Have you ever had that moment where out of nowhere you feel this looming sense of impending doom? Where a thick cloud of dirty gray smoke just hovers over your being, and begins to suffocate you to your very core?

Yeah, me either.

They’ve started the over advertisement of Mother’s Day everywhere, and no matter what I do, I cannot escape it. It’s on my television when all I’m trying to do is watch people compete against each other in a kitchen setting on the Food Network. It’s in every store I go too, no matter if I’m just picking up more coffee or grabbing windshield washer fluid for my car. It has become inescapable.

I hate that I feel this way, this doom.

In my mind, I know I’ll survive it just like I did last year. And just like I have with every other holiday that’s came and went since Kamren had to leave. But man, when I think about May 8th and it being less than a month away, I feel like I’ve got a cellophane bag zip tied around my head, keeping fresh oxygen from reaching my brain. I find myself with the internal whispers saying, breathe mama, just keep breathing.

I’d like to put a disclaimer out about what I’m going to say next, so brace yourself for the less than politically correct.

I’ve also found myself getting irrevocably jealous lately, rationally or not, when someone else that I know announces a new pregnancy or posts pictures of their new child. I’m jealous every time they get past the 16 day mark, and I could put my fist through a wall when I see another 1st birthday party come to life. It’s not that I want their child to die, because I absolutely don’t. It’s just that I’m still so jealous that mine did.

And when these moments hit, I find myself back in the ugliest parts of grief. I hate these moments, but when they’re here, they’re here. And they take their pretty little time finding the nearest exit.

I’m sure to at least one person I sound like an asshole, and whatever other word one would use as an adjective. I’m okay with that.

Along with the jealousy and doom, I’ll own that.