I Am Missing You

My four year old Grandson will have his Mom or Dad call me and he will say “Gramma, I am missing you.” When he is with me, he will sometimes say “I am missing my Daddy or Mommy (or his brothers).” He will almost always add the “am.”

Spoken in that sweet, sincere little boy voice, it represents what it means to want to see someone as soon and as long as possible. To me it says so much more than “I miss you.”

Just adding the word “am” changes an often used phase into present continuous tense. The “am” makes it a more active longing.

Not only do I miss you, but I am missing you right this minute!

My sweet Mama, left this earthly life two weeks ago. She had dementia and was in a memory care facility. For the last eight months because of COVID, visits have been limited and at times denied.

I cannot say her death was unexpected, but I was always hopeful I would see her one more time. I am thankful that when it was time it was quick and she passed to the other side in her sleep.

Since 1989, I have lived thousands of miles away from my parents, on the other side of the country. I have visited as often as possible and for the last five years have done multiple extended visits every year.

As the dementia became worse, Mama often did not know who I was. She remembered LINDA her daughter, but some how the old woman sitting across from her was familiar, but not the daughter she knew.

We tried FaceTime and phone calls but that was too confusing for her, so I was limited to visiting with her in person when I could make the trip.

When I would leave, I would tell her I loved her and I would see her soon. I stopped saying Good Bye about five years ago. She had lost concept of time and sometimes she would reply “Thank you for loving me.”

She had told me sometime back that if I came back for a visit and she wasn’t here, she would be waiting for me on the other side. I have been going through her papers and I found a letter to me to be opened after her death. It was a long letter but the most important line was “if I precede the Old Vet (my Daddy, her husband of 78 years, WWII) in death please take care of him until he can be with me again.”

My Dad is in Assisted Living in the same facility where my Mother was in Memory Care. He was able to visit and sit with her until a few hours before her death.

Since March 6, I have only seen Mama twice, limited to masked, social distanced and outside. Because of the dementia, I feel as if I lost Mama in pieces, but ironically the last time I saw her during a trip in September, she knew who I was and we had a pleasant if limited conversation.

I had started sending her a card every week, telling her that I loved her and would see her soon. We were planning to be here, in Georgia, for Christmas and Daddy’s 100th birthday. The last one was in her room, unopened.

This past few weeks have been a time for reflecting on the loss and what COVID took away from Mama and Daddy and all of us.

I am at Peace with the events of the last year.

Thank you, Anton, for showing Gramma what it means to actively miss someone.

Today, I am missing my Aunts, Uncles, Grandmas, Cousins and friends who have gone before. But most of all, I am missing the Mama I knew before the disease took so much from her. I will continuously and actively miss the talented, beautiful Mama I remember.

I AM missing you, Mama. I will see you on the other side.