Bits and Pieces: My Mother, My Brother, and Me

by Whoopi Goldberg

Probably none of us had the childhoods we think we had. We only have our individual memories of what we believe happened.

I didn’t know anything about feeling lost until after she died. I wouldn’t call it crippling grief because it doesn’t have a grip on me. It is more of a grief that stays way down in my toes. It doesn’t feel dark. It’s a kind of fog or numbness. I can’t figure out what I’m supposed to feel now.

“I looked in the mirror one day, and I saw my mother coming out of my shirt. Same will happen to you. One day you’ll look and see me coming out of your shirt.”

I start out by saying that other people who still have their moms will not know what to do or how to respond to your loss. Do your best to be kind to them even when you’re not feeling it.

There will be times when people who haven’t lost a parent, particularly their mother, are going to say things to you that make you think, What the fuck! You don’t know what you are talking about. They aren’t where you’re at. They don’t know any better. The best you can do is say, “Thank you,” then wrap it up quickly and get the hell away.

the loss of the first person who ever looked at you and thought, This is my baby. Regardless of whether she raised you all the way through, you were still a part of her in the beginning.

But count on the grief to come back. Even years later. Three years after my mom passed, I would sometimes think, Why am I still feeling like this? It’s not a grief that has an end date. It evolves, but it stays around. You know, it becomes something that hangs out in the corner. It’s still nearby, every day. And sometimes it comes up and runs at you. You just have to let it do what it’s going to do.

Eventually, you have to separate your grief for your mom and your grief for yourself. That’s okay, too, but you have to call it what it is. If you’re grieving for yourself for a long time, get some help from somebody who can help you figure it out. Take the onus off it. You’re not crazy; you only need to talk some stuff out.

My best advice to anybody who has lost their mom is to find a way to celebrate her life. Regardless of what your relationship was with her, figure out how to find some humor in who she was and your life with her.