Dear Mom

Dear Mom, I went ice skating on Saturday for the first time in two years. It was so much fun but also very difficult! I went with Joey and some friends to finally celebrate Joey’s birthday from December. I have a tradition of throwing him really cool birthday parties. In 2018 we did a surprise Chicago trip. In 2019 we went to a trampoline park. And for a very belated 2020 we went ice skating. You passed away three weeks before his birthday so I wasn’t in the mindset where I was able to plan anything. I was able to make a 21st birthday video for him with clips from the day he was brought home from the hospital and birthday messages wishing him a happy 21st so I’m not the worst girlfriend to exist. You would have loved that video. You always told me I should make videos for others and sell them. I’m not totally opposed but that may come later on. In addition to ice skating, we walked around downtown Elmhurst (we wanted to be as covid friendly as possible.) I got to tour the office for th...

Dear Mom, Today was a life changing day for me! I helped in my first ever product launch! The company that I do my internship for released a bunch of new products today for a Greek life apparel line. I’ve been working on this since November of last year and I’m excited to see it come full circle. I’ve done influencer marketing, content creation, Facebook advertising, social media campaigns, and so much more to prepare for today.  There’s still a lot of work to do, but I am happy to see my work making a difference. I’ve already seen more engagement on Instagram and it’ll be fun to see how the conversions reflect that. This internship has taught me so much and I am so grateful I’ve had this opportunity. You would have been really proud of me and I’m disappointed that you didn’t get to see the outcome. That’s not all, I’ve done a lot of “big girl” things this week. I had a LinkedIn photoshoot to get some more professional looking photos before graduation. I also used the shoot for a h...

Dear Mom, After writing my blog post from two weeks ago, it really got me thinking about going on an adventure. I wrote that post to talk about a mini road trip you and I went on and it brought back a flood of memories. To be quite frank, I miss going on adventures with you. Whether it was going on a road trip or even grocery shopping. I’d give anything to have one more day with you to thank you for everything.  I know I can’t have that, but that doesn’t mean my life can’t feel at least a *little* more normal. I became fixated on the idea of a road trip. I then saw an inspiring TikTok of a couple that did a road trip to Utah and it got me thinking… What’s holding me back from making my own adventure? I realized the only things holding me back were me and my busy schedule. So I started planning my next adventure!  I messaged my boss and asked permission to have the days off and he was very understanding and excited for me! I was in a meeting with him when I found out you were p...

Dear Mom, You’d be proud of me this week- for, most likely, more reasons than just this one, but I FINALLY GOT A HAIRCUT! Nothing major or even anything someone else would notice but I did it for you. I haven’t had my hair trimmed in so long because of the pandemic. You were begging me to get it, at least trimmed, because it “looks like a rat’s nest.” Well I went and you were right. It looks much, much better. I got about two and a half inches cut off and it made all the difference.  Last week, I ordered my cap and gown for graduation and I knew you wouldn’t want me to have “rat’s nest” hair in my graduation photos, so I figured it was about time. My hairstylist was named Kristin and she was amazing! She’s from Florida and has a really cool palm tree tattoo. I was a little nervous that it wouldn’t look good afterwards but Kristin knew what she was doing! I’m obsessed with how it turned out and the best part!? It was only $8.99! (Don’t worry I still tipped her a normal tip.) They ha...

Dear Mom, I found a picture from Sunday, June 7, 2015 and it’s of a road trip we went on. It feels like forever ago but it’s a day I’ll always remember. We were visiting family or something (this is the only part that’s a little fuzzy) and when we got in the car to go home you asked if I wanted to go to Iowa. For as long as I can recall, I’ve had a goal to visit all 50 states and you knew how determined I am to make it happen.  I had never been to Iowa so I jumped on the opportunity to visit somewhere new. We were already in western Illinois so we decided to drive an extra hour to make it happen. You, Tony, and I made the most of the trip! We visited the Ronald Reagan Boyhood Home and took pictures outside. We found a cool tunnel bridge that I got out to vlog (back when I thought I’d be a famous YouTuber some day).  Then we got to the point in this picture where we finally crossed over the border from Illinois to Iowa. Another state checkmarked from my list. We found a cool be...

 Dear Mom, This has been another hard week. It’s starting to feel like every week might be difficult at this rate. I know it won’t always be like this, don't worry. I will be okay and I will not lose sight of that. I thought that I was doing pretty well for the circumstances thrown my way, but it will take time. I need to take that time to myself. This week I’ve realized that you cannot rush grieving. Especially grieving the death of someone so close to you. My friend Alyssa really helped me realize this. I did not grasp how much of my energy I’ve been giving to everything except grieving. I’ve been focused on my six classes, my four group projects, my internship, my digital marketing position, my sorority, my relationship, my friendships, and everything other than me. I’ve started having nightmares and I’ve lost the ability to sleep for more than two hours at a time. It’s exhausting and I constantly feel drained. I’ve started feeling guilty for the days life feels normal without y...

Dear Mom, I’m not going to lie. I’ve had a very very bad week. I went into this blog assignment hoping to write about the good things to make myself feel better about everything. This week just does not call for that.  For starters, we had another death in the family. For personal reasons, I won’t broadcast it over the internet because others have not found out yet. I hope you guys are catching up and you are showing him the ropes- whatever those ropes may be.  Secondly, I haven’t been feeling well recently, which during Covid-19 is a very scary thing. I haven’t been around people though so I wasn’t too worried. I did, however, become worried when I noticed a GIANT lump behind my ear. Luckily, the giant lump just turned out to be a swollen lymph node caused by me ignoring my ear infection. Whoops. To be honest I was scared to get it checked out because last time I thought I had an ear infection I didn’t and the nurse kinda laughed at me. You were not happy when I told you that...