The Unspoken Words from a Motherless Daughter
“It gets better with time” Well guess what? I call bullshit.
This is the beginning of my thoughts on my grief and the story about losing my mother at 11. The most I have ever shared. The rawest I have ever been. Tears have surfaced as I have been writing and thoughts I never thought I would share are been shared. Its messy buts it authentically me and the start of my story.
It has almost been 7 years since my mother passed away and trust me when say I have spent my fair share of those years trying to figure out just when it ‘gets better.’ What I have learnt in those times is it doesn’t and I wish it were true but it just doesn’t work like that. Our society has placed this idea on the fact that when something bad happens to someone we must try make them think it is going to be okay, but why? Why do we not just acknowledge the fact that what has happened is sh*t and nothing is going to change that? Why can’t we just physically be there for people? offer tangible things like going for walks or coffee? Why does our world put grieving people in the too hard basket and say when they need me I’ll be there? Guess what they need you now, they just don’t know how to handle what’s happening in their new reality and reaching out becomes hard. Show them you care with actions not just telling them it’s going to be okay.
Maybe it’s just that for others it does get better. They might grieve with for a few weeks but then get to move on with their life. They get to move on because it wasn’t their mother that just died. You try move on and maybe you begin to and then it rushes back like it was yesterday. The pain is indiscernible. There is no recovering from a mother’s death so young and this whole idea of it ‘gets better with time’ just leaves me 7 years on feeling like my grief is no longer valid. I’ve been made to feel that because I still feel this undesirable pain from my mother’s death that something is wrong with me. I have been made to feel like because it’s been 7 years I should have my life back together again but I don’t and why is that not okay? When grieving for somebody we love there is no expiry date. The pain is always there but also anything can trigger you even more. That’s what people don’t understand. That something and often at times completely unrelated will send you back to those feelings of being lost and the dreaded unknown the grief brings.
My feelings of guilt are becoming more real as the day’s pass. Guilt for many reasons like I should have told her I loved her more, appreciated her more or spent more time with her. But also for reasons I have never dared shared. I feel guilty because the memories of my mother are fading. I have always said I will cherish our memories and while this is true as time goes on what I remember about her becomes thinner. I remember a few years ago stumbling upon a video where you could hear her voice. Listening to was one of the hardest things and put me into huge shock because it made me realise I had forgotten what her voice sounded like. The video has been lost and I have no way of remembering her voice anymore. That hurts like one wouldn’t believe.
At 11 years, old I never could have imagined living life without her. I mean at 11 you aren’t really thinking that your mother is going to die because that’s something that happens when we are old right? My mum was sick, like really sick but I refused to see it. I feel I was sheltered from the situation and that only made it worse. What I remember about this time is hazed and I think I have some preconceived ideas about what happened. Sometimes I remember more than others. As the years are going I have begun to connect the dots and remember different things about this horrid time. I do remember her spending days in bed or on the couch and the pain in her eyes, I couldn’t see at the time but now it seems so clear, so real. I remember the visits to the hospital and watching her get worse yet I had no idea what was coming. I was asked if I wanted to take time off school to spend more time her. I declined, school was my safe place away from this mess. On our way home from the hospital I remember dad saying to us “Mum might die soon, we must be prepared” I lost it, this was the first time somebody told me the reality and I refused to believe it. My response was a frim NO. She had just told me she would be home for my birthday, I believed her. That night I went to bed thinking what if. I remember thinking I wouldn’t cope without having a mother. I thought it was not possible for this to happen A week later my worst fear became my reality and now I am living it everyday.
My grief is still valid and so is others. Time does not heal all wounds.

Thank you for reading the starts of my story, this has been for me but I hope you enjoyed. I plan to write more about my grief and the places it’s taken me. Both the lows and highs. I am not a writer there are probably mistakes everywhere but this has been healing for me to write so I thank you again for listening.
- Paige x
