My mom in 2014
My husband wished me a Happy Mother’s Day, when he woke today. Not long ago, I told him I miss BOTH of our moms. His mom died in 2009 and my mom in 2015.
My mother-in-law with her cat.
My mother-in-law was a gem. She always treated me like the daughter she never had (she was mother to 3 boys). She was more a mom to me, for over the 20 years I had with her, than my own mom lived many miles away. If I was lucky, I saw her once a year and sometimes, not even that much. Mostly we communicated by phone or email.
My mom yearned to connect with her birth mother but the state of Tennessee refused her persistent requests until she gave up. Less than a decade later, the state came to the conclusion that victims of the Georgia Tann scandal should be allowed to have their adoption files but no one ever told my mom. In 2017, as her descendent, I was allowed to receive it and saw a picture of my genetic maternal grandmother for the first time.
Missing Mom 