first came out to LA in the summer of 2010. I was fresh out of college, completely unprepared, without a car or a job, and still full of that “stick it to Mom and Dad- do it anyway” stubbornness. The stay was short to say the least. I returned home a little over a month later broke, defeated, and absolutely hating the city of L.A. 

In 2013 I returned to LA, this time to write for an episode of Ridiculousness. This time with a rental car, money in my account, and a job doing what I wanted to. It changed things big time. My friends from college who lived out here were all flourishing and I missed being around them. People actually thought I had talent. Maybe I could make it work. After the episode was completed, I returned to Chicago and my job as a customer service rep like a convict who had violated their probation. The gears set in motion for an eventual venture west. 

In 2015, the time was right. I was terrified about the move. It was a huge risk. I moved here not because I wanted to, but because I needed to if I wanted to actively pursue my dreams. I moved in with one of my best friends from college, who I’ve known for 12 years, and it was like no time had passed (except it had, and we were now much hotter and cooler- looks/personality, not temperature-wise). I knew that this was the “for good” move. 

“Now Rosa,” you’re thinking, “the fuck does this have to do with your mom?”

A lot, actually. You impatient bitch.

When I was 15, I took my first on-camera acting class at a local talent agency in San Antonio. I looovvveeddd it. I was a theatre nerd, dramatic, and ambitious. Some of the kids in the class would live in LA for months at a time for pilot season and such, and I just knew that if I could convince my mom to let me do that- I would make it BIG. I begged her and begged her to move out to LA with me “just to try it for a few months, and then we could come back”. Of course, the answer was no! I felt betrayed and unloved. How dare she not be willing to drop everything and leave behind three other children (one with special needs) to rent an apartment a thousand miles away for her home to cart me around to auditions?! The gaul! Of course now that my brain’s done cooking for the most part, I completely understand. She often defended her decision by saying, “I don’t want you become a child star.” At the time, I thought she was totally stunting my growth and preventing me from any future success, but looking back, she might have said that because she actually thought I was good enough to go somewhere someday and wanted me to be able to handle it when I did. Of course, she never told me this, and probably didn’t actually mean anything profound by it, but let a surviving child interpret, ok?!

The hardest part about living out here and having even the slightest semblance of success is that my mom isn’t here to experience it with me. There are so many exciting phone calls that I never got to make to her. I hate that she only got to experience the phone calls of a 24 year old mess of myself at best. It’s not fair to her. She deserves to see that she didn’t raise a total fuck-up (just a mild one). We would talk everyday. That a part of my life, my routine, completely ceased to exist the moment she passed. I go days now without speaking to anyone. I’m silent. 

I want rob a bank and hire a sky-writer to draw a list of everything I’ve done out here in the sky for her to see. I want her to see that the stubborn pain in the ass that drove her nuts for 24 years is now a stubborn pain in the ass that drives big time Hollywood so-and-sos nuts! To know that every single victory I’ve had would’ve been so much sweeter with her by my side.

[ohheygriefsucks]

2012 vs. 2018

There’s a meme going around on Twitter where people post pictures of themselves in 2012 and again in 2018 (which is our current year). The term “glow up” is thrown around a lot, and that’s honestly why I’ve refrained from doing it myself. 2012 wasn’t a bad year for me, in fact, it was a really happy year, so I don’t feel like there’d be that revolutionary “Oh, damn!” reaction and therefore, why bother? I can find really fat, unflattering old pictures of myself and glue them next to sexy todaysy pics, but I don’t want to do that. That’s not a fun meme.

I looked back through my pictures from 2012 anyway, because I’m addicted to nostalgia, as the world crumbles around us. 2012 was a really good year for me. Really good. 

I was living on my own in Chicago, working at Groupon, assistant directing a show, quasi-dating a guy (it was vague- but great!). My mom came to visit me in March of 2012. I’m so, so incredibly grateful for that visit. I’m so happy she could see me, being an adult, on my own, succeeding in the same city where she and my dad had gotten their footing 30 years prior. I was also so happy when she suggested a trip to Target. Oh lord, how I miss mom-trips to Target- the mumble of “Oh, look and this! I don’t really need it...” answered by her golden reply of, “We should get it!” 

A month and a year later, she’d be gone.

It was spring in Chicago, and it was beautiful. I was living in Lakeview, walking distance to Lincoln Park, likewise, Lake Michigan. My mom and her friend Emily, our neighbor back home, came up for a few days to visit and see the show I had been working on. I was able to take time off work and enjoy myself. The trip was also nice because whatever treatment my mom was undergoing at the time (likely some form or oral chemo or radiation), meant she needed to take shorter trips and more frequent breaks, which is kind of my default mode anyway. It took her ingesting poison to make it happen, but my mom and I were finally on the same pace! (For the record: she was feeling good. I wasn’t maniacally relishing my ailing mother’s anguish. She just finally allowed me to take naps.)

They stayed with me in my shitty studio apartment. The two of them. Imagine getting to go on a trip to someplace cool like Chicago and then having to stay in a studio apartment where the closet was bigger than the kitchen. We had a vegan food night- this was back when vegan food was fun, new, exciting city fare! We sat on my floor and watched TV. We went to the zoo, saw the animals. We went downtown, Michigan Avenue, Millennium Park. We saw the tulips there. Chicago has TOP tulip game.

Tulips are my favorite flower. I’m obsessed with them. Determined to see the fields of them in The Netherlands in the next few years. They make me happy. I look forward to them every year.

In 2013, I missed the tulips. They didn’t exist that year. When I flew home from Chicago at 4am one April morning, they hadn’t yet bloomed, and when I returned to the city a month and half later, they were gone. It was a loss not unnoticed.

I love this picture of my mom and I. It makes me as happy as the flowers that surround us. I’m so grateful we had that time, and I’d give everything to do it all again.

Six years later. Here I am. I figured, since I’m an adult now, and time flies, it wouldn’t seem like I’ve done or changed much in the span of it, but I was wrong. I’ve done shit tons, survived more, and even in my most miserable moments am still within inches of accomplishing my dreams. I’m proud of both of the pictures. I’m glad 23 year-old Rosa had the wherewith-all to appreciate the visit as it happened, and not take any of it for granted. I’m proud of 29 year-old Rosa for leaving her apartment to go spend time with her sister and her nephew rather than spending another day doing nothing. We’re the same person. We’re worlds apart. 

[ohheygriefsucks]

Back On

I want to watch Merlin. I haven’t in a long, long time. In fact, according to my Netflix history, I haven’t watched an episode of Merlin since January 1st, 2013. Just over 5 years ago.

Merlin was one of the only TV shows that my mom and I both enjoyed. I longed for her to get hooked on some trashy reality TV show with me, but she couldn’t stand them, and I’d be damned if I was going to watch an episode of Royal Pains voluntarily. So this was it. We could meet on the even ground that was campy British wizard shows.

In a way, the show became sacred. A lot of weird things become sacred after a person dies. It’s something that I’ve really grown to embrace and honor over time. The show was so directly related to memories, happy memories, that at first it just plumb hurt to even think about it, and that sucked. It was like a weird breakup. I loved and respected the show, and only wanted good things for it, but I needed to be by myself, and maybe one day, if we felt up to it, we’d try again. 

The summer after my mom died, I binged and binged Supernatural. I said “Fuck that good, British boy, Merlin- lets go American and evil!” It was what I needed at the time. It’s a weird show to do so, but it brought me comfort. I only now realized how blatantly I replaced one show with the other.

I think I’m ready to start again. I don’t think we finished it, but I’m gonna have to do it alone. Not that Heaven doesn’t have Netflix. It totally does. I’ve been craving the comfort of nostalgic TV, and want to feel happy. I’m on month three of hiatus (nee: unemployment), and I’m in need of a boost. Bring on the talking dragon and that funny-eared British boy!

[ohheygriefsucks]

On Tuesday, my paternal grandmother “Baba” passed away. She was just one week shy of 94. She passed peacefully in her chair at her nursing home. She wasn’t sick, she was happy, and she lived a very, very full life. 94 years is a LONG time. If I were to live 94 years, it would mean I’d have to live as long as I already have two more times. Christ that sounds exhausting. But if I do, remind me to reblog this in 2082. It’ll be super timely. We’ll all say “wow”.

I’m having a lot of issues processing this loss. I have conflicting feelings, and keep catching myself lining things up with the loss of my mom. 

First off, it’s weird. Really weird. At 29 to feel like you have to walk your dad through losing his mom because you did before he did. Up until Tuesday, my dad didn’t know what it was like. I’m aware that the situations are wildly different, but I was taken aback by this weird protective feeling that overcame me. It wasn’t my loss, it was his. He was the one who would need tending to. 

A big thing I’m dealing with right now is that I’m not that sad and don’t think I should be. That makes me sound cynical and cold, but, what is there to be sad about when a person lives a happy, fully, life, and passes painlessly? I will miss her. To imply that we somehow deserved more time (which is what I’m feeling like I should feel) just doesn’t make sense. The mission was successful. The world bettered by her presence. 

I leave early, painfully early tomorrow for Ohio for the funeral. I’m not working at the moment, so I wasn’t planning to go, and was sure everyone would understand. I wasn’t that conflicted by it. I’m not financially able to buy last minute airfare right now. My Baba washed and reused ice cubes. She’d get it.

But then, Wednesday morning, my dad called me and told me to book a flight and he’d reimburse me. It was an order, not a question. And I started to freak out. And I have been doing so on and off since then. I’m going to try and articulate the faux psychological findings I’ve identified after spending so much time in my head. 

So far, here’s what I know is bothering me, and maybe why:

- Last minute travel (not by choice) freaks me the fuck out. Why? Because the last and only time I’ve ever had to do it was to rush home to Texas because my mom was dying. I realized today that I’m leaving just as early tomorrow as I did when I left Chicago for Texas in 2013. 

- Early morning flights stress me out: This one isn’t mom related, but I nearly missed my outgoing flight the last time I had to fly out of LAX and I had a horrible panic attack on the airplane and it was horrific and I’m afraid I’ll have another panic attack this time. I shouldn’t worry about this. I have my xanax rx for that very reason. I shouldn’t feel guilty for utilizing modern medicine that will safely help me feel better.

- Traveling during cold and flu season freaks me out. Why? Well because I am a hypochondriatic germo and emitophobe. The thought of catching a bug while traveling and being sick away from home sends me reeling into anxiety, which in turn makes me feel sick, etc. etc. I bought anti-bacterial Wet Ones and Travel Clorox Wipes. I have Emergen-c in my bag. I got my flu shot.

- I wasn’t extremely close to my grandma, because we moved around so much. I loved her. But I don’t want to feel like I’m co-opting any grief/sadness from my cousins who spent much more time with her as they lived just down the street. I feel like an impostor. I also feel like a bad grandkid because I wasn’t as close to her as my cousins.

- There will be drama that I don’t want to deal with. My dad’s family is pretty small. Three kids, eight grandkids. The grandkids are split 4/4 between 2 of the three kids. There’s not much room to disappear to. There are a lot of potentially volatile situations that could arise. There’s a lot of tension and broken relationships that have been cut off for personal well being. I feel like I’ve worked hard to make choices about distancing myself from things like this and I’m angry that I’m being thrown into a situation that I don’t want to be in the middle of.

- This is a weird one, but I’m stressed/weirded out because my mom took a trip with my dad and little sister to Ohio this time of year the year that she died. It was her first/only time flying with oxygen and I remember the trip was rough on her. She had just started using a cane. We’re staying at the same hotel.

- Sunday would be my parents’ 41st wedding anniversary. We’ll be at the viewing all day. I’m not angry about that, it just makes me a little sad.

- I don’t want to see my grandma’s dead body. I don’t want to spend hours in a funeral home staring at her. This one is big. And causing me a lot of guilt. I don’t spend a lot of time around really old people. Since my mom died, it’s been weirdly hard for me to not resent old people simply for being alive old people. It’s awful. It’s all surface stuff. But, something struck me deeper while I thought. The time I spent sitting next to my mother’s body after she passed while we waited for my little sister to get home from Austin was sacred to me. She was still my mom. The brief time we had a family viewing of her before she was cremated was sacred. I didn’t like it, particularly. It didn’t feel like her. She looked fine, but wrong. She was dressed beautifully. A dress she had picked out. I don’t think I want to have that experience with anyone else right now. I don’t want it to be one of many. I don’t want to devalue my past. 

- This will only be my third funeral. The first with an actual body present. The only one not too early and due to cancer. I don’t know how to do grief when it’s just nature taking it’s course.

-Having a maternal figure pass away just keeps sending me back to my mom dying. I know this is selfish. I hate myself for managing to make everything about me, but I also need to acknowledge the level of PTSD that my mom’s passing has caused. Logically, I know I shouldn’t feel bad about this. That it makes sense that something relative would bring up relatable memories. It’s just exhausting and overwhelming.

Well there you go. There’s my mind and soul over the past four days chucked up for you. I feel better. So there’s that.

[ohheygriefsucks]

@midnight

On June 8th, 2016 I went to the then Hollywood Center Studios lot for my second interview for a position as a researcher on @midnight. I had met with Joe Ferrell, one of our EPs, a week prior, over avocado toast (on the house- what a fucking treat!) to go over the position, and luckily, so luckily, he passed me on to the next round.

The lot was empty. Most shows, including @midnight were on hiatus. I wandered past the correct building more that a couple times (something I now laugh at people for doing- which is rude of me) before deciding to go in and upstairs to what looked like the receptionist area, but without a receptionist. A few solitary minutes later, Becca, the outgoing head of research/incoming writer’s assistant found me and brought me downstairs to the research room to begin.

I was beyond nervous. Intimidated. I had been searching for work, unsuccessfully, for almost 8 months. My unemployment benefits had run out, as had any money I’d ever possessed. I wanted this job so badly, that I didn’t know if my body/spirit would hold up if I didn’t get it. I was also way overdressed. Like I don’t know what the fuck I was thinking.

I was sunk into the middle of the plush, low-to-the-ground couch of the researcher’s room. Becca, and Adam (the incoming head researcher, and my future boss) sat in office chairs in front of me. It was like an odd interrogation.

Throughout the interview, there were times where I thought I got it (oozing over dog pics with Becca), and times where I thought it would go to someone else (when Adam asked me how many nights a week I cook dinner, and I said almost none). I was sweaty, and desperate to impress these two people in jeans and flip-flops, who I’d go on to know as two of the kindest folks in my world.

Then. There was the final question. A question I’ve kept between myself, colleagues, and family up until this point.

Adam asked me, “Who is your hero?”

I replied, “Umm I guess I’d have to say my little sister and my mom.”

Adam looked at me, and followed up with, “If you had to kill one, who would it be?”

To which I responded, “Well. My mom is already dead, so I guess I’d kill her again.”

Silence.

“Fuck.” I thought.

Who had let me blurt out that asinine, inappropriate, yet so on brand answer?

I felt like shit for saying I’d be okay with killing my already dead mom, should she ever return. I thought, wherever she was now, she must hate me. 

The interview was over.

As I left the lot, I called my dad. Almost to apologize for botching something I’d gotten so close to getting. He assured me my mom would’ve laughed at my sound logic. I was angry at myself. Embarrassed. I wanted to cry.

A day or two later, I got a call. They’d like to offer me the position. I fluttered. Spat out, “Yes! Absolutely! Yes!” Zig, our then producer, grumbled back, “Don’t accept a job before we tell you how much we can offer you!” So I rescinded, and then re-accepted a few seconds later, after being told the going rate was well above the $0 I was currently taking in. I started the following Monday.

I later learned that my response to Adam’s final question had solidified me getting the position. How lucky was I to meet strangers who understood my snark and gallows humor, instead of writing it off as hostility? Now, it’s like, of course. Everyone on the show is so kind, smart, and openhearted that it doesn’t surprise me one bit. I had finally, FINALLY landed right where I was supposed to be. I was home.

Today, thirteen months and three days later, I’m going home for the last time.

186 shows I help build. Comedians I’ve idolized since I was a child have become my coworkers. I’ve gained confidence and knowledge. So, so much fucking knowledge. Albeit the majority of it is of fetishes I didn’t know existed. I am absolutely heartbroken that the time has come to say goodbye to an institution that embraced me for who I am, and let my oddity shine. I hope, and pray that I can keep moving forward. That I will never have to work outside of the TV/Film industry again. That I have a future in this business. 

Thank you a million times @midnight. Thank you Joe for getting me an interview, thank you Becca and Adam for choosing me to become a member of the family, thank you Chris for hosting one hell of a show. Thank you to everyone who worked on the show for being the best friends a human could ask for.

Until next time. Red light.

[ohheygriefsucks]

Sleep no more.

I dream every night. I remember my dreams, and they’re vivid most always. 

For the first three months following my mom’s death, I dreamed of her dying every single night. Vivid and horrific variations of the memories I retained. For whatever reason, if was never a play by play of the actual events. Most of the time it was if an ellipses had occurred, and her death was a false alarm. She was still alive- but never healthy. My mom would have evaded death, only to have it looming just around the corner; this time for good. Some nights I knew she was going to die, but obviously had to keep it secret from her, as her spirits were usually higher. Watching your mom die in real life, and then watching her die every single night for 90+ days is exhausting. I’d wake up exhausted. One night, I begged out loud for them to stop, and they did.

The relief was not permanent, but I’ve not had a steady block of them since. 

They have become fewer and far between, but they are still just as jarring. Take just as much life out of me. Have me going through the motions the following day in a daze. 

I had one of those dreams last night. Not at all convenient when you’re prepping for your last 14 hour work day before a two week hiatus. I’ve felt like shit for the past two weeks straight. A pestery cold gave way to an IBS flare up which, of course, gave way to anxiety. I’m constantly nauseous for no reason (not pregnant, but thanks for thinking I get laid). I’m always slightly dizzy. I can’t eat anything without my stomach cramping up, but I push through it. Because of all that, I’m constantly freaking out on the inside. Nothing seems to help, and a solid night’s sleep continues to elude me. Before having last night’s dream, I had already awoken at 1:30 AM because my heart was beating two times per second. I had to take .25mg of Xanax to bring it down and allow me to sleep, but taking a drug that makes you super drowsy 5 hours before you have to wake up will throw you off for the whole day. And when I finally did get back to sleep, it was only to watch my mother regain lucidity, then die, completely unable to influence the outcome. 

I miss her so much. Seeing her and hearing her in these dreams is all I have. It’s like getting her back, and then throwing myself down a rocky hill. It hurts. I woke up feeling sick and fuzzy. I was tired all day. Flickers of the dream popped up throughout the day at random. It was like I was walking down the street with one foot on the curb for 14 hours. I love my job. So much. And I am actually proud of myself for being strong, and always going in and forcing myself to hope for the best. So that’s got to be a sign of growth, surely. But I’m tired. So fucking tired. And I feel like I’m screaming into a void.

People don’t like to hear about other people’s dreams. I realize this may be the most annoying post to date, to force you empathize with an idea of someone you never knew. So thanks for bearing with me. There’s no resolution, and that is the point.

[ohheygriefsucks]

Four Years Time

What are you supposed to do when you know you need to write, but your sadness is so strong that it aches from your heart and saturates every inch of you body? The sick feeling. The real, physical pain that you can feel basking just below your epidermis. It doesn’t feel good to be awake.

It’s four years ago today that I lost my mom to some jerk-ass bullshit cancer cells that thought they knew better. And today it hurts to be awake.

Year one, I went away to a bed and breakfast by the sand dunes of Lake Michigan.

Year two, I went to El Matador beach with friends of mine from college who knew my mom, and were with me her entire journey.

Last year, I went to Target and bought some potted plants to grow in our backyard. They sprouted, but fizzled out in a few weeks.

This year, I’ve woken up, and wished for sleep. I’ve shoved s’more Pop Tarts and veggie-chicken sliders down my throat and played hours of TV in the background, barely following any of it. 

I know it’s no one else’s responsibility to remember this date or to grieve with me, but when the only way to get someone to acknowledge your loss is by publicly posting to social media about it, any condolences seem false, and the empty apartment, and silent phone next to you solidify the sentiment. 

It doesn’t get easier. Know that every single day of my life is lived feeling like I’ve got a little weight tied around my heart, making it ever-so-slightly harder to breathe. I fight through it, because ultimately, all I want is for the entire world to love me, and being an annoying depressive fuck-face doesn’t make that achievable, but it’ll always be there.

I want to go outside, to yell at strangers, to show up crying on the doorsteps of people that I’m more invested in than they are me. I want silence and absolute solitude, and I want the company of a handful of people to show up unsolicited and force hugs and love upon me. To lie with me as I stare blankly at my walls trying to articulate this fog. I want peace.

[ohheygriefsucks]

Calling Bullshit on “The Christmas Shoes”

We need to have a talk. As someone whose mom really did die to a fictional character from a shitty pre-9/11 country song. You’re garbage.

Here’s the video for the atrocity, if your life had somehow been spared up until this point. 

Disregard the action of music video, as it’s from the TV movie adaptation of the song (which I haven’t seen, and respect myself too much to), and focus on the lyrical bones of this shit-skeleton.

“Standing right in front of me was a little boy waiting anxiously Pacing 'round like little boys do And in his hands he held a pair of shoes His clothes were worn and old, he was dirty from head to toe”

Okay- so this kid is old enough and responsible enough to walk to a shoe store from his home, presumably after dark (what with daylight savings time), but can in no capacity bathe himself? BULLSHIT.

[I know the idea is that because his mom’s dying she can’t give him baths, but the song clearly mentions a father later. If this wise-beyond-his-years kid can’t stay clean in a 2 parent household, that’s more of a personal problem. Don’t put that shit on dying mom. She doesn’t have time for that.]

“And when it came his time to pay I couldn't believe what I heard him say Sir, I want to buy these shoes for my Mama, please It's Christmas Eve and these shoes are just her size”

How old were you when you learned your mother’s shoe size? I was at least in my early teens, and that was only I was the acceptable gender to be trying to wear my mother’s shoes. Any 7-9 boy who knows his mother’s shoe size by heart is a foot fetishist in training. There’s no ifs, ands, or buts. That boy is focusing way too much on his mother’s feet, and it’s fucking gross. 

“Could you hurry, sir, Daddy says there's not much time”

We’ve gotta chat, Dad. If you exist. How aloof are you that you do not notice your child has gone missing on a winter’s night? If he left with your consent, why didn’t you give the fucker $20 so he could buy the damn shoes? 

Also, kid, your dad’s not a doctor. Mine is. And we still didn’t know exactly when my mom was gonna die. The hospice nurse said she’d go into a coma for a few days before passing. My mom was awake up until her death.

Sorry kid, but your father knows nothing about death or timing.

“He counted pennies for what seemed like years Then the cashier said, "Son, there's not enough here"

Again, what intelligence level is this kid? Did he not price check before he left home, and asked his father for whatever difference he needed? It is not the responsibility of the cashier to unburden some child who can’t wait to get home to touch his dying mom’s feet. 

At this point, we should be concerned that this boy is even gonna make it home. All signs point to him pulling a Little Match Girl on the way back.

“He said Mama made Christmas good at our house Though most years she just did without Tell me Sir, what am I going to do, Somehow I've got to buy her these Christmas shoes”

I feel you kid. My mom made Christmas what it was for us too. But frankly, the way you ask for help in that follow-up sound like straight-up solicitation. 

“I'll never forget the look on his face when he said Mama's gonna look so great”

Haunted. It’s clear that the singer was haunted by the look on this lurky little kid’s face when he talked about his mother looking “so great”.

“You see she's been sick for quite a while And I know these shoes would make her smile”

Hold up. So you’ve known your mom was dying but you wait until now to buy her nice shoes, which she will presumably wear NEVER?! Dude. Talk about too little to late! And, if your mom was sick for a while, she probably had plenty of time to shop online, and likely has ten pairs of the shoes she actually wants by now, not some Payless knock off.

“And I want her to look beautiful if Mama meets Jesus tonight”

So, so many questions. 

1. Does your God only accept beautiful people?

2. Were you raised to believe that Jesus only likes physically attractive cis-gendered females? 

3. Why the uncertainty that she’s meeting Jesus tonight? You were pretty damn certain of it back in line.

“I knew that God had sent that little boy To remind me just what Christmas is all about”

So God’s up there like,

“How can I remind Steve what Christmas is all about? Oh shit! I know! I’ll give some random child’s mother cancer! YES!”

Makes sense. Next time send a pamphlet or something first, Christ.

“And I want her to look beautiful if Mama meets Jesus tonight”

Again with the fixation on your mother’s physical appearance. It’s getting straight up Batesy here. 

I know the song lyrics say “if Mama”, but I’ve always heard it as “when Mama”, and I believe that to be the real line. In which case, Little Boy Blue here is planning on putting Mama’s shoes on her feet, and her pillow over her face as soon as he gets home. This kid is a stone cold psycho.

IN CONCLUSION,

Real dying mom’s aren’t like, 

“Bitches, I’m dying, go get me some sweet kicks to go out in!”

That was Heaven’s Gate. 

Get it right, country music, or just shut the fuck up entirely.

[ohheygriefsucks]

If I am good at anything, it’s buying a journal, writing about 2 entries, and then buying another journal. I found this one while trying to clean my room (or find my deodorant- can’t recall). I’ve been feeling really distant lately, and this really brought me back to square one. In a way I wanted to be brought back, albeit a painful one. I was unsure about sharing this, but I think it is important for me to remember how I hurt and why in those early days. You find ways to forget your world was shattered, carrying on, crumbling, but appearing normal. It’s always there with you. It’s about owning the broken person you’ve become.

[ohheygriefsucks]

Plan your shit.

One of the great things my mom did in regards to her whole death thing, was plan ahead for funeral stuff. I know it wasn’t easy for her to do (it was an urgent meeting set up three weeks prior to her death), but I really appreciated it. She and my dad had picked out everything really, and we just went through an itemized list to confirm when we went to the funeral home. She had appointed people to write her obit, sing, and speak at her funeral, most of whom she was able to ask herself. But...that’s not really want to talk about. More of a seed thought that sprouted from those memories.So, thank you, prologue.

Why don’t young, healthy people chat about their ideal funerals more? It does happen: the flippant “Play this song at my funeral!” or forbidding a viewing if you die with your hair looking like that. But that’s not written down, and chances are pinky-swears are voided upon death. Part of growing up is realizing that people die all the time and lots of time it’s a surprise, and how shitty would it be if your friend passed away and you played the wrong Cranberries song at their funeral? It would be so shit. Why isn’t there some common-use database that’s formatted like those quizes we’d take on MySpace? A place where a 19 year old’s wishes can be saved, and released upon death to the proper authorities?

I’m sure there are services like this. If it were free (and a thing), I would spend all day on Polyvore Funeral. But I want viral buzz about it.

I just people to be able to talk about they we wanna go out *when* the time comes without everyone thinking they’re going to end it. I’m not saying I’m going to kill myself, I just need you to promise that Haribo gummis are served at my wake, and I brought my own notary. 

[ohheygriefsucks]

Playing this game doesn’t mean you know how to play any other.

When you experience death first-hand, you think you get the gist of it, but the truth is you don’t. 

I’ve written about my grief for over two years now; how it imprints itself on everything my life touches. How it doesn’t define me, but at the same time is everything I am. 

I know what death is like when cancer takes away someone you love.

And really, that is it. That is my entire experience with death. 

Just because I can read, doesn’t mean I can read and comprehend any language comprised of the same alphabet. That’s not how life works, nor is how death does. 

You think you’re helpless when you are bereaved, but it is when someone you love loses someone they love for absolutely no just or logical reason that you realize you’re just as clueless as everyone who drove you mad while you went through your process. 

How can I be so good at death, but not able to stop it continuing to hurt the people I love the most? How can I stare at a friend, knowing that their world has been shattered, and not have any capability to grasp their grief in the slightest? How can I tell them that I love them and that I am here for them any hour of the day or night, when those words can be so empty?  Why does “I just want to squeeze you and hold you for hours” have to sound so fucking skeevy?

All I can do is hope that the answer is just having the sentience to ask these questions in the first place.

[ohheygriefsucks]

Mother’s Day

I don’t think I’m going to post anything to Facebook today, regarding the holiday.

I’ve been trying to work it out in my mind, and I honestly feel, given my candor and openness with my feelings on Facebook, that I shouldn’t. 

I love my mom. I loved her. And my heart aches.

At this point, the world knows that, right?

What I would be doing by posting some photo or epitath today is nothing more than saying, 

“Hey! I know you’re all enjoying your days with your wonderful alive-moms, but mine’s dead. Do you remember that? Of course you do. I talk about it all the fucking time. Anyway, I’m really fucking sad about it. I miss her more every day. It’s not like those flowery inspirational posters. There’s gotta be some mathematical equation that the longer you live without a loved one, the more you realize the reality of everything you have and will have to do without them. So that’s where I am! Envious of everyone with tangible loveable mothers. Angry at people claiming their’s is the best, because they don’t fucking know. Furious at those who have great, alive-moms, but don’t care about them. I want you to enjoy your day. I won’t tell you to hug your mother tighter because there are those of us who can’t. I’d have to be pretty fucking dumb to believe human-to-human compression would bring my mom back to life. Any sort of post I could muster would be a Facebook downer, take away a delightful holiday from my friends, and make it about my sadness. Which, honestly, I’d probably love- but Ghost-Mom taught me better. I don’t want you to think that I’m not proud of everything my mom did. I am. And I would love to tell you all about her sometime. Honestly. Fact of the matter is she knows I love her, I’m proud of her, and I miss her. If it turns out there’s Facebook in heaven, and she’s gotten real into it, then yeah- I’m fucked. But I’m pretty sure I’m safe. Plus, a girl can only take so many sorry-for-your-broken-everything platitudes.”

and what would be the point of all that?

[ohheygriefsucks]

Hodor

I get Hoarders. I totally understand.

Well, I get the ones who refuse to let go of anything because it meant something to someone who isn't alive anymore.

The rotten meat on the kitchen floor/no working toilets/feral cat husbandry gang....they remain a mystery.

As I stated previously, I’m moving. I’m leaving my un-sarcastically beloved Chicago, and heading west to Los Angeles to start doing what I actually want to with my life. It is a really hard break up. If I didn’t want to write for TV, I would stay here forever. This city is magical. My parents lived here, my sister was born here, and I’m closer to family than anywhere I’ve ever lived before. But I can’t do what I want to do for a living here, and I want to, so I’ve got to go. 

I can’t imagine going through this with an actual human. People do this? Like more than once? I’m feeling heartbreak and guilt for leaving an inanimate square on a map next to a lake full of rusty metal and occasional deads. Couples are weird. 

Anywho, one of the best things about moving is throwing out almost everything you own. Some do it for spiritual cleansing; I do it because I ran out of boxes (and fucks to be given). I also realized that I’ve held onto a lot of clothes for way too long. I continued to wear them because I didn’t have money to buy investment clothes, and didn’t really care if I looked like shit. I’m still not radiating self-love, but nobody benefits from pilled-up t-shirts purchased at Forever21 in Norman, Oklahoma, before we had a black president. No one. Both of my roommates in L.A. are stylists, so I’m finally going to have people to point me in the right (read: fuckable) direction. Trash bags. Trash bags upon trash bags of clothes so grodified, that even the nakedest homeless person would rightfully refuse.

It also meant parting with a lot of clothes that were gifts over the years. Christmas sweaters that I’d worn holes in. The annual gift from my mother that amounted to 90% of my winter wear. I’m not really one to splurge on sweaters, so I’d hold onto the ones given to me, and wear them out. My mom always specially picked out these sweaters for my sisters and I. What she thought we’d like. What she thought would look cute. There was thought and love in each purchase. While packing, I’ve had to evaluate my sweater situation: is it worth finding space to keep an 8 year old sweater that Old Navy didn’t give more that 2 years to live, just because your mom gave it to you?

The logical answer is no. But logic is a cunt.

Here’s what it feels like. Maybe the skewed thought process will help you better understand why some people do what they do. I was able to part with my clothes, but I still have many objects that I hold dear and close to my heart that I will not part with. I’m not saying that hoarding is okay, or healthy; just that I understand why people fall under it’s reign.   

If I get rid of this, will it break my mother’s heart? If she’s watching me, will she think that I’m trying to throw her, and everything that has come from her away? I have to hold onto this. She touched this. She touched this and meant it for me. She got this to care for me. It’s just not presentable anymore. Okay- If I keep it, what am I going to do with it? Nothing. No amount of Pinterest “upcycled” clicks will actually lead me to making something. Will my mom be angry if I get rid of it? Will she be okay? Will I run out of things that mean “her” to me? It’s such a tangible dismissal. 

Dumb, right? Super stupid. You don’t even have a firm stance on afterlife, and yet you’re positive that if there’s anything, it’s your mom tsk-tsking your wardrobe choices? How shitty would it be for your mom to love you, get to heaven, and after watching you on GodTV, say, “ Oooo...Nevermind...I don’t like her anymore. I take it back.”?

But it is what it is. Brains rock at making mountains out of mole hills. They’re dicks.

I parted with many a sweater today. It wasn’t easy. It didn’t feel good. But I have to believe that it was the appropriate thing to do. 

Every single time I move, I think of move number 6 or 7 of my childhood. I was in peak brat mode, and was not going to pack anything. Oh, movers coming? Tough shit. I’m staying right here. Mom was not going to do my work for me. What she was going to do was put all of my belongings into trash bags, and throw the trash bags into boxes, leaving the eventual unpacking and organizing as my deserved punishment. 

A woman like that has got to be cool with me cleaning house ahead of time. Right?

[ohheygriefsucks]

Trust Fall

I hate April. And I hate that I hate April. 

Tulips get to come out in April. I fucking love tulips.

Fiesta is in April. I fucking love Fiesta.

But 2 Aprils ago, my life went so balls-to-the-shit-walls so incredibly fast, that April has become a sort of Advent calendar of horror.

My mom was sick for 6 years, but she was only dying for 3 weeks. Imagine only ever walking from point A to point B, and then one day, without your permission or consent, a jet pack is surgically fused to your back and it’s coordinates are entered; you have no power to change them. It’s a speed you’ve heard of in stories, but have never felt. That is, of course, until you find yourself holding back your cry-barf, shooting towards a brick wall.

It sucks. I can go back on my Facebook, my Tumblr, my texts and emails, and watch in slow motion as fate crept up on me. There’s nothing good about doing this, and I actively avoid doing so. Hurting again never makes the hurt less. I have some dates memorized. The day I flew home, April 13th. The day my mom died, April 23rd. The harder dates aren't so cut and clear. There was the day at the start of April where my mom called me and said her liver was going crazy, but she’d let me know when it was time to come home. Then there was the following Thursday, when I called to check in on her, and she wasn't coherent (she’d had her liver drained that morning, and it made her loopy). There was the call from my dad saying I needed to get there now. There were the tears as I spoke to Cristina, telling her to keep Mommy alive until I got home. There was the night, where I decided I had to leave the next day, and spent $700 (my entire account, over a month’s rent) for a one-way ticket home. The morning  I wore sunglasses, and held my teddy bear in public, in the airport trying to dissolve to nothingness. The moment I got home, and I hugged my mom, and hurt her, because I had squeezed to hard. The nap we took together in her bed. The way she’d put her hand on my head, and rub my forehead with her thumb. That day, she said “There’s my baby!”. My mom never called me her baby. We were nothing but fragile.

I don’t know what happened over the following 10 days. There are memories here and there; but nobody ever tells you how much you forget, or rather, don’t retain in the first place. 

Remember when I started this post and it was about not dwelling on all the shitty things that happened, and then I did all that, thinking since I didn't research specifics that it didn't count? Good follow-through, Rosa. Good.

My point is, the next 4 weeks are going to be tough as shit. 

AND I’m moving. But that’s a choice. And a choice I’m extremely happy about. 

My lease isn't up until the end of April, but I’m leaving Chicago on the 15th for Los Angeles. Something that’s been a long time coming. 

I made the choice to move early, because, holygodsofallthehells moving sucks regardless. Add my neurosis, and it is nothing that I need to put on top of the  anniversary. I’m moving in with one of my dearest friends from OU, and will be within a stone’s throw from dozens more. 

These are the people who knew me before, during, and have stayed with me after. We’ve done every cheesy verb together.They’re my core, and I’m safe with them. 

I don’t know what I’m going to do on this 2nd anniversary, but there’s comfort in knowing I will be surrounded by people who I love and who love me. The kind of people who can make getting locked out of your car at a gas station in the middle of Texas for three hours fun. So, I think we’ll manage.

It makes me feel good to do things that I know are good for me, because they are good for me.

I can do this. And I can’t wait.

[ohheygriefsucks]

I stand upon a precipice.

Not literally.  Not entirely figuratively either.

I just have major life choices to make, and I want it to seem dire- of the utmost importance. 

What I really wanted to say was, "I want my eyeballs to pop out of my head because my support, my sounding board isn't here, and I need someone to tell me that this stupid and risky venture I'm planning is the right thing to do, and that even if they don't want me to do it, they know I am going to, so they're going to be happy and be there for me." 

That. That was what my mom was. She would tell stories of when I was younger: I would ask her to choose one of two outfits, and then come out in the opposite of the one she had picked. But I was wearing clothes. So we moved along. She understood my stubbornness, which, she insisted, comes from my father's side. When I make my mind up about something, it's done. Telling me not to, or why, or how unprepared I am, does not help at all. All it does is make me recoil and go on, feeling like that's one less person I can rely on. What I need is someone to say, "Rosa, you are crazy, but you've got this."

Man, am I one needy bitch! Surely we all have this kind of need. Not necessarily my way, but still. Some people may actually need people to tell them "no", so they won't do something. To me, that's absurd, but apparently there are souls out there more receptive of outside opinion.

This is just one of those shitty things you didn't even realize was so important to have in your life. Yes it's possible to find someone as supportive in the future (typing that out, in sounds like tuh-hotal bullshit, but hey, ideally), but a mom is a default, the prototype. If my mom was still here, and I were to go to her and say, "Mom, I feel like cutting off my arm tomorrow, because I feel like having two armpits is overwhelming. Will you still love me?" the answer would be "Yes." and always "yes". Because she is my mom. Because she loves her children unconditionally. Because her heart is incapable of saying "No. I will stop loving you."

I loathe. I just loathe every hole that she's left. Not because it's there, but because it will never, ever, again be filled properly. What's worse than a filling, is a cavity without a dentist.