Earth Angels

 I don't even know their names. They were just two women camped out in the visitor lounge outside the palliative care unit of our local hospital. I would learn that they were sisters and that their mother was in the room next to my daughter Jaime's. Jaime, after being diagnosed 9 years earlier, at age 20, with melanoma caused by her tanning bed use, had been a "guest" of this hospital for 5 weeks, and within a couple hours, she would leave us and her pain and suffering behind.

I had left Jaime's bedside for a short break. I went to the lounge and curled up in a recliner, physically and mentally exhausted, with my world taking a deep dive into the darkness that only a mother who has lost their child can know. 

My husband came in and gently asked -- "Are you okay?" I snapped back out of my fog with the fury of an injured wild animal -- "My daughter is dying, and you ask me if I'm okay???" My husband, who needed consoling himself, was just lost in my anger and couldn't respond.

Then, as if it had been choreographed and rehearsed to perfection, those two women pulled up chairs on each side of me and took my hands in theirs. One told me the story of how her teenage son was in a horrible auto accident and died in her arms. She told me how painful this was going to be for me; she told me that I would want to die every minute of every day for a very long time. And she told me that it would be the most painful thing I would ever face but that I would survive. She was right about everything.

I returned to Jaime's room, knowing that what was about to happen would be the best thing for my little girl but would rip my heart right out of my body. A few minutes later, the nurse came in with a small stuffed lamb that she said the women next door wanted me to have. 

Such a loving gesture ... one that had even more meaning to me than they could ever know. Years before that, Jaime's nephew, my grandson, had died when he was a week old. I had put a little stuffed lamb in his casket with his tiny body. And here I was once again clutching a little lamb for comfort.

You might think all this is coincidence, or fate, or an accident, or maybe pure chance ... but I believe it was more than that. I think people are sometimes put into our lives for a specific reason. I don't know how this happens, but it just does. I am so grateful to those two strangers and have thought about them often over the years. We had a bond, a special moment in time, and I don't even know their names. But I call them "Earth Angels."

 

 Melanoma Mama (Jaime's mom, Donna)

http://www.facebook.com/donna.h.regen
http://www.facebook.com/jaime.regen.rea (Remember Jaime)
https://www.etsy.com/shop/sweetpea321 (Jjem Creations)
http://stores.ebay.com/Sweetpea321 (Jjem Creations) 

 http://www.facebook.com/BanTheBeds (Pull the Plug on Tanning Beds)

February Was Once "Fear"uary

February is always a difficult time of year for me. 

Not only is it dreary and cold but it was during February in 2007 that my 29-year-old daughter Jaime walked into the hospital not knowing that she would never walk out. 

I took her to the emergency room for pain management for her Stage IV melanoma, not an uncommon thing for us to be doing at that point in time since the cancer had spread everywhere. 

Usually we both fought for her to not be admitted (one time I even smuggled her out against doctor's orders) ... just get her pain to a manageable level and let us go back home ... but for some reason neither of us balked this time when they wanted to keep her overnight, that turned into just for the weekend, that turned into 5 weeks, that turned out to be the rest of her life. 

That time was a nightmare for Jaime, me, and our family, knowing where we were headed but not wanting to believe it. 

We were out of treatment options, which years ago were few; there was nothing left to try ... yet Jaime refused to quit fighting. When the doctor offered her hospice, she responded with, "Will they work to make me get better?" When he sadly shook his head no, her words were sharp and direct -- "Then hell no!"   

We were in a free-fall, unable to control anything, feeling so helpless and hopeless but at the same time needing to stay strong and positive for Jaime. It was the ultimate conflict, but we wore our happy masks (I still have mine and wear it frequently!) for our girl. 


We had successfully fought off this evil beast of a cancer for 9 years, but Jaime's little body had taken as much abuse as it could and there would be no more surgeries, no more pumping poison through her veins.  As much as we all wanted to rewrite her story, in February 2007 the end was quickly approaching.

Somehow, no matter how hard I try to ignore these memories, every year at this time they creep back into my mind and remind me how much I HATE melanoma and how unfair life can be. I am reminded of that relentless fear that gripped us all that February, along with the love that surrounded us as we faced the stuff that horror movies are made of. 

But one thing I never need to be reminded of is how much I love and miss our beautiful baby girl!

Melanoma Mama (Jaime's mom, Donna)

http://www.facebook.com/donna.h.regen
http://www.facebook.com/jaime.regen.rea (Remember Jaime)

http://www.facebook.com/BanTheBeds (Pull the Plug on Tanning Beds)
https://www.etsy.com/shop/sweetpea321 (Jjem Creations)
http://stores.ebay.com/Sweetpea321 (Jjem Creations)  

https://www.facebook.com/jjemcreations/ (Jjem Creations)

Life Interrupted, 10 Years Later

Life has its ups and downs. You buy a new car and then have a fender bender; you graduate from college and then it seems like forever to get a job; you find the love of your life and then you discover that he/she is not your soulmate after all.

But imagine that your life involved climbing up the slope of a steep cliff with someone you love more than life itself, some times dragging them and some times being dragged by them and some times carrying them on your back ... only to reach the top and step over the edge into a free fall, losing your grasp on your loved one along the way.

That is kind of the way it feels to lose a child to cancer. And I've been in a free fall for the past 10 years.

My daughter Jaime was 20 when we heard those terrifying 3 words "you have cancer." It was also the first time we had ever heard the word "melanoma." She had been diagnosed with melanoma, an often-fatal form of skin cancer, caused by her love of tanning beds since about age 14. But everyone said "she was too young for cancer" -- and "she didn't look like a cancer patient" -- and "it was just skin cancer, right?" WRONG!

It's been 10 years this week since Jaime took her last breathe, and I feel I should have something important to share. I feel like I should have encouragement for those mothers who are also grieving but not as far down the road as I am. I feel like I should have some answers to all the questions that all of us angel moms ask. But I don't.

I hate to tell you, but it does not get easier; it just gets different. The grieving continues, but you do get better at wearing your mask, the one you put on whenever you are not alone. The unimaginable pain is chronic, but you somehow get used to carrying it and it is not as raw or heavy.

You will never be the same person you were before. Your life has been divided into your life with your son or daughter and your life after having them ripped from your arms. My "post-angel wings" life now is nothing like it was when Jaime was alive. As I said, I'm in free fall.

Ten years has been an agonizingly long time to be without my child and best friend ... honestly, much longer than I ever hoped I would be separated from her ... and at the same time, it seems like it was just yesterday that she came through the front door yelling "Mom." Jaime was always the center of attention and I was her shadow. Now I am just a shadow looking for its missing object.

That doesn't mean that my life has no meaning or direction. I still have a husband and 2 sons that I love with all my heart, but my direction has only come from a little voice whispering in my ear, giving me passion and commitment to fight the tanning beds that took my baby girl.

One thing I have learned in the past 10 years is that life is not fair. Growing up, my mom always would tell me that because I was such a bleeding heart. But now that I'm here and Jaime is not, I do believe that my mom was right. It's really not fair -- not fair at all! And don't assume that because you have gone through the unthinkable, nothing else bad will happen. You think you have paid your dues, but life just keeps happening.

Then there is the tremendous guilt. She was my child and I should have

been able to protect her. I should have been able to fix her. I've always been a fixer, but not this time. Why not this time? Then there was the guilt that I was not the same wife I had been before Jaime's death, and not the same mother. I realized how badly my family wanted me to be the same ... but that Donna was no longer here. She had died with Jaime. The guilt has been suffocating!

For the first couple years I had a never-ending loop running in my head of all the events leading up to Jaime's death. All the second guessing; all the what ifs; all the searching for answers when I wasn't even sure what the questions were ... playing it over & over & over. I finally came to realize that no matter what I had done or hadn't done, the final result would be the same. And as weird as it sounds, I haven't worn a watch or carried a purse since the day Jaime died and I have no idea why that is. I've just learned to accept that not everything has an answer, at least not one I understand.

At the beginning of my grief, I heard all the comments from people who mean well but just don't know what to say -- "she's in a better place," "it was God's plan," "at least she is free of pain," "I understand your pain because my grandmother died," etc. FYI: The best thing you can say to a grieving mom is "I'm sorry," "I love you," " He/she (and use their name!) will never be forgotten," or a story about the son or daughter, or even just a hug.

It was 3 years before I could look at Jaime's photos. And then it was not because I wanted to but because I was forced to as part of the video presentation on tanning beds that I had agreed to do. It was so very painful to dig through all the pictures from a better time, a happy time, but I did so with a lot of tears. The nightmarish memories from Jaime's death were just beginning to let the happy memories of her life come forward.

Somewhere along the way, I learned to recognize the warning signs that I was sliding into that deep dark hole of extreme grief and despair (you angel moms all know the place I am talking about) and eventually gained the strength to not allow my mind to take me there. The climb out was extremely exhausting. If you haven't been there, it's not someplace you ever want to visit.

It took me several years to feel comfortable about going out socially. Small talk scared the crap out of me. The question I feared most was the pleasant, simple "How many children do you have?" And if I got through that one without breaking down, there was usually the innocent follow-up "And where do they live?" I was also aware that people who knew about Jaime's death felt uncomfortable around me, like I had a contagious disease, and they were afraid of doing or saying something to cause me pain. Let me assure you that I was already in more pain than you can imagine. You couldn't make it any worse -- unless you tried to ignore or avoid it.

About 5 years after Jaime's death, I began to smile again and really mean it. It would be almost 10 years before I would hear myself laugh -- not a tears-running-down-your-face, pee-running-down-your-leg laugh like Jaime could provoke, but it was a laugh. And it was such a strange sound coming from me after so long that it actually startled me!

Ten years out and I can finally tell Jaime's story without sobbing ... at least some of the time. I don't think it will get much better, but I will not stop talking about how her use of tanning beds took her life at 29 because the killing has got to stop. Melanoma is a cancer that, in many cases, can be prevented ... and it must be prevented. I have a mission. I did not choose it but I have it. Some of the time I don't even like it but I have it. And I will continue on that mission until that little voice in my ear leads me in a different direction.

Ten years out ... and I can't tell you everything is fine or back to normal (whatever that is) or that the road of grief is behind me. I still find it hard to imagine that she is really dead. But I can tell you that, even after 10 years, Jaime hasn't left my heart or my side. I may be in free fall, but she is right there with me. That I do know.

Melanoma Mama (Jaime's mom, Donna)

http://www.facebook.com/donna.h.regen
http://www.facebook.com/jaime.regen.rea (Remember Jaime)

http://www.facebook.com/BanTheBeds (Pull the Plug on Tanning Beds)
https://www.etsy.com/shop/sweetpea321 (Jjem Creations)
http://stores.ebay.com/Sweetpea321 (Jjem Creations)

Pain of Mother's Day

Mother's Day is not on my list of top 10 favorite holidays. Matter of fact, I detest it! Now don't get me wrong. I don't hate mothers ... 'cause I have one (although she is 94 and usually thinks I am her sister) and I am one, three times over. None of us escaped having a mother; many of us are mothers or hope to be someday. But the sad truth is that many have lost mothers, and many mothers have lost children, and many women are trying unsuccessfully to become mothers ... and Mother's Day is huge reminder to us of all that pain and emptiness.

I don't understand why there should be one designated day when everyone is told to honor and adore your mother. Why not give her special attention every day? Why not visit or call her, show your appreciation, tell her how much she means to you, shower her with love and affection without being prompted by retailers and florists? Mother's Day is the 4th biggest retail holiday in this country. I prefer to buy gifts for people, including my mom, when I see something that makes me think of them and not when I am told I must. Perhaps that is just the rebel in me.

If your mom is no longer living, I am sure it is difficult to celebrate this day. It is a huge reminder that she is no longer a living part of your life. Your visit to the cemetery isn't the same as giving her a hug or hearing her voice or seeing the delight in her eyes at the sight of you. Mother's Day reminds you of the unconditional love that is missing from your life. And if you are a mother missing your mother, the day must be painfully complex.

Many have moms who are living with dementia or Alzheimer's disease, like mine, who no longer recognize their children. It is bittersweet. She is still alive but no longer the same mom you have known all your life. Mother's Day is difficult when your mother doesn't remember your name or recall that you are her child.

If you are a woman unable to have children, Mother's Day must be hurtful. You want so badly to have the title Mother. You dream of little arms wrapped around your neck and hearing a little voice call you Mommy. What's to celebrate for you with your breaking heart? It's just a reminder of what you yearn for but are being denied.

If you have lost one of your babies (however old, they are always your babies), then I do understand the pain you will be feeling. You feel it every single minute of every day, but on Mother's Day the pain is sharper and your loss is more intense. I lost my daughter Jaime to melanoma when she was 29. I was her mother; I was supposed to protect her ... and I failed. It may sound silly that I think I should have been able to keep the cancer from destroying her little body and taking her life, but I was her mom and keeping her from harm was my job. I failed ... and Mother's Day is a reminder of that.

If you still have other living children, the day is a major predicament. You have trouble celebrating the day because your heart is torn. A valuable piece of making that day special is missing ... one of your children. But your other children have a mother and want to celebrate with her ... because, after all, all the commercials on TV remind them that that is what they are supposed to do. So for your surviving children, you put on your happy mask and somehow get through the day even though you are crying silently on the inside. 

So although the retailers look forward to Mother's Day, I will just be glad when it is over. And I know I am not alone in those feelings.  It makes me so sad that this day causes so much pain to so many ... but please know that I am thinking of each of you this Mother's Day.