Another First...Not the Worst. Mostly.

 I got the first reminder two weeks ago.

Then another one this week, "Hurry before it's too late!"

Brent got one this morning when he woke up and I got the last one shortly after that. 

Everyone clamoring to remind us that today is Ann's birthday. 

The first two were pretty frustrating because I went through it when my mom died. The flower company I use to send flowers sent the reminders. Now, when Mom died I sent them a note saying hey, how can we fix this? And they were very sorry, and would look into it and...

When Ann died I went in and removed the relationship from my file pretty quickly. So 6 or 7 months ago. Thinking that if I did that they would have, surely, fixed their algorithm in the year since I messaged them about Mom right? I mean, I cannot be the only one to send them a message saying DON'T DO THIS! But nope...and the Hurry before it's too late message was just a peach. 

Well...

Actually...

The calendar reminder was just me forgetting to turn off the notification. I had it set so I would remember to remind Brent and Christopher to call her. Because that was my job on her birthday. Send a gift a few weeks earlier, then remind the boys to call her so they could take credit for remembering. It was a well oiled machine.

We have a break now for a stretch. Until the worst part in May. But we've made it through the anniversary of Brent's father's death, all of the holiday cluster and now her birthday. So that's good. It's good to make it past the first milestone markers. The first year just sucks. And this year blending with the first year of my Mom and the year of Covid (which, of course considering that's what she died from) and just the mess that time is right now...it just sucks.

It's a slog. 

The memorial that Biden did as part of his inauguration was lovely. And moving. And it helped. To have someone in authority say, yeah, this happened. This was not okay. We know this hurts. That helped. There has been too much denial. Too many people who want to act like the hundreds of thousands of Americans alone who have died are no big deal. Well...

Hurry before it's too late!

It is a big deal. To each and every member of their family it's a big deal. And we all hope you never have to face it up close. But we wish like fuck you would at least understand how awful it is and how incredibly insulting, and hurtful it is when you deny it is real. That it's happening. That we could all be doing things to help stop the spread but...you know...government control or what the fuck ever...

Brent and I are still working through her loss. It's always hard to lose someone, it's harder when the relationship was complicated. And I think a lot of adult children/parent relationships are complicated. Or at least mine with my mother was, and his with his was. For me I still go between grief and guilt and little anger is still there as well. But mostly grief. And I think the guilt and anger are probably part of the grieving process so I guess all grief. 

But we are past (or in the middle of today) the bulk of the firsts. Her birthday isn't the worst. I think Christmas was. That was the day that we both forgot at different points in the day and thought to ourselves, "Oh we need to call...oh wait..." Remembering is hard, forgetting is the worst. 

One more first down. Two more to go.