A love letter to my mother

Last August marked three years since I was given the keys to my college dorm room. My mom wept as she hugged me goodbye while I counted down the minutes until she left. I won’t lie and say my college move-in day was all about new beginnings or my newly-found independence. It sucked. I was pissed at my mom for micromanaging me, I was irritated with my little sister for asking too many questions, and frankly, my grandma was walking too slow. My family said their goodbyes and I sat alone in my dorm room staring at my unopened boxes and empty walls. As I began rummaging through my things I found an unfamiliar, thick, white envelope hidden underneath all my bedding.

Written in uppercase letters and purple pen were the words “MY LOVE” with my mom’s signature squiggle underneath. I opened the envelope to find a handwritten letter, three pages long, in matching purple pen.

Let me give you some context. I’m the oldest daughter of two, and the first in my family to go to college. My entire livelihood has depended on the fact that my parents made the ultimate sacrifice when they put their roots down in the United States. The dream was for me to become something more; a lawyer, an astronaut, a doctor even! Anything that made my parent’s sacrifice worth it, really.

When college application season came and went, I decided I would settle in Chico, only a four-hour drive away from home. Close enough to drive but far enough to start anew. When I informed my mom of my decision she nodded unenthusiastically. After this I berated her for months on end, asking her, “Are you going to miss me?” I was kidding, for the most part, but a part of me just wanted the validation. Every single time I would receive a blank stare and a response along the lines of, “No, why would I? You’re choosing to leave.”

Now, I knew my mom was tough. Everyone knew that.

But I was her baby. Her firstborn, her princess, the light of her life! And yet, nothing. She kept this up for the months leading up to my move-in date, not a single time did she budge.

Six months later I sat on my dorm room floor, legs crossed, and staring at these letters. I began to read and found myself in tears before I even reached the bottom of the first page. My mom had written me the most gut-wrenching letter I had ever read in my life. In her letter she revealed that ever since I decided to move away for college, she had begun carrying a box of tissues around with her at work. She detailed the months of silent grieving that she experienced under the guise of nonchalance.

I found myself trembling silently while I traced my mom’s purple handwriting. She wrote that I was the first love of her life and that she hadn’t known a love like the love she felt when I was born. I cried until I couldn’t. She wrote “of course I’m going to miss you” and “I don’t know how I am going to do it without you” and suddenly I wished she had never left.

It’s been over three years since that day. The homesickness came and went. I made friends and made bad decisions. I call my mom every day and I think about her letters often. I think about how badly I wanted to leave her and how much it must’ve hurt her to see me go. I can only imagine that the grief I feel now parallels the grief she felt then.

Now I know that my mom misses me, but I hope she knows I miss her more.