Kailey’s Story

I was 21 years old when I lost my mom. A loss I had never experienced, wanted, or was ready for. My mother had breast cancer that metastasized to her liver. I knew it was bad from the moment I heard the word cancer. I refused to believe that my mom, the strongest women on earth could be given this death sentence.

“They’re wrong. The doctors are wrong. Not my mom, she’s too tough to have cancer.”

That’s the funny thing about cancer. It doesn’t care how tough you are. It doesn’t care about your family. It doesn’t care if you still have your whole life ahead of you. When it strikes, it does so with vengeance. I never let her see how scared I was. I cried in front of her twice from the moment we found out that dirty word had hit our home. I was there day in and day out. My mom didn’t need to worry about me for the first time in my life.

The roles had been reversed. Sitting next to her felt like I was being suffocated. Suffocated by emotions, suffocated by fear, and suffocated by the unknown. I went days without eating, sleep, and sanity. I questioned why. Why my mom, why me, why my dad, and why my brother?

“God, do you not know how much we need her? Do you not know she’s the glue to our family? Please God, please don’t take her.”

The day came where the word “days” started being thrown around. The shock, numbness, and terror that comes with the word days is overbearing. I didn’t think I would ever be able to pick myself up off the kitchen floor. You can’t tell me there isn’t a God. I will never believe you. As I laid there something came completely over me that said. “Get up child, now is not the time to lay down. You are stronger than this. Not only because she is your mother but because you are my daughter as well.”

I picked myself up off the floor and continued putting up the Christmas décor. There was no way I was going to let what might be my mom’s last Christmas, look like something out of the Grinch’s lair.

She came home to a house that looked like the Christmas section at Hobby Lobby had exploded, just the way she liked it. Tears filled her eyes as she walked into the house that evening. I don’t know if those tears were of joy, sadness, or pride. She didn’t know she had days. That was something only dad, my, brother, two family friends, and I knew. A hard pill to swallow to say the least. One that stayed in my throat and refused to go down. Even days later it was still trying to come up. 

I went back and forth to Birmingham everyday she was in the hospital. I came home every night to take care of my 17-year-old brother, my dog, and her pride and joy of a Shih Tzu, Charlie. Those nights were hard. I slept with my phone right beside my head just waiting for a call I didn’t want to come.

That call came December 6th, 2022. I had gotten home that night around 3am. At 5am my dad called and said, “You need to come now. Don’t pack your bags, just get here.”

I called my cousin Chloe and we made it there in just a few hours. I looked at my dad, broken, defeated, and exhausted. I looked into his eyes and said,“Daddy, please tell me we’re not giving up”. He looked right back into mine and said, “No, baby. You know I would never stop fighting for her. I love her more than you could possibly understand. She’s suffering… her body has had all it can take.” I knew he wasn’t giving up. I guess my brain just needed that clarity. I also knew how much he loved her. I knew he was right as bad as I didn’t want him to be. I climbed into that hospital bed with my sweet little momma. I brushed her hair out of her face. I held her hand and told her things I should have told her a lot more often. 

 “I love you momma.”

“You gave me the best 21 years of my life.”

“I’m so proud to call myself your daughter.”

“You did so good raising me and Carson.”

“I am never going to stop trying to make you proud.”

“I’ve got Carson and daddy, I promise I’ll take care of them.”

“I’m right here.”

“You can go momma…”

She took her last breath in my arms. I cried until I couldn’t breathe. I laid there soaking up the warmth of her body slowly leaving. I don’t remember much from the rest of that day. I know I went home and started going through pictures for the funeral. I wondered why I was having to go through our whole life on her bedroom floor. I wondered if she would’ve been okay with the outfit I chose for her to wear. I questioned a lot. I still do. 

I have learned that because of my mother I am the woman I am. I carry her strength, grit, determination, love, and so much more. I am better because of her. I lost a piece of myself the day I lost her but I gained so much more. I gained an understanding of love, marriage, being a mother, and strength.

Some days are harder than others. Some days the grief consumes you and pushes you so far into a hole it feels like you’ll never come out. You will. You will miss her. You will long to hug her, hear her, see her. That never goes away. I live my life with her by my side. I hear her guidance in the back of my mind daily. How blessed I am to have a mother that made saying goodbye so hard. How blessed I am that she gave me the most precious young man to help finish raising. How blessed I am that she gave me the strongest daddy in the whole word. How blessed I am to have been loved by her.

How blessed I am…