It has been 30 days since my mom died. Not four weeks and some change. Not a month. Those shorten the time that she's been gone. I've lived 30 days since she took her last breath. I regret that I wasn't at her side when she took her last breath yet I feel so fully blessed that I savored over 51 years by her side while she lived and breathed. Grief is a strange creature. During her last weeks and the two weeks following her passing, grief was sudden and all encompassing. It showed up at unexpected times and demanded to be acknowledged. Before I could stop myself, I was sobbing for my impending loss, then for my real loss. Although it wasn't pretty and hit at times I was busy trying to do something else, I usually welcomed the grief to some degree. It was a time when I could authentically and fully experience love for my mother, grief that she was gone, and nostalgia for when I was with her. She was a good mom. She was brave, hard-working, loving, intelligent, protecti