Catering Christmas: One Daughter’s Story of How She Lost Her Mother While Becoming One Herself

Life works in interesting ways. Years ago (many more than I’d like to admit), I went to college with a girl named Christie. She was a senior while I was a sophomore, pledging her sorority. I interviewed her along with the rest of the sisters for several minutes and that was the extent of our relationship. More than a decade later, after attending the same Soul Cycle class, we discovered that we not only lived in the same neighborhood but blocks away from one another. After several failed attempts to get together, we finally made it happen. And, here’s where I get all teary talking about it- and her. We bonded over failed friendships and family structure but we could’ve had nothing in common and it still would’ve been special. I dare you to spend some time with this remarkable woman and not feel supported, championed and loved. She, no doubt, got it from her mama, whom she, sadly, lost too early, something that forever shaped the way she sees- and treats- the world. 

What I love most about this guest blog, is not that it comes from my beautiful friend, that she entrusted me with such a sacred piece or that it’s better storytelling than I’ve ever attempted, but that it’s raw and unfinished. When people pass, we tend to sugarcoat the situation, develop a bit of revisionist history, painting only positive, flattering images but, often, life is unattractive. Often, we are unattractive. Christie reveals a real relationship between a mother and daughter (and mother and daughter) that I know so many will relate to. We also try and tie everything up in a nice, little bow but this is just a small portion of her story, of which, I hope, there’s much more to come. The holidays are not always happy. So many are struggling this time of year. If you find (or have ever found) yourself or your family in your own version of catering Christmas, may Christie’s words help you heal. 

“Just don’t be a lawyer. Do something you love. Stay home.” Do something you love. Stay home. Somehow she had decided that staying home was what I loved. I had been a mom for 6 months but she knew what I loved. Moms. They know.

Sitting in the tiny kitchen, my mother was continuing her campaign to make me realize that I didn’t “need” to work. A falsehood of the highest degree. She was incorrect –  I did need to work – intellectually, financially and emotionally. I needed to work. I was confused that these were my mother’s words since she repeatedly advised me throughout my life to make my own living. To not wait. It’s as if she gave that advice all those years knowing that she would never get what she waited for. Waiting for independence, in her case, was a mistake. And now she was telling me to do the opposite.

I found out that I was pregnant with Anabella while working for a federal magistrate judge. My judge was a force. A powerhouse. Needless to say, I was TERRIFIED to tell her I was pregnant – by my calculation, I couldn’t both have my baby on time and see my clerkship to its completion. I had been downing sleeves of saltines at my little desk outside of Her Honor’s office faster than the speed of light. Chased each of those sleeves with 20 full ounces of ginger ale. And, finally, Her Honor stopped pretending not to notice. When she asked if I was okay, I did what any aspiring superstar female lawyer would do – I cried. That’s when the most difficult, truthful professional advice was ever bestowed upon me: “Congratulations. Truly. But, boy, I don’t envy you. Not. One. Bit. I mean, your generation has the worst of the worst. My generation was full of women who were told they should work. My parents’ generation was full of women who were told they should stay home. But, your generation? You have to do it all. You have to make a killer cupcake and a killer closing argument. Perfection. I’m going to help you in any way I can.”

Now, in that tiny kitchen with the tiny window I was being sent a clear message – just make the cupcakes. Screw the closing argument. Make the cupcakes. It was July and we were sitting in our assigned seats. My mother at the head of the table closest to the refrigerator, me with my back to the stove and Anabella in the high chair between us. It had been 7 months and she was frail. She had always been slender but now she looked very ill. Her skin was ashen and her hair was gone. Not that anyone would know – that damn wig almost never came off. It looked hot, itchy and uncomfortable. I would eventually try it on and it was hot, itchy and uncomfortable. Her make up never came off either. Old habits keep us sane.

While it was hard to believe that we were in this place, the signs were there for about a year. We didn’t ignore the signs, but we didn’t acknowledge them either. I became suspicious that she wasn’t well the prior November on the night before my baby shower. I had decided that the outfit I planned to wear for the shower made me look fat. I was, in fact, very, very round in the middle. I took on the shape of an egg with both of my pregnancies.

We decided to make a quick trip to find something “more flattering.” In the car, she coughed. At the store, she coughed. I heard the coughing from the dressing room. She insisted she was fine. That it was just a tickle. I heard the sound of a cough drop wrapper – a Ricola because they were “all natural.” I still hate that sound.

“I can’t believe how soon she will be here,” she said. I couldn’t believe it either. Our first born was a blessing made in Rome by God and a lot of wine and gelato. She coughed the whole way home. “I just need some tea,” she said. Lemon zinger with honey. The cure all. She coughed and carried a cup of tea all the way through the baby shower. She declined to greet guests too closely because she was “fighting a little something.” Yes, she was fighting a little something.

It was bronchitis. “Change of seasons, stress from planning the shower… no big deal.” That cough held onto her for the better part of three weeks. I had transitioned to my new doctor and was excited to have my mom go with me to my appointments. The first time she declined: “I’m sorry. I don’t want to cough all over the waiting room. If this doesn’t get better, I may have to cater Christmas.”

The words hung in the air like smog. Cater Christmas? My little Italian American ears had no idea what those words meant. Cater Christmas? And, that’s just what she did. Not all of it, of course. But, it was catered and it was different. As I sat there on Christmas day in the flip flops that made a mockery of my swollen feet, I knew it was different.

Yet, it wasn’t different for all the understandable and logical reasons. Jason had just lost his job to lay-offs at his non-profit employer. I was unemployed too since I opted to end my clerkship early to have the baby. While the thought of both of us being unemployed when we had our first child left me bitter and scared, it didn’t leave me feeling different. I was about to become a mother (before New Year’s, if I could help it) but that didn’t leave me feeling different. Oddly, amidst all of these factors that should have made me feel different, my mother deciding to cater Christmas was the only one that actually did. And not just different. Grossly uncomfortable and different. She looked far more exhausted than she ever did in the years that she didn’t cater Christmas.

The New Year came and went. My due date came and went. No baby. This amused everyone (but me) because just two days after my due date was my 27th birthday. “She’s waiting,” Jason said with a wry smile. “It’s a test.” It would be the easiest of all tests that year.  Sure enough, my precocious, challenging little girl came into the world on my 27th birthday. Having my mother in the room when I delivered was never a question. We all needed her. We had three names ready when we had the baby but when Jason first looked at her, he simply said, “it’s Anabella.”

After greeting the baby and kissing me on the forehead, my mother left for the waiting room. She flitted back in with my father and said, “I’m going to run home to make sure everyone has breakfast and to get your cake. It’s your birthday after all.”

Visitors arrived. They sang. We had “box cake” – yellow cake with chocolate icing. Natural ingredients, minimal. Deliciousness, maximal. My mom announced that she wanted to be called, Nana. My dad, Pops. When everyone finally left my cramped quarters, Jason and I were terrified – utterly and completely. I figured the day your baby is born is supposed to be as terrifying and exhausting as it was. But the day after, that’s when all the excitement and joy begins. That’s when it begins, right?

Jason returned the next morning and the nurse wheeled Anabella into my room. My mom promised the night before that she would get to the hospital before noon. She would have been there sooner but she had a gynecologist appointment. While dealing with the endless bronchitis (which eventually ended), she was trying to schedule a minor surgery. Since around July of the prior year (have I mentioned we should have known?), my mother had been struggling with symptoms that the doctors attributed to menopause. A plausible explanation.

Noon came and went but they didn’t show. I relentlessly called both of their cell phones. My mother was not in the business of blowing people off. Especially not her children. So, my intense anger came with a strong side of fear. My parents finally arrived at around six o’clock. My ever-punctual mother was 6 hours late. They both looked awful. Pale. Exhausted. Someone has died, I thought. I sat in the hospital bed, holding Anabella and waiting. “Give me my Bella,” my dad said. He still calls her that. Years later. “My Bella.” My mom just stood there with an antiseptic smile. She was a million miles away. She was looking through me. Someone had died.

I kept waiting. Jason broke the silence. My strong, silent husband who could go hours without speaking broke the silence among three people who had no clue how to keep their mouths shut. “We couldn’t wait for you to get here,” he said. Just shy of an accusation. My dad stared at the baby. They said nothing.

Finally, it became unbearable. I was yelling. Demanding for an explanation. Pleading for one. Yelling from a hospital bed holding my brand new baby was not a shining moment. My dad started to speak. She touched his arm. My dad shook his head. “I have cancer,” she said. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here. Today didn’t go as planned.” I stopped listening after “cancer.” Only snippets registered. Stage four. Uterine. Cancer. Surgery. Cancer. New baby. Tired. Hormones. Cancer. Easy to fix. Curable. Cancer. Awful timing. That’s when her voice cracked. It was then she realized that she wouldn’t be able to help me. She was never unable to help. She never catered Christmas. That was an exception. I cannot recall the rest of my hospital stay. That year forever compromised my memory. So much is gone. When she walked. When she sat up. When she talked. All gone. Maybe I never knew any of it. I quickly transformed from a new mom into a selfish child. Who was going to help me?

The first night in our apartment with the baby was a disaster. The baby felt all of my anxiety. All the lights were on because I needed to watch her breathe. All the windows were open (in January) because the radiators were pushing out heat waves like we were on the sun. I had a ton of questions and convinced myself that I should not bother my mother. She was having surgery in just a few hours and needed her rest. Jason tried to reel me in – it didn’t work. That night would be my first foray with anxiety. The first beats of an endless waltz.

The downward spiral quickly followed. The surgery, which did happen immediately, could not fix it. The tumor was the size of a grapefruit. Her lymph nodes were infected. The week of and after her surgery, my dad tried to come by. One of my favorite photos is of my father sleeping with Anabella in his arms. Anabella is also asleep and my father is still wearing the visitors pass from my mother’s hospital affixed to his fleece. To me, my mom is in that picture.

I spent those first weeks in fits of anger and exhaustion. Or numb. My daughter was not getting her best me. In fact, she was not getting me at all. It was a version I did not know. I didn’t like her. I was trapped, conflicted and resentful. I did not want to be home with my baby. I resented her. I resented my husband for not having more experience with babies, for not showing more confidence when he cared for her so I would feel comfortable going to my mom, for not having a job. I resented my mother for getting sick. Resentment is so powerful. Once it’s inside, it bleeds. Everywhere. Mine was hemorrhaging all over my life.

Some days I felt so strong. Like I could do both – be a new mom and supportive daughter. Sadly, I didn’t do either particularly well. That’s not martyrdom – that’s a fact. My “support” took all different forms. None of which were objectively impactful. It was apparent to my parents and the doctors that my mother’s prognosis was dire. In fact, I suspect they knew far before they let on. Nonetheless, my dad’s commitment to her recovery was unfailing. They saw doctor after doctor, they researched, they considered Chinese medicine, they eliminated all processed foods from her diet, began juicing (everything within reach was juiced… the garbage disposal rebelled… it was not pretty), cut down on meat. If it had potential and even if it didn’t, they tried it. By “they,” I mean my father. He spent all day searching for that potential. My mother, frustrated, scared and angry, let him. He needed to do it. She knew that.

My own support involved crazy acts of little value. For example, when my mother started losing her hair, I went to the salon and had my hair cut just shy of Demi Moore in GI Jane. Impressed with my demonstration of support, I drove straight from the hair salon to my parents’ house. I walked into the den convinced that, with one pair of scissors, my mother’s view of losing her hair would transition from panic to heroic accompanied by a proclamation. “Cancer be damned! Fetch me some clippers and find a video camera to commemorate this!” Of course, there was no such proclamation. Instead, she simply said, “I had no idea you had a hair appointment today. Did you go SO short to make it easier? A lot of new moms do that.”

I experienced a tsunami of disappointment. “No, mom. Not to make it easier. It’s just hair. See. It grows back.” Then, she laughed. A loud, snorty, unattractive laugh. “You did THAT for me? Did you think that I would see your hair and immediately grab clippers to shave my own head?” I persisted. “It’s just hair, mom,” I whispered. The laughing stopped like it was battery operated and the battery had died. “You’re not watching yours come out in clumps in the shower.” Demonstration of support – attempted and failed. She did eventually shave her head. The speed with which it fell out became unwieldly. I was not part of the event. No “cancer be damned.” One day when Anabella and I arrived at the house, the hair was gone. I looked at her and she said, “it was falling out too fast and making a mess.” I simply responded, “okay.”

The best support I provided was bringing Anabella to see her. Anabella was her “medicine.” Anabella was all of our medicine. Turned out she was more than just too much wine in Rome. She was part of a greater plan. A survival plan for those of us that were left to survive.

As we sat there in the kitchen, we were debating who should care for my mother’s medicine who sat in her high chair happily gumming fruit in a mesh bag. “Yes, I have to be a lawyer. I want to be a lawyer.” My frustration was rising. Before I could say more, my mother rose from her chair and refilled Anabella’s little bag of mooshy grapes. Without looking at me, she said, “I’m sure the American Cancer Society would hire you. You seem very focused on their work.” Their work. As if my new focus on ACS was for want of something to do with my time.

I decided against restraint and pushed until she explained herself. She was poised for battle. “Well, you dragged me to these cancer events.” Anabella started to fuss. She wanted those grapes. My mother didn’t move from the sink.  She didn’t look at me. My blood had gone from a steady simmer to a full on boil. This was not a conversation about working at all. I couldn’t do it. “The baby wants the grapes, mom. They’re clean.” She returned to her assigned seat at the table. I needed to work.

If you’d like to see more from Christie Del Rey-Cone, check out her Instagram!

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