How to Take Care of Your Mental Health While Grieving a Mother Who’s Gone

Because love doesn’t disappear—and neither does grief (unfortunately).

Let’s just say it: Mother’s Day can be hard when your mom is no longer here. The commercials cue the violin music. Store aisles bloom with pink tulips and “Best Mom Ever” mugs. And there you are—just trying to buy paper towels without collapsing next to a life-sized “Call Your Mom!” display.

For me, the grief of losing my mother isn’t just something I carry. It’s something I wrote through. My book, Smoke, is laced with that loss: the ache of it, the confusion, the longing, and the way it shaped who I became. Writing it has been part memoir, part mourning, part exhale.

Whether your mother passed recently or decades ago, missing her doesn’t always show up with a calendar invite. Sometimes it hits like an emotional sneeze—sudden, messy, and hard to explain. And when it does, your mental health deserves care, not shame.

So, here’s how to gently (and sometimes awkwardly) support yourself when you’re grieving a mother who’s gone:

1. Acknowledge the Hole She Left

Grief is not something you “get over.” It’s something you learn to live with—like a tattoo that stays fresh on your ribs: always there, sometimes aching, and occasionally catching you off guard when you stretch.

Missing your mom doesn’t make you stuck. It makes you human. And deeply loving. The ache is proof that she mattered.

2. Normalize Re-Grieving

You’re not broken if you were fine last week and suddenly sobbing into a sink full of dishes this week.

Grief has a weird calendar. It’s not linear. It’s more like a toddler with a juice box—unpredictable, sticky, and prone to throwing emotional tantrums when you least expect it.

3. Create a Ritual to Feel Close to Her

Rituals don’t have to be fancy or spiritual—just something that says, “Hey, I remember you.”

• Light a candle
• Make her signature recipe (burnt edges and all)
• Wear her old scarf or perfume
• Play her favorite song while ugly crying in the car (we’ve all been there)

You can keep her memory alive in your own quirky, meaningful way.

4. Talk to Her (Yes, Really)

This may feel silly initially, but saying what’s on your heart—aloud, in a letter, or whispered during a walk—can feel surprisingly grounding.

Grief doesn’t mean the relationship ended. It just changed. You can still share things with her, even if she’s not physically here to roll her eyes or correct your grammar.

5. Let Yourself Feel It All (Even the Weird Stuff)

Grief comes with the whole emotional buffet: sadness, anger, guilt, joy, longing, and occasionally laughing at a memory so hard you snort.

All of it is welcome. Feeling it doesn’t make you weak. Suppressing it doesn’t make you strong. Your brain and heart need to process, which sometimes means ugly crying during dog food commercials. It’s fine. You’re fine(ish).

6.  Seek Support—Not Silence

You don’t have to go through this solo.

Whether it’s:

• Therapy
• A support group (even the awkward ones)
• Talking with a friend who gets it
• Online grief forums where everyone uses “mom hugs” as a legitimate emotional unit

…connection is healing. Don’t underestimate the relief of hearing someone say, “Me too.”

7. Be Kind to the You She Loved

Whether your mom was the warm-hug type or more of the “eat some fruit and toughen up” variety, she cared about you in her way. And now, it’s your turn to carry that love forward.

That might mean:

• Drinking water before coffee (okay, fine—with your coffee)
• Getting fresh air once a day
• Speaking kindly to yourself when you feel messy

Grieving is exhausting. But taking care of your mental health is a quiet way of saying, “I mattered to her. And I still matter.”

In Closing, With Love

There’s no manual for grieving your mother. There’s no gold star for doing it “right.” But there is comfort in knowing you’re not alone, even when the world has moved on.

She may be gone, but the love isn’t. It lives in the stories you remember, the phrases you repeat without realizing, the laugh that sounds just like hers, and the strength she left in you, whether she meant to or not.

So, take care of your heart this Mother’s Day (or any day). Cry. Remember. Light the candle. Laugh at the good stuff. Eat the pie she used to burn (or, in my mother’s case, it was always the bread) and talk to her anyway.

She’d want that.