Based on a post originally published here on May 13, 2012
This month marks both the occasion of my mother’s birthday (on May 7th, coincidentally the birthday of her first great-grandchild, Everly Rose, born in 2015) and, of course, Mother’s Day – yet another Mother’s Day when I didn’t send my Mom a card and flowers. That’s because she died on February 21st, 2012. Last month, she missed the birthdays of her first child (me) and her first grandchild (my own son, Ben) – but since the cruel diagnosis of vascular dementia invaded her brain cells some time ago, she’d long been unable to keep track of things like family birthdays anymore.
As Christopher Buckley wrote in his memoir, Losing Mum and Pup, when the last of your parents dies, you are an orphan:
“But you also lose the true keeper of your memories, your triumphs, your losses. Your mother is a scrapbook for all your enthusiasms. She is the one who validates and the one who shames, and when she’s gone, you are alone in a terrible way.” Continue reading “A motherless Mother’s Day”
While I was in my hospital’s Coronary Care Unit recuperating from a heart attack, my longtime family physician knew nothing about what had just happened to her patient of over 32 years. At some point, a hospital report signed by the cardiologist in charge of my care was sent off to her (probably by fax – and by the way, can you name any other profession that still uses the fax machine as a mode of such sensitive, important and personal communication?) 
When I learned that
Heart Sisters 