Mother, May I Mourn You?

May I grieve the woman who used to braid my hair with gentle hands and kiss my forehead like the world could never hurt me? May I mourn the version of you that loved softly before life hardened your voice into something I could no longer recognize?

Because you are still alive, yet somehow, I have already lost you.

No one teaches a child how to mourn a mother who still cooks in the kitchen, still folds the laundry, and still exists in photographs—but no longer feels reachable. No one talks about the kind of grief that comes quietly: the silence at the dinner table, the absence hidden in presence, the ache of looking at your mother and realizing you miss someone standing right in front of you.

I miss your gentleness. I miss being little enough to fit in your arms and believing that your love could protect me from everything. I miss the days when “anak” sounded warm instead of distant.

And maybe that is the cruelest part of all—grieving not death, but change. I am grieving the way time, exhaustion, anger, and pain can turn love into something unfamiliar.

So mother, may I mourn you? May I cry for the version of you I carry in old memories? May I ache for the home I once found in your voice? May I admit that loving you and hurting because of you can exist in the same breath?

Because despite everything, a child never truly stops searching for their mother. Even in grief. Even in silence. Even after becoming a stranger to the very person who first taught them what love was.