When Life Rips You Open
Making sense of too much loss in too little time
Seven days after my last post, my mom died.
Five days before that, my son told me he was moving back to Denver.
At the end of this month, my stepdad will leave for Chicago.
And fourteen weeks ago, cancer took a quarter of my right lung.
Loss after loss after loss. Each one opened a fresh wound before the last had even begun to heal.
I have cried more in the last month than I have cried in the last five years, or maybe even 10. Well, I did cry a bunch when we lost the gluten-free business in 2020, but these tears feel so much heavier and never-ending. I am fairly certain I will be crying in a few seconds as I continue to write.
I’ll share the events as they unfolded for me.
From my journal the day after Dawson told me he was leaving…
My son is moving back to Denver, and I am both sad and happy. Sad that I will not see him every day, and happy that he will hopefully be on a path to happiness.
But I am so sad. And I think it is not just Dawson moving, it’s my mom’s situation as well. But I feel like he is leaving me, again. It feels like a rejection, and I know it is not, but it feels that way.
And my mom is in increasingly bad shape. Her heart had AFib again yesterday, and I am not sure if it is strong enough to keep her going for much longer. We should know more next Tuesday at her cardiologist appointment.
She never made it to that appointment.
I thought we had more time, and her sudden death put me in a bit of a tailspin emotionally. As I struggled to make sense of it all, I wrote in my journal the morning after she passed…
My mom is dead.
My mom is dead.
My mom passed away.
My mom died.
My mom left me.
My mom left me, again.And there it is. The forever wound that has been picking away at my soul for nearly 59 years.
She has left me, in different forms, several times since she birthed me and then gave me away. Now, she leaves me for the final time. Will my feelings of abandonment recede?
Why does her death have to mean or change anything? Maybe it just is what it is, death.
She suffered, she fought, she pushed me and others away. She died, not even realizing that some of the last things she said to me in person were mean and hurtful.
But finding her was one of the most influential things in my life. I was obsessed and had to know who my biological mom was. We met and then spent the next 32 years together.
The pain that morning was so raw for me, and there were moments I wasn’t sure I was going to be okay. I cried myself to sleep the night before and was crying as I wrote that morning.
My entire world has been upended, and now I am faced with questions about my future and pain I have never experienced before.
It’s been rough, but I am strong and resilient, and I will be fine, eventually.
I have painted and journaled (a bit) during these weeks, but I have not written anything substantial or art journaled. It seemed so hollow and pointless at the time. Now, I feel like I MUST write to keep myself on the path of healing and acceptance, or I may find myself stuck and spiraling in grief.
So here we go…
My Son
My son and my mom were very close. She knew moving back to Denver was something he was considering, but he hadn’t made the decision yet. He realized, after nearly a year here in Detroit, that he really did love Denver and missed it greatly. I wasn’t surprised when he told me he had decided to move back. But I was astonished at my intense emotional response. Typically, I don’t react to things the way I reacted to his news.
From my journal the day after he told me…
I think I can get past this. Dawson needs to follow his heart. This is not about failure or losing. We gave him a chance to do something different, and he did. Now he wants to do something different again.
I need to stop thinking that this is a finality, “he will never come back,” or “he doesn’t love me.”
This is not about me. This is not about me.
Nothing is about me, yet I make everything about me.
I don’t feel safe. What is being triggered here?
It’s about abandonment. It always is.
I thought twice about sharing the above, but my quest to be honest is stronger than my fear of being judged. It’s raw and vulnerable, but it’s the truth.
My son was planning to tell his grandmother he was moving back to Denver the weekend after he told me. He wanted to do it in person, and I agreed that it was best. Then, on Thursday, she was having a very difficult time breathing. My stepdad called 911, and she was taken to the hospital and quickly admitted. We all went to visit her that evening, and although we all wanted her to know about my son leaving, we didn’t want to tell her while she was in the hospital.
From my journal the next day…
My mom is in the hospital again. It’s her heart, and I am not sure they will be able to find a medication cocktail that will help her breathe when she moves. We will see.
The shit my son moving back is bringing up is crazy. I don’t understand any of it, and I am no closer to any conclusion. I don’t like this emotional ride and want to get off.
But I cannot, and I don’t know why.
I keep seeing memories on Facebook and feeling sad. It’s like I want to go back to some time in the last ten years and stay there. Was everything better? No, I don’t think so. So, why?
I don’t understand. What is being triggered inside me?
I am so sad, and I feel I am sadder than the situation warrants.
I didn’t go to see my mom on Friday as I have a very late Zoom call. The plan was for me and my son to see her the next day. But before our visit, she asked us to go to her house and work on a sales tax return that needed to be filed by Monday. Yes, she was 80 years old and still working.
We Facetimed with her as we worked on her computer, and I could tell she wasn't as coherent as usual. Because of that, she wasn’t much help in guiding us through the sales tax return, so I told her I would let her go, figure it out, and call her back in a few minutes.
When I called back, she didn’t answer. I called again, but there was still no answer. I began to worry, and my son reassured me that she was probably just talking to the doctor.
I learned shortly after, when my stepdad called from the hospital, that as I was calling her, she was dying. She worked up to the moment she died. It’s crazy, so very crazy.
And because she did, I was not there with her when she took her last breath.
My Mom
A short recap for those who may not have been following along, or haven’t read my book:
At five days old, my mom gave me up for adoption. I was raised by a couple that probably never should have raised children. They told me early in my life that I was adopted, and I remember having the thought that I needed to find my real parents when I was old enough. At the age of nine, and because I was such a curious child, I discovered my adoption papers. In them, I found my birth parents’ names and the name I was given before I was adopted. The knowledge was a turning point in my young life, and I knew in that moment that someday I would find my birth parents.
In 1993, when I was 27, I hired a private investigator who specialized in finding biological parents, and within a couple of days, he found my mom. On November 19, 1993, I picked up the phone, dialed a California number, and tried to steady my shaking nerves as I waited for the call to be answered. As soon as the person answered, “Hello,” I blurted out, “I was born Victoria Ann Leahy, and I think you are my birth mother.” And from that moment until Saturday, July 19, 2025, my mom, Carol, and I were inseparable.
But the relationship was complicated, and after nearly 32 years together, some baggage has accumulated.
From my journal the day after she left us…
“May her memory be a blessing to inspire you to do great things.”
My client just sent this to me, and it is so beautiful. My mom wanted the best for me, that I do know. She sucked at showing her feelings, talking about how she felt, and even acting in accordance with her feelings.
But I do know, she loved me.
But, in the end, for me, it was not enough. It could never replace or repair the abandonment, the betrayal, the pain. She could not love me in the way I needed to be able to let go and heal.
Maybe that was my fault, not hers, and I will never know.
Now, it’s my turn to make things anew. To grow and heal, to thrive and flourish, to give and nurture, to find and give joy.
I am unburdened by the history between us that always weighed down the present. I could never let it go, and maybe, much of our strained years were the fault of that stubbornness on my part. But, I could not let it go for a reason, and I need to know what that reason is. I cannot grow and move past this if I do not.
It was the “sacred wound,” the “mother wound,” as some on Substack call it. The wound that dictated the rest of my life. How can I move on from that?
Well, there must be a way.
I will find the way.
My family was in town, and their presence and support were incredibly important to me. We spent the next week planning her celebration of life and going through her things (she had a lot of stuff!). We had to take care of all her things so my stepdad wouldn't have to. He would have his own stuff to pack for his move to Chicago.
From my journal…
I am feeling better today. Less tears.
It was weird going through all of Mom’s things today. It felt so final, but it had to be done, and now was the time. Jim will need to move as soon as possible, and there is so much to do.
I planned the celebration of life, designed a couple of posters filled with photos, and created a brochure for the event. It was very difficult to go through photos, select the ones I wanted to use, and be creative with the design, but I did it, and not without so many tears. My son, stepdad, and I decided we would split my mom’s ashes into three so she could be spread in three of the places she lived: Chicago, Denver, and Michigan. We had three boxes, and my stepdad and I both chose to paint ours, which I thought she would love.
The day of her celebration of life had arrived, and I wrote in my journal…
Today is Mom’s celebration of life. Then, tomorrow, life will resume, forever changed, but moving forward, back to normality, until Friday, when my son leaves for Denver.
I am sad, mad, confused, hurt, scared, joyful, and hopeful at the same time. It’s a very confusing time.
I am relieved that Mom is free from pain and suffering. I am relieved that I am as well.
I am glad Jim has another chance to build a relationship with his kids.
I am sad that my son is going back to Denver because I will miss him greatly, but so very happy he is on his way to his happiness.
I am happy to refocus on Rich and me, and now Bodi, and forge forward in life, no matter where it takes us.
Goodbyes are Hard
Less than a week after I said my final goodbyes to my mom, my son left for Denver.
From my journal that day…
He left.
I have tears.But I am happy for him. He is going back to the place he loves, to people he cares about, and people who care about him. He is heading west a different person than the one who headed east just a year ago. For that, I am happy and grateful.
Being a parent is so bittersweet. You raise your kids to be independent, to be prepared to leave home one day. But then, when they do, you feel such loss. I guess it would be different if we were in the same city, or even state, but we are not.
We will visit often. And he will come here, too.
I will be okay in a few days. It’s just sad. So much loss. So much pain.
My mom dying and my son moving back were a one-two punch that hit me like a freight train. I have been trying to make sense of it these last few weeks.
From my journal the day after my son left…
I am less teary this morning. I walked into Dawson’s former room, now Rich’s office, and our “studio,” and I did not shed a tear. That’s progress.
I was weepy all day yesterday, and so very sad. Everything I looked at, recipes, his room, Bodi, made me sad. I felt as if my life as I knew it had come to some sort of end.
I don’t have my boy near me.
I don’t have my mom.
I don’t have anyone to cook for anymore.
I don’t have family.
Oh, here come the tears.
Over two weeks of tears. That is unheard of in my world. But I guess this is my new world. One where my mom does not exist in the flesh, where Dawson lives in Denver, Jim and Tucker live in Chicago, and Rich, Bodi, and I live in Michigan.
It’s been two weeks now since Dawson left, and I don’t cry as much, but I still do cry. Geez, I have been crying since I started writing this.
Loss is tough, and heavy, and full of pain.
But it’s also joyful as you remember the happy things
And then, it's painful as you remember that things are now different
And then back to happy as you try to be resilient and move forward
But, lingering in the background, always, is the shadow of loss, the stabs of pain
Grief Has Its Own Agenda
I do know that I can’t control grief and how it chooses to manifest in my life. Given that I am somewhat of a control freak, it’s monumental that I am not trying to control my grief. Well, I may be trying to control it a wee bit, but I know in the end I will fail.
I cry when I need to cry, but I still want to make sense of it all. In an attempt to understand and heal, I put together a list (I do love a good list) of what I will miss and what moving forward looks like.
Things I will miss about my mom…
She was always the first to react and comment on my various posts, paintings, and writings. She was my biggest fan.
Calling or going to see her when I wanted her advice. She was a very opinionated woman and did not hesitate to give you her opinion whether you wanted it or not.
Cooking her favorite dishes for her, such as egg foo young, anything with beef, potato salad, strawberry cake, and so much more.
Knowing that she is there for me when I need her
Her interesting takes on life, sports, and politics
The amazing support system she provided for my son
Things I will miss about not living near my son…
Talking to him in person, sharing stories, happenings, opinions, and more
Our coffee chats at the Yemeni coffee shop
Hugs
Cooking his favorite dishes such as Korean lettuce wraps, potato salad, dill pickle pork chops, more potato salad, shrimp caesar salad, and so much more.
Grabbing a seat at a bar and having a fancy drink together
Exploring new places and things together
Seeing his smiling face regularly
Things I Am Wary About…
The holidays. They will never be the same, and I will need to create a new normal.
Not having an immediate family around me. It’s just Rich, Bodi, and me for the foreseeable future. Well, Rich’s mom is in town, so that’s good.
Things I Will Focus On…
Staying healthy and in good physical shape
Growing and improving Wolf Design and Marketing
Creating book design videos
Painting and writing, and someday offering classes for one or both
Getting back to cooking videos
Traveling and exploring
My two upcoming art shows (Ferndale and Louisville, KY)
My grief journey is just beginning, and I have no idea where it will take me, and I like it that way. I know I must be open to the journey and the healing, and I am doing my best to do so. Some days are difficult, though.
From my journal…
I am not nearly as frustrated today. Well, I thought so until Bodi started biting on my pothos plant and whining at me to go out when I was in the middle of something. I am just so on edge.
I drove to FedEx and cried about my mom. I am so mad at her. There are things I wanted to say before she passed, and I could not because she could not handle reality. Would I have really said those things? Maybe not, but I would have liked to have had the opportunity.
I am very angry, extremely sad, and not capable of handling even the smallest amount of stress. And, I have no hope for my future.
And on another day I wrote…
What’s the point of doing art or writing?
I just want to be done with hoping, dreaming, wanting.
There is no second, or third, or fourth act for me. I just don’t have it in me anymore. I am tired and cannot even begin to contemplate creating something new that could actually be successful.
How did I get myself to this place? I am so stuck and in some way happy to be stuck.
I have no dreams left.
The good news is that today, I don’t feel any of what I wrote those days, but then again, the day is still early. But, as down as I have been, I am still working, still designing, and still moving forward. When I am in the despair that I was when I wrote that journal entry, I feel like there is no future for me. But when the fog clears, I know that is not true. The push and pull of grief is strong and unmooring at times, but I know that I will survive and most likely thrive as I continue on the journey.
To end on a lighter note, something Rich, my son, and I say all the time to each other: Saul Goodman! Translation for those who have not watched Breaking Bad:
It’s all good, man!
Thanks for reading and being there for me. I really appreciate you.
What a wild range of emotions. My heart is with you.