Grandma, I will miss you forever and hope that I always make you proud.

He said

And with that, my family of six is half its size in the span of a year and a half… And the weirder piece in all of that is I am now an orphan. Weird to say that as a fifty-three-year-old adult, but I feel it in my heart.

The last year and a half has been a journey I would wish on no one. In that time, I lost my best friend and brother, Greg. Four months later, we lost my father. Bam! In that span, we lost probably the two most influential male role models in my life. What’s more to the point was there were a whole lot of other people who lost those two very meaningful people in their lives.

Most notably, Danielle & Emelia.

And Mom… She made life after their passing and doing better than we expected in her new Long-Term Care facility at Glendale Crossing despite already being in declining health with increasing mobility issues. She was in congestive heart failure but, like Dad, would always find a way to bounce back from setbacks. 

That was until the last month or so.

 Towards the end of April, it was suggested that we move forward with palliative care as everyone on her care team who knew the situation better than anyone and we trusted could see the writing on the wall. And from the moment we moved forward on that, we were blown away at the support and care we got.

In the last week, we started to see a very marked and increased decline and prepared ourselves for the inevitable. We messaged family and kept them in the loop, and there were visits with her that really lifted her spirits. Hell, Emelia even snuck over with us one time and got into her prom dress so Mom could have a preview of Emelia face to face—Mom’s smile was ear to ear. (Very similar to the time she saw Danielle before our prom).

Tuesday morning (this week), we got messages from the care team that it was beginning to look like the time was near for us to drop what we are doing and to get bedside with her if we could.

So we did.

Somewhere just ahead of 7:00pm Tuesday evening, Mom took her last breath. The world felt a little less golden as her glow moved to a different plane. Shawn, Matthew, Danielle, & I were with her as she passed. She had a wonderful visit with her sister and niece just before. And her other sister and brother were there this weekend.

There isn’t a doubt in my mind that she felt loved by everyone she came into contact with. There also isn’t a doubt in my mind that everyone she knew knew about her siblings, her husband, her kids, and her grandkids as she was so proud of her family.

And within minutes of her passing after sharing with family, I got the most touching message from my absolute best friend from growing up that explained my Mom in a way that anyone who knows her would

Sitting here listening to Van Morrison desperately wishing we were 13 years old and both your Mom and Dad were here to make your home feel like my home. Every ounce of my love and sympathy is finding its way to you tonight. What a brilliant, kind, beautiful soul your Mom was to me and a billion others. I wish I could say something more comforting. She didn’t have to love my brother and me, but she did. And when we probably needed plenty of it. What a beautiful human.

Because that’s who she was. She, like Dad, taught us to always lead with love, care, and most of all, a “what’s mine is yours” approach.

The funniest thing to my brothers and me is how my Mom would ensure that everything was divided equally, right down to the last piece, to ensure fairness across all four boys, where my Dad, if asked why one kid got more of something than the other, would respond with, “Because I love him and I don’t love you.”

Everyone remembers the Festive Special at Swiss Chalet when it came with a Toblerone chocolate bar? My Mom would ensure that each kid got an equal amount of pieces. And when she got to the last triangle, she would actually cut that triangle into four so there were no cocoa favourites to be found. That was her in a nutshell.

But, the bigger loss to speak of hits a chord with Danielle and me most. When we were early in university, we lost Danielle’s mother to suicide. That is a solar system-sized hole in developing young women’s hearts. And without ever being asked or ever trying to overstep boundaries, Mom filled a section of a colossal void in Danielle’s life. She stepped up and was there for Danielle in ways that we mostly only recognized years later as we started our own family.

With Greg, Dad, and now Mom, it feels like giant pieces of the universe I know, now missing. But don’t take this post as sad or feel sorry for me. I recognize the fortune I was dealt with having those bigger-than-life personalities as my family and the privilege of being tasked with taking their presence forward. I will do the best I can with whatever time I get to do that in.

Many will know my Mom as the kindergarten teacher. Many will know my Mom as the one who was officially or unofficially their Mom. Many will know my Mom as a great friend. I had the fortune of knowing all of those versions of her and so much more.

Tonight, after we accepted that she was no longer with us, Matthew, Shawn, Danielle, and I went and had Swiss Chalet for dinner together – something we all know Mom would have been happy we did as it was her favourite.

Mom, you are gone. I love you and will miss you like crazy. But, you are never forgotten as you are with the person I am still becoming.

Love,
John

She said