becoming an orphan

My mother-in-law is quite literally on her death bed.

Strangely enough, I haven’t thought a lot about what it will be like without her. For the last 18 months, I’ve been honing in on what to do for her in the here and now, and simply trying to enjoy every meal, every laugh, every joke she tells, every glimpse of orneriness she exhibits, every praise to the Lord she expresses …

Until this morning, when I woke up with the stark realization that we were facing the end. My mind wandered to what the next Christmas, Thanksgiving, and April 3rd (her birthday) will be like.

For the first time, I understood that when I turn 39 next week, there will be no one to ask me, “Whatchya’ want for your birthday, cutie?” followed by a card with money in it because she couldn’t decide what to get me.

I will never again hear her sing “You are my son, Shaun, my only son, Shaun. You make me happy when skies are gray …” to my husband.

She will never watch Andrew pitch another ball …

I don’t know how much longer she will live, but in so many ways, we’ve already lost her. Just like I lost my Grandma many months before she died. She was there physically. But she was somewhere else. Someone else.

So today, my husband and I begin the process of becoming orphans. A journey where we will no longer have parents, but where we are the parents. Where the younger generation begins looking to us for the same wisdom and knowledge we have sought from our parents.

And while I know that it is “better to have loved and lost, than to never have loved at all,” I also know that that it hurts like a cactus prick in the bottom of my foot.

It stings.

And only time will heal it.

I love you, Jeanine Coats. And I miss you already.