Inspired Possibility
  • Home
  • About
    • Testimonials
    • Privacy Policy
  • Work with Me
    • Coming Home to Yourself Coaching
    • Serenity Now Retreats
  • Events
    • Come Home to Yourself Retreat
  • The Book!
    • Book Testimonials
  • Blog
    • Subscribe
  • Resources
  • Contact

Lessons Learned from My Mom...

11/1/2020

2 Comments

 
Picture
This time of year marks the anniversary of my mom’s passing.  It’s been 17 years now, and I have been reflecting on the life and love I was blessed to share with her while she was here.  I thought it would break me to lose her, and it didn’t.  I still feel her with me, even now.  She lives on in my heart. 

My mother was a beautiful blend of sweetness, gentleness, kindness, shyness, humility, feigned incompetence, and fierce fiery grit.  This woman would helplessly ask me to change her clock time or her lightbulb, but she faced cancer like a warrior woman! 

Here are just a few of the lessons I learned from my dear mother:



Do not collapse when you think you can’t go on – You are stronger than you think!
When my dad left her for another woman after 32 years in an era when a woman’s only job was to devote her entire life and being to her family, she did not collapse.  Facing unwanted independence in her early 50’s, she showed up for herself.  She hadn’t worked since her 20’s, but she launched herself into temp work that ultimately led her to a position in our local library that she held onto into her early 70’s because she loved it so much.

Kindness is the way to go.  Give people the benefit of the doubt. 
When a waitress was particularly gruff, rather than getting upset about how badly we were being treated, Mom brought in gentleness, understanding and compassion… offering “Maybe she just broke up with her boyfriend…”

Don’t bear a grudge – forgive and bring loving compassion to people and situations, even when it doesn’t seem reasonable
After my parents’ divorce, she never spoke unkindly about my dad and encouraged us to be involved with him.  She found a way to forgive, I guess.  I don’t think she had a bitter bone in her body, but rather gave people grace, compassion, and loving kindness. 

Flow with what life brings your way
I always knew I would lose my mother too early in my life – she was 44 when she had me, after all.  I was undoubtedly an accident (ultimately a happy one, I believe) after my parents adopted my oldest brother when it seemed they couldn’t have kids, and subsequently gave birth to 4 more.  It had been 10 years since a baby had been in the home and my sister was deathly ill.  I don’t know how my mom did it, but somehow, she created a loving home for one more.  She opened her arms to a baby, tended to her daughter in the hospital, cared for the others, and pulled it all together – finding a way to clean the house, cook the meals, bake the cookies, and love on us as if we were all that mattered.  She was the epitome of a good mother!

Be free!!  Enjoy this life.
When I was 12, my dad left us, having found a woman who he thought better matched his intellectual and adventurous tendencies.  While devastating in some ways, this also deepened the richness of my life with my mom and our opportunities to live our own adventurous life!  I was the only one at home, so we bonded together and began to travel the world – we ate out more often, we laughed more often, we found things we enjoyed doing together, and we became best friends.  We made it through, and we made it through in style, choosing to live rather than crumple into a defeated puddle.  St. Croix, Disney, Texas, Arizona, and cruises called to us, and we said “Yes!”  Summers were spent at our cottage in the Finger Lakes, playing cards, savoring root beer floats, entertaining friends and family, and basking in the beauty and peace of this place that mom had bought with her own money. 

Don’t be fooled by the soft veneer – underneath a mighty giant lies in wait to awaken when she is called
When Mom was 72, she was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent treatment involving surgery, radiation, and medication.  Grateful to live nearby I was able to support this modest woman with wound care, meals, home care, and rides.  She went on to beat this cancer and found remission.  She lived life and enjoyed her family, friends, work, music, theater, and travel.  Cancer was not going to stop her. 

Persevere in the face of adversity
6 years later, a new cancer came, likely a result of the medication she had taken for the breast cancer.  She stayed with us post-surgery and my family and I were able to support her through recovery, and the ongoing chemo.  She loved her medical team and even seemed to look forward to her chemo days.  She did all that she could to beat this disease so that she could continue to thrive. 

When the choice is life, choose it!
For nearly three decades she had shown me what it could be like to live life fully, and she wasn’t about to stop now.  She made the decision to leave the home she had lived in for about 20 years to move into a senior living facility in order to have community and support.  Moving is always a big transition, but she handled it with grace and ease.  She enjoyed meeting new people and sharing activities and meals with them.

When it’s time to go, go in your own way. 
On the day before her death, my sister and I (having no idea that the end was so near) visited with her, cleaned her apartment, ironed her clothes and got things in order.  I think this mattered a lot in the sense that things were “tidied up.”  She had hurt herself in a fall over a week before and was in a good deal of pain, food no longer tasted good and that was a big loss for my mom – she loved to enjoy her food!

I don’t even know why, but I asked her if she sometimes wished she could just die, and she acknowledged that yes, she did.  I suspect there was an unspoken permission to go in that conversation.  She told the nurse that night that she wished she could just close her eyes and drift away…  this seems to be exactly what she did.  They found her the next morning, “unconscious and unresponsive.” 

And, though it wasn’t the end I envisioned, because I strongly wanted to be with her by her side as she passed, I realize she would never have wanted that.  She loved us but would not have wanted to distress us with her final breaths.  I find comfort in witnessing how much choice she seemed to have in the timing of her departure – before the cancer that was invading her belly took over and things got really miserable.  She went at the exact age she had always told me “seemed like a good age to die.”  She had lived a full, rich, and loving life, and she was ready to be done.

Love transcends time and space.
I still feel her here with me, breathing through me, inside of me, emanating out, supporting me as I move through my life.  I know she walks with me, loves me, and looks over us all.  I can lean into her soft and gentle embrace (I can still feel how gloriously smooth, warm, and soft her skin was).  I can remember her tender look and feel.  I am softened by her sweetness.  I thought it would kill me to lose her.  It hasn’t.  It has added to my will to live, and I will be forever grateful for that! 

I love you and miss you every day, Mama Bear!!  Thank you for being my mother and my best friend!
​

p.s. a few more lessons that might have supported me and might serve you well:
Baking soothes the soul (as do the smell and taste of fresh-baked bread, cookies, and cake!)!!
There’s always time and room for “a little something” (her version of a shared sweet treat)
Live well, laugh often, love deeply!
Wishing you a little something sweet this week!!  


2 Comments

I Know a Woman...

6/4/2015

9 Comments

 
Picture
I want to talk about a “taboo,” off-limit subject.  Sorry, it’s not sexy. A week ago I wouldn’t have dreamt that we’d be having this conversation, but we need to. We need to because too many people face this alone and too many people don’t know how to react when someone shares this news with them. We need to talk about this because it’s a very real scenario that happens in households everywhere every day, and I want to be real about it. I want to give voice to it.

So here goes…

The topic most people would rather not talk about – biopsy… and cancer.  I know a woman and she has to have a biopsy, and that means she might have cancer.  Of course, she might not. But there’s reason for concern, so they’re “taking a look.” This woman is having her own unique experience and at the same time represents hundreds of thousands of women and men. 

She is oddly at peace with this, trusting that this (whatever “this” is) is part of her life journey.  She does not feel gripped by fear, but she does find herself wondering… “What if I do have cancer?”  How does she want to show up to life if cancer does become her reality in the next few weeks? What will rise to the surface as that which matters most?  Who will she choose to spend time with and how will she choose to spend her time and energy?  What would change? What would stay the same?

I imagine, like having a baby, everything changes in some way – her world, as she knows it, would never be the same. But, “cancer” – such a scary word that can so easily define and consume life.  She doesn’t want to have cancer, and the fear is definitely present…even in the peace.

We know of many miraculous stories where people have healed or reversed their cancer, often through natural means.  What route would I take, I wonder, if it were me?  I started a clean eating regimen last month – removing caffeine, alcohol, gluten, sugar, processed foods, dairy, and animal proteins from my diet. At the time I felt really ready and enthused, and I’ve felt great on this new way of eating, this new way of nourishing my body with real foods.  One of the things I said before I began was, “I want to do this before I have a wakeup call.”

Right now this woman is having a mini-wakeup call – a small awakening to what could be a new reality for her body. She is so very grateful for the doctor and the people in her life who take time to listen, but don’t venture to offer the false reassurance, “You’ll be fine.” Because we don’t know.  We don’t know what they’ll find. So, please, she asks, let her be in the space of uncertainty, the space of unknowing.

Right now she has a lot of questions.  Does she put her life on hold? Hold her breath till she knows? How does she lovingly support herself through this time? Who can she lean on for support? Who are the people who are really able to be there for her, rather than needing her to comfort and reassure them that she will be “fine;” that it’s “nothing?”

I trust she will be fine one way or the other simply because of her peace, her trust, and her faith that she is living her life as it comes. She will be “fine” because she will face what comes to her with courage, with love, and with the same belief in possibility that she usually has.  And, at times “fine” might include tears, anger, and fear.

If it is cancer (and it might be – let’s wrap our heads around that possibility), it will no doubt bring lessons and opportunities for a richer life. Witnessing this has most certainly deepened my philosophy that life is for living NOW.  This woman enters these next few weeks of uncertainty wanting to be very real about it, and with as much grace, dignity, and ease as she can muster. She will welcome all of the many feelings and thoughts that may dance through her days.


9 Comments
    Subscribe

    About me...

    I am a writer, coach, and teacher, and I love capturing life's many moments through writing, whether that be journalling, blogging, poetry, or essay.  I have always found the written word as a natural way for me to express what lies within.  

    This is the space where we get real.  I will write about my life experiences and things that I find my clients encounter in their daily lives.   

    What's real for you? What would you like me to write about?  Feel free to share with me topics you would like to see discussed and please join in the dialogue through the comment section. Your engagement makes the blog a much richer place to hang out!

    Thank you for joining me on this journey!!    

    Archives

    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    November 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    August 2024
    June 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    October 2023
    August 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    August 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    September 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    March 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    October 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    November 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    May 2016
    February 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    September 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014

    Categories

    All
    Addiction
    Anger
    #AtoZ Challenge
    Balance
    Biopsy
    Cancer
    Career
    Challenge
    Change
    Choice
    Comfort Zone
    Commitment
    Compassion
    Connection
    Coronoavirus
    COVID 19
    COVID-19
    Discernment
    Discomfort
    Disconnect
    Dreams
    Election
    Empathy
    Empowerment
    Extraordinary
    Family Recovery
    Fear
    Freedom
    Grace
    Gratitude
    Grief
    Harm Reduction
    Health
    Holidays
    Hope
    Inner Work
    Inquiry
    Inspiration
    Intention
    Intuition
    Joy
    Kindness
    Letting Go
    Life
    Light
    Logic
    Loving Kindness
    Meditation
    Mental Health
    Mindfulness
    Mom
    National Recovery Month
    New Year
    Overdose Awareness
    Overwhelm
    Pause
    Peace
    Perfectionism
    Personal Growth
    Perspective
    Possibility
    Presence
    Procrastination
    Purpose
    Quarantine
    Recovery
    Relationships
    Responsibility
    Rest
    Retreat
    Sadness
    Self Awareness
    Self Care
    Self-care
    Self Compassion
    Self-compassion
    Self Renewal
    Self-renewal
    Slowing Down
    Solstice
    Sport
    Stillness
    Strength
    Substance Use Disorder
    Support
    Thanksgiving
    Time
    Transition
    Wellbeing
    Women's Retreat

    RSS Feed

Barb Klein
Inspired Possibility
585-705-8740
[email protected]