Lay It Down or Let It Crush You: A Mother’s Day Reflection

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catacosmosis

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There comes a point in every soul’s story where you’re asked to lay down what you thought was love—or risk letting it break you.

That’s the thing about burdens: we don’t always know when they stop being sacred and start becoming self-destruction. But eventually, if we’re honest, we feel it.

That’s the core of this message.

You can carry the burden until your knees give out, insisting it’s strength. Or, you can listen to the whisper that says, “Lay it down,” because true strength isn’t brute force. It’s not in how long you hold on. It’s in knowing when to release—when to grieve, and when to grow.

Brute strength—the kind that resists surrender—is fear in a steel mask. But surrender? That’s wisdom. That’s love maturing into understanding.

This isn’t a love story between me and someone else. It’s a love story between who I was and who I’ve become. It’s the story of two souls—two versions of my own soul—and how only one of them eventually realized that the weight of love, when carried alone, becomes grief.

That grief, if left unprocessed, becomes blame. Becomes resentment. Becomes bitterness. Becomes the ghost of a life I never got to live.

The version of me that held on so tightly was trying to preserve love by never letting go—even of the dead. Even of ghosts. But the version of me that learned to let go understands now:

It’s not about letting go of the ones we’ve lost. It’s about letting go of what keeps us from healing. Letting go of the pain we wrapped ourselves in like armor. Letting go of the misunderstandings. Letting go of the old wounds that kept us from breathing fully.

I couldn’t shrink myself any longer to fit into the versions of love that others offered. And they couldn’t stretch themselves to meet me in mine. That wasn’t failure. That was fact. Then, in the case of my mother, she died.

Maybe—just maybe—there’s a higher realm where we meet again, whole and healed. Where all the versions of us come home to each other. Where they are not in conflict, but in communion.

Until then…I carry them forward. I no longer miss them the way I used to—because they’re not gone. They’re right here, quietly guiding me home.

I love you, Mama.

Happy Mother’s Day.

Comments

2 responses to “Lay It Down or Let It Crush You: A Mother’s Day Reflection”

  1. promisesunshine Avatar
    promisesunshine

    Thank you for these words today.

    Firstly, I’m glad that you’re healing.

    If I may. I will need to come back to your words, maybe more than once, today and in the future, but my first take is that today is the first Mother’s Day without my mother. It’s freaking complicated. On the one hand, I’m very ok with her being gone. Ours was a tricky relationship before the Alzheimers, and that bitch is no gift (Alzh). She was going downhill already by this time last year and that slope became a precipice not too much later. Where was I. Oh. The part where every now and again, I get a little surprise. Like when I said in a conversation, “my mother is dead” and I spontaneously teared up. Or when I decided to spend a small fortune on a flower pot for her gravesite and delivered that the other day. Or the fact that I’m crying right now. And then there’s the shouldas. I shoulda had the kind of relationship where when she died, I was stricken with grief. You know, the kind in which I blubbered at her funeral service (like my brother did) or needed to take multiple days of bereavement (again, like my brother did). – Look at me having some feelings about that. Anyhow, Mother’s Day has always been hard seeing what was supposed to be- especially on social media. So I’m glad that my FB boycott lasts until tomorrow. Makes today easier.

    Pardon me for processing my ugly on your comments. Probably shoulda made my own post.

    Happy ok day to you

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    1. catacosmosis Avatar
      catacosmosis

      Oh wow, please—no apology needed at all. I’m honored you shared your heart here.

      It’s taken me almost five years to be able to speak these words from a genuinely healed place—not from a “fake it till you make it” posture, but from something real and earned. And getting here wasn’t tidy. The key, for me, was being willing to get down in the mud with my own truths, behind closed doors. I’ve shared a lot publicly over the years, but there were layers I couldn’t even show in writing—grief and guilt and resentment and ache that had to be walked through privately, in the dark. I shut myself away with it on purpose, and I’ll never apologize for that. It was worth it.

      And I still don’t think healing is ever finished—it just changes form. As long as I stay in the process, I’m becoming better than I was the day before. That’s all I can ask for.

      So thank you for your words. They’re not ugly—they’re true. I’m really grateful you trusted this space enough to leave them here, and I’ll be looking forward to anything else you feel like sharing, whether it’s in the comments or in your own posts. I see you. And I’m sending you grace and so much love on this complicated day, my friend.

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