Just about twenty years ago, I got the news…. it’s cancer. She had back pain for a long time and a doctor missed the cancer on an x-ray. Not that it would have helped. I knew her time was limited.

She showed up to her doctor appointments and did what she was told to the best of her abilities for about nine months. She was tired now, had given up and simply stopped taking her meds. My father called me from their final Las Vegas trip together, to let me know she was dying and I needed to get to Vegas to say goodbye to her. Luckily, I didn’t have any unfinished business. We both knew how much we loved each other. We had said those words plenty of times and talked on the phone nearly everyday.

I quickly booked the last seat on the plane (it was Thanksgiving weekend) grabbed our youngest, Paige (who was 2 at the time), flew with her on my lap across the country, next to THE largest man ever and bawled my eyes out, as Paige fell fast asleep.

Fast forward to last year, where I’m sitting in an astrologer’s home listening to all the things I didn’t know about myself but she seemed to know. She relays the story of Persephone and Demeter and how it is symbolic to me. Quick recap of this story, Persephone is stolen from her mother, Demeter, by Hades and forced to live in the underworld with him. As a compromise, Demeter gets to see her half of the year and the other half she goes to the Underworld to become Queen of the Underworld. As she is telling the story, I’m getting caught up in '“why is she telling me this?”, “which one of my daughter’s is Persephone?”, “why would I agree to let them go, but wait, haven’t I already (they are 29, 25 and 21)?” While I spend over 3 1/2 hours with Sue (the astrologer) filled with more stories, archetypes and personality traits, I can’t help but say to her near the end, “I’ve always thought my mother had passed away to let me live my life. I know that sounds crazy, but if she hadn’t died, I would have never left my former husband.”

A few days later, still reeling from the fact that someone on this planet (Sue) knows me way better than me, I wake up from a dream and realize none of my daughter’s are Persephone. I am Persephone. My mother let me go by passing away and because of this, I’ve pursued a life I would have NEVER had I stayed put. Her passing allowed me to be on my path to become Queen of my world, my deeply introverted Underworld. Yes, she loved me and I loved her, but I NEVER wanted to disappoint her. I always worried I would have let her down if I left my husband. This wasn’t her stuff… this was MY stuff. They say “hindsight is 20/20.” It took 20 years to get 20/20 on a situation where I felt cheated out of having my mom around. But her last gift to me was dying so that I could discover myself and live the life I was supposed to live, even if it meant without her. Thank you, Mom. For this and for many many more reasons, I love you.

I hope this story got you thinking differently about a time in your life that maybe didn’t make sense, but now does. If so, I’d love to hear about it so please comment below.