• What a freaky freaky Monday
• Things Change
• Dreading Mother's Day

There is something off-kilter in the cosmos today or something...it has been a freaky Monday.  It isn't just me - I heard someone mention how strange today has been.  I had a dreamless sleep and didn't feel like I had slept at all.  I cut someone off while driving today and then someone almost backed into me from their laneway as I was driving past (she wasn't even looking in my direction as she backed into traffic!). I've had a couple of strange phone messages and Turbo (our dog) and Bugsy (our cat) are eerily quiet today.  Even the air outside feels and smells odd.  I can't explain it.  It's like that feeling you get when you're watching a movie and you know the guy with the axe is behind the door and you know the high school jock is about to "get it" but you're not sure when and you have no way of stopping it. 

You will never imagine the change that occurs to your family or your outlook on life when you lose someone precious to you.  My mother passed away almost one year ago and my personal life has been turned upside down.  Everything is different.  If it weren't for my husband I think I would have completely lost it.  His mother passed away in much the same way as mine but two years earlier.  They were very close and I have never met a more understanding man in my life.

All of my relationships are different.  My father was always very emotionally distant and judgmental when I was growing up but he has become someone I can talk to (although not as close as Mom and I were) and I have more of a relationship with him at 42 than I ever had before.  I have one sibling, my younger sister.  I feel like what we have been through in the past year has had an adverse affect on the two of us.  I feel a distant there that I never felt before.  We had very different relationships with Mom and it has affected us very differently, I think. 

Since the loss of my mother I feel like I don't belong to my family anymore - and I can't explain why that is.  She was one of my best friends and now she is gone.  She was the one I spoke to for at least an hour every day.  We went out for lunch together, got our nails done, and she was incredibly patient with all my step-drama conversations.  I saw her flaws and her quirks and how her illness affected her personality and physiology - and I learned to accept who she was.  I will honestly say that I hated her when I was a teenager.  She was overemotional, controlling, and extremely critical - the last thing a 17 year old girl wants in her life.  I am so blessed that we got past that and were able to have a close relationship when I had my own family.

Still, I mourn the changes in my family.  Holidays are brutal to get through.  It is tough to adjust your family expectations, roles and dynamics after four decades.  You just can't imagine how emotionally exhausting it can be at times - especially during birthdays, holidays, and anniversaries.  Sometimes it's nice to have a "fresh start" but other times I just want to run away. 

I'd "guestimate" that at least 80% of stepmoms dread Mother's Day.  I am one of them.  I don't expect anything but do get the occasional gift or stray greeting card scrawled with "thanks for all you have done" (I don't know if my OSS means this in a good way or a bad way).  Last year's MD was a blur - it was one week after my mother passed away.  Now that both my mother and my mother in law have passed on and, after 8 years as a stepmom, I have decided not to recognize the day.  I am giving my sister a token for being a great mom to my two nephews but that is it.  I am telling my DH that I sincerely prefer the day to go by with no notice.  In the past, my SD has always done something but our relationship is almost non-existent now even though we live under the same roof (long story).

It holds no joy or sentiment for me now, so I think it's time to move on and let it go...