by Missy Dickerson

Created on: July 25, 2009

I've lost a few people in my life that have been close to me. I lost my mother to cancer of the lungs and I lost one of my best friends to cancer of the brain stem. I miss them everyday. When they died, I wasn't sure how I was going to live. I felt a part of me died with them and I still feel that way. I will go through each of the deaths that I encountered and tell you how I survived and learned to live after they were gone.

On October 29th, I lost my mother to cancer. When I got the news at 2:30am, I rushed through the early morning hours traveling the 45 minutes it took to get to her house. When I arrived, my grieving process kicked in immediately. I was in denial about her death. I covered her cold body up with her blankets so she could stay warm. I stepped out of her bedroom and elbowed the wall and fell on my butt and wept. She died before Halloween and we made sure all of her multitudes of Halloween decorations still were displayed for the little children. It was painful, but we needed to do what she would have done. She loved children.

At first, all I wanted to do was sleep and I did. I did realize that through my depression, my family was still living and I was no longer apart of that life. I couldn't do that to my family; they needed me. When I pulled myself out of bed, I realized the world was still turning and I wasn't the only one grieving. I think the one thing that helped me to grieve was allowing me to cry, say her name and talk about her as much as I could. I visit her grave to this day and it's been 8 years now. I carried on because I forced myself to live. Although the pain is still looming around my heart, it stings a little less now. When I felt my worst, I kept hearing my mothers say to me "what doesn't kill us makes us stronger". I held on to that saying like it was a life preserver; it saved me. I also think what helped me was relying on the support that people were offering to me. I took that shoulder any chance I could get and that help me too. I miss my mother the whole world, but I rose above my grief and lived because of my friends, my family and my sheer determination to live for them all.

When my friend Rene died, I was broken. I never had a friend die before. I watched her take her last breath in the sterile environment of the hospital. While she took her last breath, her whole family and her closest friends stood around her bedside and held each other and cried when she left this earthly plain. I miss her humor, her spirituality, her ability to see the best in people even when it wasn't warranted. She was good friend and great mother. She was a fighter for justice. She always had a soft spot for the underdogs. I handled this grief differently than with my mother to a certain extent. With Rene, I used all of our good times together to shield me from the pain of losing her. Every time I felt sad or lost without her, I would remember all of our funny moments that we shared. I used humor, and my family and friends support to help me. I allowed myself to cry, talk about her, and to miss her. She's been gone for two years now and although I'm still grieving, I'm living because of the gift of humor she gave to me.

I may grieve for my mother and my friend for the rest of my life, but I will live because I was open, I accepted support, I laughed and cried openly and honestly. When I was mad about their deaths, everyone knew it. I didn't hide from my pain in my bed this time, I lived because I used laughter and honesty about my pain to let me live for my friends and my family.

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