Why I bake: I started baking while my mama was battling stage-4 cancer. I’d moved home from the city to take care of her & was looking for some kind of distraction from our painful day-to-day. I’d never really set foot in the kitchen before this… I’d been working for big-name fashion magazines back in the city and had little (well. absolutely no) interest in cooking for myself. And so, I was more than surprised when I fell in love with baking. I soon became obsessed– I was baking every second when I wasn’t with my mama. I made huge messes, tried my hand at 3-tiered cakes for baby showers, brought pastries & sweets to every chemo session to handout to our favorite nurses & the other patients… Hell, I almost baked us out of house & home. Sometimes I regret not spending more of that time with my mama instead of fooling around in the kitchen. But to be honest, I forgive myself for it… because I think I needed to be lost in baking.
Category: Blog Post
Nobody’s Home.
My neighbors whispering amongst each other…
“First. She tried poisoning us with the Glade PlugIns. But, luckily she is a kind beast and removed them all. However, guy-across-the-hall could not convince her to attempt washing her cat. He even offered to give her lessons in cat bathing…
But now, if she’s not sobbing, she’s moving her damn furniture around. (Seriously, though, it’s not a big apartment, how much room could there possibly be for heaving manmade objects, AKA: couches, dressers and a bed? LOTS, is the answer we’ve gathered from hearing her accidentally knocking stuff off the wall and breaking it as she curses madly at the furniture gods.)
The worst, though. Is that she finally figured out how to use her Amazon echo, Alexa. And it has been a hell filled with the voices of Kelly Clarkson, Blink 182 and v. loudly blasted Avril Lavigne Pandora stations. (I know, right?! Who knew there are people who still use Pandora?) Odd. She is v. odd.”
The good news– nobody talks to me!
P.S. The BEST news, however, is that a part of my front door fell off… (baking accident.) I think it’s called, like, the door strip? IDK, but now that its gone, the gap under my door is even bigger: SO ALL THE MORE AVRIL I can share, and I’ve got the Avril to share. You’re welcome, neighbs.
P.P.S. If anyone complains about Avril, I’m not afraid to bring back the PlugIns in full ‘Mystic Tropical Island Staycation’ scented force. Try mehhh.
Ever Wish YOUR Clock Was A Picture of MY Feet?
Don’t answer that.
P.S. If a clock doesn’t do it for ya (you’re crazy) but then also checkout my blossoming store for something else you can get your kicks from owning.
Why I’m Single. Well, One of Many Reasons
“I went from relationship to relationship and needed a break. Every woman should have a period of time where she is unencumbered and free to focus on herself. I never had that. There was always someone in my life from 16 on.” –My Mama in a journal she wrote to me
Me too, until just recently. During the last 8-months of my mom’s life, while our family was fighting cancer around-the-clock and facing never-ending drama, I dated three different men. THREE DIFFERENT MEN. My mom was dying and suffering through terminal cancer, and yet, I found the time to be in three different relationships. I also went through my Instagram pictures… I started my Instagram account during my junior year of college… which was, erm, lemme get the calculator or text somebody, H/O. I got the account less than four years ago and there were pictures of four different boyfriends scattered throughout my feed. If I’d married every serious boyfriend I’ve had in the past four years, I would be hella mormon, but with drinking coffee still (lots of coffee), so I would just be a **polygamist.
So, when my last relationship crumbled like a badly burnt cookie into thousands of crunchy, little pieces, I put my foot down. I deleted all my past boyfriends from my Instagram and from my life. I have no desire to date anyone again, for a while, maybe forever.
A few days ago, my only bed companion, Tyga (my dog… not the rapper. Calm down, Kyle Jenner!), and I headed out for an evening at the “small dog” park. En route, a man jumped out friggin’ of nowhere to talk to me. (And yes, I was wearing headphones. Dude interrupted my Slow Jamz mix.) He said I was pretty and really stood out (on the not very crowded street, for real, I think I was the only person passing by at the time.) He asked where I was from, and trying to be kind and polite, I answered him. He unfortunately took this as an open invitation to walk with Tyga and I. When we neared the park, he said he had to go meet a friend and would take my number. I was like, um, no you won’t… but I said it nicely.
Then, shit went down. Here’s our convo:
Stranger Danger: Listen, I’m running to meet a friend but what I’m going to do is take your number!
Me: Oh, okay, have fun. And, sorry but I can’t.
Stranger D.: Why can’t you?
Me: I just can’t. I’m sorry! K, bye now!
I began making my great escape by crossing the street. BUT, he followed me.
Strange D.: What do you mean you can’t?
Me: I’m sorry, bye!
He continues following and refusing my answer. At this point, I’m v. annoyed and stressed.
Strange D.: Will you just tell me why? Why can’t you?? Tell me. Just give me a reason!
It was very clear I wasn’t interested in this man’s questions. I was being hassled. He was being a dick. However, after all the shit I’ve trudged through over the past year, I am no fucking damsel in distress. I’m the last women in the world who needs rescued. Ever. Kapeesh?
As we arrived at the park entrance, I turned on my heel and yelled at him:
“MY MOM JUST DIED THREE MONTHS AGO. AND I’M REALLY NOT IN A GOOD PLACE RIGHT NOW. SHE HAD PANCREATIC CANCER AND FOUGHT FOR 8-MONTHS, AND THEN, SHE DIIIIIIIED.”
He said sorry so many times and backed away so quickly onlookers probably thought I had a gun on me. Good.
I realize this makes me sound crazy. What was I supposed to do? I realized afterward I could have just given him a fake phone number like a normal person. (Call me, babe! It’s 555-5555!) But, it irked me how he just wouldn’t let up. I don’t NEED A REASON to say ‘no’ to men. That’s something I wasn’t fully aware or confident of prior to my mama’s diagnosis.
I’ve made a lot of poor decisions in my life based on my desire to be in someone else’s.
But you learn. You live through the worst and you live through so many lies from the people who love, and then you learn. When my world was falling apart, I was stuck in this constant pain, which is beyond what’s imaginable by those who haven’t lost the person they love the most. My biggest nightmare in life became my life’s reality. And so, I cried on the floor, and I sobbed until I couldn’t catch my breath every night in my bed, and I pricked tiny cuts up and down my arms using steak knives, and I manically baked a new batch of cinnamon rolls everyday… I was pretty much outside of my mind and overwhelmed with my mama’s dying.
And, he didn’t care. There’s nothing my ex could have done to stop me, of course, or to make my pain go away, but he didn’t care either way. I’d spent the past weeks living off his perfectly sweet words of love and his promises that our love would last forever, and then, it stopped. His words crashed and it broke me.
He told me I needed to be strong– I needed to be strong by myself. I needed to pick my body off the floor. I needed to find the courage to find comfort, while being alone. He didn’t have the time or the positive energy to deal with me, (he was always talking about his ‘chakra’ which I was like, um, not in front of family, dude!) He couldn’t be around 24/7, even though, that never felt like what I was asking him… but I guess to him it did.
There were nights when my body shook with panic and I felt like I’d pass out or worse, (or better), like I was dying too. Sometimes, I just wanted him just to hold me. And so, I’d get the nerve to ask him, only to hear him frustrated and saying ‘no’ he was tired from work. He wanted to work on his trade– nothing more. His friends were in town and he was busy entertaining and he didn’t have a minute to call or text me to see how I was doing… for two days. He was angry. He was doing his best. He always me fit into the time he had to spare– between building bicycles and not paying his taxes this year– and if I wasn’t going to fit his schedule, it didn’t work for him, and if it didn’t work, then he’d always known that to mean goodbye. In the end, I was told by my love who was so different and unexpected, who held me and stared into my eyes, who got me so high… sorry, I didn’t fit. I wasn’t his girl. His words dropped me so low. Luckily, though, I was already lost in a hole so deep, being guided by my grief I was falling into the core of hell farther and father, the pain of it couldn’t touch me.
My family and friends who’d visited during my mama’s last weeks had all loved him. Me too. But when things fell apart (and did so quickly) everyone blamed the timing for us falling in love. It makes sense I would want someone good to cling onto during the end of my mama’s life. I didn’t totally buy it, though, saying over and over, “Yes, but I really, truly did believe it was the most perfect love. I thought I’d gotten way too lucky, and I’d met the love of my life.”
He looked at me and held me and loved me like I was the only true-love-of-his-life. I guess in retrospect, I’m a huge dummy. After our crash-and-burn breakup (on the day before my mama’s memorial service), I told my *guy-bestie about it. I went on about how much my life sucks, how much I miss my mom, how I wish my ex still loved me and how I was still lost on what the hell happened. But, when I told my guy-bestie how my ex had said “I love you” after two weeks of dating, or really, even meeting me… he (not so) nicely reminded me of something. THAT’S BATSHIT CRAZY. Adummy is on the extremely logical, AKA smart, side of the spectrum, and he said seven or eight months is ideal (if not early) for an I love you.
He was right. He was so totally right. Maybe, not about the seven to eight months thing, but my ex telling me he loves me after two weeks was just so… not anything but complete shit.
He didn’t know me. It’s impossible to know someone after two weeks let alone two years. On the phone the other day, my big brother was saying how he and his GF had just hit the 2-year mark, and even living together, he was still learning new things about her. TWO YEARS LATER AND THERE’S STILL NEW SHIT. Ha, even my mama and my dad were, for better or for worse, still learning new things about each other, together, 30-years later.
Thank God for all of this. Because, my ex? He still doesn’t know me.
He’d promised me he would understand and he would love me through my grief– even a couple weeks ago, while I was in town for my dad’s birthday, he made promises again– I found myself being held and kissed by him again as he said we’re so good together and he cares so much about me still, and he maybe wants to move to New York to be with me. And then I found out, via internet stalking (duh), he’s had a new girlfriend for a good long while.
Oppsies. I win. I win so big by not being with a guy who has a girlfriend and still kisses other girls and makes plans with them. And honey, you didn’t know me. You wouldn’t know me now, either. I’m stronger than a woman you “knew” and loved back then.
One last thing: The man I do marry, (Lord help him!), won’t be in love with me after two weeks. We’ll barely know each other after two months– we’re in no rush— we take things slow. He’ll see I have bruises, and down the road, he’ll find out I have scars. I’ll let him feel my heartbeat and how it still stops at the ache of losing my mama. It always will. His kisses will feel great, but they won’t heal anything. I’m sure he’ll be a bit beat up, too. That’s life, man. And most importantly, It won’t matter to him that while my mom lay unresponsively in the hospital bed setup in our living, I cried on the hardwood floor alone and terrified. He won’t be concerned as to whether or not I needed someone, of if I was strong, and he won’t think less of me for feeling alone in those crushing moments bringing me to my knees, because what matters most to him is that I wanted someone.
I’m not looking for a relationship, right now. But weirdly, deep down, I know that when I’m ready for one, I’ve learned so much that the next time I fall in love I’ll be so badass at it.
xoxo.
*Every, every, every gal needs a guy-bestie. Guy-besties rock because they have kick-ass taste in music and they don’t ever wanna talk about the Real Housewhoevers of any county. Plus, they give you honest (TOO HONEST) no-frills feedback on shit. I’ve maybe only (ever) gotten two compliments from Adummy, but they are the most sincere, meaningful compliments in my whole collection of ego-boosting flattery!
My Ultimate Inspiration Comes From My Best Friend.
My dad let both my big brother and I share a short something in my mama’s honor before he gave the eulogy at her memorial service. My brother told a great story– he has an awesome gift of being able to make people laugh, insanely, despite life’s darkest moments– it moved the audience and also, of course, had them chuckling. The big guy, who’s now a software developer by day and stand-up comedian by night, credited my mama for buying him his first comedy magazine, Mad Magazine. He was home sick one day as a kid and she returned home from errands with medicine, soup and the magazine that sparked his love for comedy. She rocked at the doin’ the mom thang. I chose to read a part of a script from my mama and I’s favorite TV show, Gilmore Girls. Weird… I know. It was a segment from the speech given by the daughter, Rory, at her character’s high school graduation. And, it perfectly describes my mom. I’d used it before in tons of captions for pictures of us on Facebook and Instagram.
It felt right to read this in front of a church full of people who knew and loved my mama.
“But my ultimate inspiration comes from my best friend, the dazzling woman from whom I received my initials and my life’s blood, Susan Maynard Doan. My mother never gave me any idea that I couldn’t do whatever I wanted to do or be whomever I wanted to be. She filled our house with love and fun and books and music, unflagging in her efforts to give me role models from Jane Austen to Eudora Welty to Carole King. As she guided me through these incredible twenty-four years, I don’t know if she ever realized that the person I most wanted to be was her. Thank you, Mom: you are my guidepost for everything.”
The Day Her Death Dawned On Me.
Susan Maynard Doan.
Susan Lynne Maynard Doan.
Susan “Mama Goose” Lynne Maynard Doan.
I miss you.
I still can’t believe you’re gone. It feels like a lie. Your death feels like a lie. It’s as if you faked it… like you “pulled an Elvis” or something. That’s a thing, right? Elvis is still alive.
So, why aren’t you?
I want to make t-shirts for people like me. We’ll wear them as a warning sign for the others. The ones who don’t know grief. They think they do, because of a dead grandpa or neighbor or classmate, but it’s not the grief we feel. If we wear special markers, like the shirts, then when onlookers see our tears in public, and our minds don’t seem to work the right way, so our conversations always sound foggy, plus we look so tired—we’re always so f’in tired even though we’re not getting out of bed some days—the others will just know. The tee says it all… we’re all just:
“BEREAVED AF”
My family was told my mom was going to die on her birthday, August 11, 2014. The official phone call came and it confirmed the bad news we’d already heard from the family doctor who found the tumor, the tech who did her immediately-ordered CT scan, another diagnostic tech who did even more in-depth searches and scans, Google, plus also, whatever we could remember from Steve Jobs and Patrick Swayze having this cancer—it’s bad news.
I didn’t know, though, that my mom was going to die until seven months later.
I had squished my big butt next to her small one and we sat in the seat of her treatment chair while waiting in the chemo wing at the cancer center. We’d scheduled an emergency visit earlier that morning. My dad demanded a meeting with her oncologist to talk about how her current treatment plan—of nothingness—wasn’t working for her. She couldn’t eat solid foods anymore—none at all. She barely kept down the chicken broth, which became the go-to meal when everything but water now caused her severe, gut wrenching, take-an-extra-15mg-morphine-pill kind of pain. And, she couldn’t take the side effects chemo anymore. It was the second-line therapy of the only two therapy options for her cancer, and a recent scan revealed chemo was doing nothing but keeping her on the couch in pain. The toxin was too much and her body was too little. As we sat together, one of our favorite nurses hooked up my mom’s ‘power port’ to an IV carrying just fluids. No treatment today.
It was the only thing the oncologist would, or could, do for her today. He put in orders for the nurses to give my mom potassium for some nutrients and saline for hydration. The IV would help pass the time while we waited for her to be accepted into a clinical trial, which was her last chance at any treatment. The one she had her heart set on was based off bullshit immunotherapy cell stuff… Read: Scientists don’t know what the fuck to do about pancreatic cancer. As the fluids passed through her IV, we talked and giggled. I snapped selfies of us smooshing our faces so close together. Her smiling face was so thin on camera. For the past month she’d struggle to stay over 90lbs., and it was clear she wasn’t doing well.
Do you ever feel like someone’s watching you? Not to sound like a paranoid weirdo, but I think that’s common… sometimes you can feel someone’s glance on you. I could feel it that day, and out of the corner of my eye I could see our favorite nurse. She was standing next to another of our favorite nurses and talking in a low voice… both looking at us.
Then I heard her. “Poor baby.”
I could see them in my side glance: watching, shaking their heads and looking at me. Going to weekly chemo treatment was the new “normal” for my family, and we were no strangers to the nurses who worked there. They saw me with my mama often. My love was visible.
The nurse was looking at me and saying, poor baby, because my mom was going to die.
My mom was going to die, soon.
Happy Birthday To My Bad Mama Jama.
Today marks exactly one year since my mama‘s stage-4 pancreatic cancer diagnosis.
It also would have been her birthday.
Today is bitter-sweet at its very core.
It also calls for joy.
A photo posted by stephrosedoan (@stephrosedoan) on Feb 12, 2015 at 2:47pm PST
Happy Birthday, Mama Goose! I’m so v. thankful we were able to talk you into the silliness of celebrating your “Halfy Birthday!” Not only was it the day you turned a 1/2 year older but it also marked 6-months of fighting cancer like a bad Mama Jama. I am so proud of you! Thank you for being my world, my moon, my guiding star and my entire galaxy for 24 years.
You Wouldn’t Like Me When I’m Angry.
A woman who no one in my family had met before died and I sobbed about it. She lost her battle with pancreatic cancer at about 11am last Sunday, according to a post on Facebook.
My dad, too, cried over the woman who we’d never met in person and didn’t really know– the woman in the picture with her death announcement was a total stranger to us. If we’d have seen a “healthy” Albie on the street, we would’ve walked on by without a second look. It was the same way with my mama. People who met her during her 8-month battle with pancreatic cancer were shocked at seeing the pre-disease pictures we’d chosen for her memorial service. This disease strips every inch of meat from its victim’s body until nothing remains but a half-alive skeleton. And it gets worse, so much worse.
My dad and I had just finished a greasy diner breakfast (note: challah french toast is king) and on our walk back to my apartment dad brought up Albie. Neither of us knew how she was doing and the last we’d heard she was taking a “much needed break” from her treatment beginning late July. We’d only ever communicated with Albie via Facebook since “meeting” her in a pancreatic cancer support group last fall. The newest post on her wall said Albie had passed away that morning, and my dad and I read in disbelief.
I get mad sometimes. I used to get mad all the time back when my mama was still fighting and it felt like our family lived at her cancer center. We were surrounded by sick people all the time. I was mad because while I spent all my time with people who were either dying, on the road to dying, or lucky and beating death to a pulp, other people kept on keepin’ on with living. I was mad because before I knew what cancer really was I’d also kept on keepin’ on with life. I’m doing it again, too. We all keep on keepin’ on by going to work, making dinner, working out at the gym, meeting up with friends, falling in love, getting married, buying table lamps and oval-shaped rugs and those damn decorative pillows, and we live our lives. It’s the way we’re supposed to live in a continuos and unaffected circle of life. And, I hate it.
I hate the saying: “keep on keepin’ on” mostly because it sucks. Not only has it grown cliche and too sorority (I’m a member of the tribe) but who the fuck in need was ever helped by shit staying the same? What progress has come from us keepin’ on keepin’ on with zero change?
I guess, I’m still kind of mad. I’ll tell you why. (Ha, of course, I will.)
One triumphant moment in my history of being the younger sibling was when I explained something to my big brother (aka my superior who I will never be as kewl as, ever) and he said: that’s a good point! Fellow baby sibs will understand this. This is not shit that happens for us v. often. My brother and I were sitting on our mama’s bed–we all took turns guarding her during those last weeks just in case the mighty angels came down and swept her away in chariots of fire or whatnot–it was our turn and we started debating her initial decision to have fought this stupid terminal disease. Coming out the gate 8-months ago, her doctors were clear on this is how it ends: she dies while her children sit on her bed watching. But she wanted to fight and she fought like hell. The side effects of chemo sucked the life out of her, though, and she suffered through the cycles of side effects like high fevers and intense weakness, plus exhaustion, and even more nausea, and this super weird cold-sensitivity thing forcing her to eat everything at room temperature and wear *gloves all the time.
So why go through with it all– the extra sickness and constant glove-wearing– if she was dying no matter what? Fair question. But, as I told my brother, someone’s gotta be the one to say no. Rosa Parks said no. She got arrested and didn’t get to ride the bus after her “no” but it definitely stirred shit up for the better. Something NOT okay was going on and because she had the courage to say no, despite the consequences, things changed. And it wasn’t an overnight change. IDK (history too well) if she ever got to enjoy the changes she put into motion that day… but, just like my mama, she decided things could not keep on keepin’ on.
Basically, I got my big brother to agree with me that our mom was a lot like Rosa Parks. (He was under a lot of mental and emotional stress back then.)
When it comes right down to it… the reason my mama (and Albie, most likely, also) died is because she starved to death. My mom stopped being able to eat at the end of March, and then her family and close friends had to watch starve to death. For weeks. Day and night. While we planned Easter dinner and then during the entire month of April. We watched her starve for a month and live without water for over 15-days until she died on April 28.
You mad too yet? Nope. Okay, I’ll keep on goin’ on.
My mom’s body stopped digesting solid food and eventually, when even our go-to liquid meal of chicken broth caused her severe pain until being vomited back up, her oncologists suggested (commanded) it was time for hospice care. I’ll remember this forever, of course. It’s imprinted in my soul: the day her oncologist had “reassured” us that her best bet at having more time was by going into hospice care, which my mom surrendered and agreed to, because continuing treatment would kill her. So, her best chance at surviving was to enter into a service that is designed for people who are dying, and they’re dying very soon.
One of the nurses put it best, “Damned if you do. Damned if you don’t.”
When our FB friend, Albie, posted a status saying she was taking a “much needed” break a few weeks ago, my dad and I shared the same thought of that’s not good. After my mama had died, Albie checked-in on us often. My dad and I prayed for her every day and talked about visiting, or meeting, her one day. I replied to her comment on my profile picture once saying how much I wished her the miracle my mama never got. She needed to beat this impossible cancer– for her self and her own family but also for my mama. Go, Fight, Win!
But, the pancreas doesn’t respond to chemotherapy. It’s used as palliative care to stop and/or slow the cancer from spreading. It was big, big news when the FDA approved the drug Abraxane for use along with the already used drug, Gemcitibine, in September 2013. Groundbreaking research was done for the discovery that together these two miracle drugs drastically improved the average survival… by two months. The lifespan of patients went from 6-months to 8-months! Woo! That’s the only advancement we’ve made in 20-years.
And yet no one’s called bullshit.
The Pancreatic Action Network (PANCAN) celebrated like it was 1999 again for two more months! No one had the balls to admit two months isn’t enough and we need to do more. Our patients, loved ones, moms and dads, brothers and sisters, children, trial test subjects, whatever these people are to we who care– need more than an additional two months.
Why should we demand more? Why should we care? As we keep on keepin’ by going to Soul Cycle, shopping at Whole Foods for only organic veggies, buying new shoes, being overall dang good people who donate to charity and don’t litter… why stop our lives and care more?
Because, pancreatic cancer will be the second leading cause of cancer deaths in 2020, according to the American Cancer Society stats. It’s moving from the fourth leading cause to the second in less than four and a half years. Add ten years, and it’s predicted that by the year 2030, the number of new pancreatic cancer cases will have doubled and the deaths will have almost tripled. Last year, 46,420 people were newly diagnosed and 39,590 people died.
This cancer is coming for you, or someone who you love even more than you, and there’s no cure. All you can do is plan what to do with the exciting gift of those extra two months.
*I got Mama a little present to cheer her up during the weird cold-sensitivity-thing, and also make her feel a little more useful around the house. It was good for her to feel like she still had purpose. I bought her fuzzy gloves that were made for dusting! She, however, did not wear them so it was a loss. Great idea, though, glove company!
#ThrowbackThursday Mama Goose on the Loose.
“Last night I remembered an incident from my childhood and the memory made me cry.”
For #ThrowbackThursday, here’s a story written by my mom. I stole it from her diary… Um, are ghosts like a real thing to worry about? I think she’ll be cool with it. Maybe.
“It was about a time when I was about 8 or 9, and I was with my (older) brother, Steven. Some kids rode by us on their bikes and called him a retard and started making fun of him. I felt embarrassed and ashamed. But, I remember Steven saying to me, “Sissy, me different.” He looked so sad! And then, I felt so sad, because he was so sweet and innocent and he couldn’t be sheltered from the cruel ignorance of the outside world that could hurt him so much. I hate that!”
My mom was in school to be a teacher when I was a kid– it kind of looked like to me that she was always in school through my entire childhood… so, you can understand my confusion when my own college days ended. She started out her career teaching fourth graders, but her true passion– which I’ll bet had a big something to do with she had love for my Uncle Steve– drove my mama to get her masters degree in special education. The number of parents who reached out during her cancer battle, plus the many more who contacted us after her death, thanking her for impacting, and literally changing, how their kids did in school was endless. At the memorial service, we watched as parent after parent stepped up to the mic to share stories about how their child was failing– grade levels behind– in school. Their kids had rosters of previous teachers who’d either given up on them or couldn’t spare the extra time on students with learning differences. But then, my mom came into the equation. Many called her “an angel” who was amazingly patient and who understood there are many different ways children can learn. Her teaching was not only effective, but also, (and the kids would even admit it) fun. She had a special gift for helping her students to regain their confidence, and eventually, to also love learning.
Here’s another one:
“I feel angry at Brent (my dad/her husband) right now because when I called him he didn’t want to talk to me– he said he’d call me back due to last seconds of a football game. This makes me feel hurt knowing a football is more important than me to him. I hate him sometimes for allowing him to control my feelings– why do I let him do that?! But, I care that a football game is more important to him than me– it’s like, I’ll always be there but the football game won’t. It makes me think and want not to always be there– so there! Hah! Feelings: resentful, worried, angry, hurt, sad, and fear. Fear is usually behind anger, and the fear is that he doesn’t care and if he doesn’t care then our relationship won’t last.”
It lasted. My parents were married for three decades, and it was about a week after their 30th anniversary that my mom first went into the ER because of bad, bad, stomach cramps. Another week passed, and she was at a follow-up appointment when her primary care doctor first discovered the tumor on an ultrasound. A week later, my was diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer, which is hopelessly terminal, on her 59th birthday. It was 28-years since she’d jotted down her anger over my dad watching that football game– she had no way of knowing, back then, not only would her marriage last, it would survive through so many imperfect life things. A couple months after her diagnosis, my dad left his job, (which ironically, he ended up being an exec at a sporting goods company. Maybe, all that OT watching football paid off… Mama sure did enjoy the heated seats in her Lexus.) He knew I needed help caregiving and also my mama just plain needed him. And he was there. My parents got into a habit during the last months of my mama’s life that was so heartwarming and sweet. They’d both end up waking up around 3 or 4am every night, my dad said, like clockwork. My mama would put her head on his shoulder and let him hold her, and then they’d talk, and they’d remember all the crazy stories from their lasting marriage. (Maybe even the one where my mom almost killed my dad bc he wouldn’t stop watching football.)
I Want My Mommy.
RORY: All I could think of the minute you left was “I want my mommy.” I haven’t thought that since I was two.
LORELAI: That’s natural.
RORY: I’m eighteen. I can sign contracts, I can vote, I can fight for my country. I mean, I’m an adult. Adults don’t want their mommies.
LORELAI: Yes, they do, honey. I’m not a good example, but –
RORY: Everything’s so foreign. I have to share a bathroom. I’ve never shared a bathroom with anyone but you. So I’m gonna be running into people in the bathroom, we’re gonna have to make small talk. I don’t know any bathroom small talk.
LORELAI: Um. . .gee, your hair smells terrific?
RORY: You didn’t socialize me properly. You made me a mama’s girl. Why don’t I hate you? Why don’t I want to be away from you? It’s going to be very hard to be Christiane Amanpour broadcasting live from a foxhole in Tehran with my mommy. I guess you’re just gonna have to learn how to operate a camera ’cause I’ll need you there with me.
LORELAI: I would do that.
RORY: And how did I end up at Yale? I mean, I let Grandma and Grandpa manipulate me right out of Harvard and into Yale. That’s how strong-willed I am. I know nothing about Yale.
LORELAI: Not so – you’ve memorized its entire history.
RORY: How can you be so fine with this? You left here without a care in the world.
LORELAI: That’s not true.
RORY: You couldn’t wait for me to get out of the house. What were you doing when I paged you – turning my room into a sewing room? I should hate you, not miss you. Do something to make me hate you.
LORELAI: Uh. . .go Hitler!
(One of Mama’s favorite Gilmore Girls episodes, 4.02: The Lorelais’ First Day at Yale)
I couldn’t agree more. Life just isn’t fun without Mama. It’s just not. I feel robbed. So many others, too, feel robbed. My Aunt texted me yesterday, saying how she feels robbed of spending retirement visiting, shopping and knitting (well, my Aunt knitting while Mama pretends) together, my dad is robbed not only of growing old along with someone but also of the only person who remembers all the stories they’d collected during 30-years together, my mom’s besties are robbed of decades together spent aging gracefully (and disgracefully, bc it’s them, ha) while giggling through it all, my big brother is robbed of having the mother who– despite not sharing an ounce of DNA and completely by choice– raised him and loved him and lit up outer space laughing at his jokes, my brother and I’s kids (not, like, our kids together… like, kids w/ our spouses… this isn’t GOT… also, I feel like I have to explain this abnormally often in conversations) will be robbed of a Nana who couldn’t wait to spoil them and who wanted nothing more than to be a grandma to her very lucky (and not inbreed) gran-babies, my future husband (or cat) will be robbed of meeting the woman who made me… me and will never know the person who has filled the most space in my life, and I am robbed of the many, many more words we would’ve spoken and the tons of fun adventures we would’ve found, together. 
THIS BABE BAKES 