The day God called my angel home

My brain does a wonderful job at taking care of me.

She takes my trauma,

Wraps it up in bubble wrap,

Tucks it away in the darkest corner and covers it in cobwebs until I am ready to clean that corner, unpack it, and put it away on the shelf of resolved issues.

But not his one.

She illuminates it.

Especially on this day.

I cannot believe it’s been twelve years.

“Buzz…..

Buzz, Buzz….

Buzzzzzzzzzz”

My phone vibrates in my pocket as I turn toward the backseat to tend to a fussy three-year-old crying about his foot being asleep and his stomach barking at him.

“Nope, I don’t have time for an unsaved number”

I tell myself as I decline the phone call and opt for the flashlight on my phone instead as I search the floorboard for the lost binky that is keeping a crying baby from going back to sleep.

Road trips with tiny humans are hard work.

“Buzz……

Buzz, Buzz…….

Buzzzzzzzz”

“Again?”

“You’ll leave a voicemail if you want something“

I telepathically spoke to whoever had the balls to call me at 10:30 at night from a number I didn’t know.

Ding!

You have a new voicemail.

The notification ran across the top of my screen.

“Thank God, now they can quit calling”

Although I felt relief, I also felt an unexplainable pain in my chest for a split second.

A few minutes later we pulled into a random gas station for one of the frequent potty breaks that come with traveling with a three-year-old.

As I stood next to the car I pulled my phone out and dialed my voicemail.

I don’t think anything in the world could have prepared me for what would happen next.

“Hi, Stormy.

This is mom…..

I……I mean…

Betty.”

What the actual fuck?!?!?

Wait.. What!

How?

Why?

It has been YEARS since I spoke to her.

How did she even get my phone number?

Anger surged through me at just the thought of her.

Just the mention of the word “mom” made me sick to my stomach.

But something in me told me to calm myself.

I slowed my breath to listen to the rest of the voicemail.

“Something has happened. I need you to call me back“

Her voice shaking through obvious sobs.

There were a few moments of silence.

“I love you“

My heart dropped from my chest to the deepest pit of my stomach and I felt like I may vomit right there in the parking lot.

I contemplated if I should even call her back.

Could I get away with avoiding whatever news she had for me?

Could I ignore it?

God. I wish I could have.

I’m sure, at some point, I had to have called her back, although that part of the night my brain does not allow me to remember.

What I do remember is feeling gut-wrenching pain as I envisioned throwing myself in front of one of the many semi-trucks passing us by.

Time stood still as a lie on the cement sidewalk of a random gas station somewhere between the Oklahoma line and Texas.

My brain was unable to grasp the information I had been given.

An overdose?

Elaina?

My sister?

This can’t be real.

This can’t be happening.

This has to be a mistake.

I bargained with God.

Bargained with myself.

Slipping in and out of reality.

Desperately trying to understand yet forget.

As I laid in a puddle of sadness, unable to stop the tears from coming I was hit with the shame, the guilt, the anger, and the disappointment in myself for the last conversation that you and I had just a month before.

For not being able to swallow my pride and make the phone call I had been avoiding.

Apologizing was not my strong suit.

“You are nothing but a fucking junkie!!

How can you do this to your kids?”

I screamed at you.

“How can you look at those sweet faces and turn around and put a fucking needle in your arm?

Do you even care about them?“

I looked you dead in the eye.

“Get your shit together. Get out of my house.

You make me sick”

I pointed at the door as I wiped my tears from my face.

Those are the last words I said to you before I kicked you out of my house knowing you had nowhere in the world to go to but back to the environment that kept you sick.

It’s been twelve years and those words still haunt me just as much as the vision of you laying half-naked, passed out in my bathroom floor the night before does.

You were sick.

Fighting the demon that had ahold of you.

Begging for help.

And all I could see was my sister willingly throw her whole life away.

Willingly give up on her children.

Willingly killing herself slowly.

I was watching you transform from my superhero.

My mother.

The best mother I had ever seen.

My rock.

My protector.

The first person in our family to make something of themselves.

MY FUCKING HERO.

To a woman who had nothing and loved nothing but the needle between your toes as you lie passed out on my bathroom floor.

When I found you that night, I wasn’t finding you.

I found our mother in that bathroom.

To me, you were the same.

I wasn’t yet strong enough to deal with the pain.

I wasn’t ready to unpack the memories of our childhood that were stacked up in the dark corner of my brain waiting to be unboxed.

I wasn’t ready to face them with the love and compassion that I knew I would have to find to get through it.

I wasn’t ready to forgive her.

So instead- I spoke to you in the same way I had always wanted to speak to her.

I said everything to you that I had kept bottled inside for 22 years that was meant for someone else.

Even in your darkest moments, you were my safe space.

You allowed me to spew my anger for someone else and lovingly held your tongue when it would have been just as easy for you to turn my words and throw them back at me as I deserved.

I’m so sorry for the words I said to you that night.

I’m so sorry for the pain that must have caused you.

I’m so sorry for not being able to be there for you when you needed me to be.

I have replayed that conversation so many times in my head praying that I could take the pain my words caused back. Wishing that I would have made that call that God was telling me to make.

Hating myself for being so selfish.

Begging that you heard my apology.

My last words to you should have been that I love you.

You were my hero.

You were my person.

You were the only true example of love that I had ever known.

I should have told you that was so proud of who you were.

That you were strong and resilient.

That your pain was valid and that I understood.

That you had done a beautiful job of carrying an unimaginably heavy load and that we all get a little lost from time to time.

I should have told you that you saved my life.

Over and over again.

I should have told you that I was grateful.

That no matter what, I look to you with pride.

Sometimes I find random coins and I see your face in my head.

I hear your laugh in a stranger’s laugh.

I see your strong will in your granddaughters’ presence.

This morning, a beautiful cardinal visited me in my new home.

He perched himself upon the tree branch of the beautiful Redwood that is in full bloom.

He sat there and sang to me.

I find comfort in knowing that these are all messages from you.

Messages letting me know that you are still watching over us.

That even in spirit, you are our protector as you always were in life.

I find comfort in knowing that you have heard my cries and you know my heart.

I have slowly, over time, been able to forgive myself.

Little by little.

I have slowly been able to dust the cobwebs off of the boxes and unpack.

I know that none of this would have been possible if it weren’t for your loving spirit pushing me to do so.

Elaina would not have wanted her struggle to be without purpose. She would have wanted anyone who was impacted by it to use it for good, this is why I chose to tell you this story today.

For those of you that God has lead to read my words today, I pray that my words help guide you to find the strength to look at whatever situation you are facing in your life with compassion.

I pray that you can look with a lens of grace and forgiveness.

We don’t always get a second chance to make that call.

To have that conversation.

To say I love you.

To say, I see you and I’m glad you’re here.

We don’t always have a second chance to ask the hard questions and love through the answers.

I pray that you take the opportunity to do so today.