Living without parents...

Even as middle-aged adults

The other night my dear aunt’s mother just passed away, my cousin’s grandmother. Her passing the end of a long journey with Alzheimers.

It was hard on the family as she required ongoing and more intensive, round-the-clock care.

Still, after sharing the news of her passing, my aunt texted me this:

“Have to navigate in this world with my mom gone.”

My heart hurt for her.

I replied:

“It’s a new rite of passage / new life for an adult woman without a mom.”

She then said:

“I hadn’t thought much about it until now.”

I answered:

“We never do until we have to.”

Even for those who don’t have a solid a relationship with their mom. Even if she was suffering and her passing is a blessing—

Still—

Without your folks—life takes a new direction. Your perception shifts. You move through this world different. Your existence altered. You are forever changed.

It sounds simple, but you won’t get it until you’ve been there and enter into that realm.

And there is no way around it—unless you go first, of course.

I experienced this change in life younger than many Americans do, given average life expectancy.

Though a full-grown, middle-aged woman, and my aunt—approaching 60, you suddenly feel an ‘orphan’.

I guess we all have our inner childs that take over in these moments, and we feel alone in this world.

Although my parents had loads of trauma and undiagnosed and untreated mental illnesses—

They were still my parents. They were still my kin, my blood-relatives. My people.

Then, after Jeremie opted out of this life—I realized this—

Though sometimes it is a deep relief that they are gone, still—

You realize that you still (and will always) feel solitude. That familial void.

Even when your family is dysfunctional as fuck—you still move through this world differently when they are no longer here.

And that is something that—try as you might, despite one’s most sincere attempts at sympathetic understanding—-

You will never really ‘get it’ until they are gone.