My Grandma Died

(Left to right) Grandma Albertha, my aunt, me, Gramma Miriam, and my little sister down in the front--at my high school graduation.

This is the second time I’m saying this phrase. My father’s mother died in 2016. My mother’s mother died two days ago. Both were difficult women. Both were the epitome of this “strong Black woman” narrative. Both were insanely passionate about their families, but it was hard to read, hard to understand until they were on their way out.

Gramma Miriam and me on my first birthday (that's my mama holding me).

My dad’s mother, Miriam, had the slickest mouth I’d ever heard. She called one of her own sons an “empty peanut shell.” At my high school graduation, she told me at a table full of people that my dress was ugly, or rather, “dat dress look ugly on you.” We happened to all be in Antigua for carnival one year, and for J’ouvert I dropped my daughter off (along with my cousins’ kids) at her house and hit the streets. The next day, she was going off—“what kind of mother jus lef and don’t check she pickney?!” My grandmother was not the only one home, nor was she the one we expected to watch the girls. My uncle was there, and my dad was in and out. My dad said, “Don’t pay her no mind. She wants them there. The girls are with their family, and she’s actually loving every minute of it. She just needs to fuss.” When I finally went to “check muh pickney,” my grandmother carried on about how the kids lost her remote control. (Mind you, she didn’t want us to take the kids; she just wanted to complain to us about them.) But we picked the kids up anyway. Later, we passed by the house, and my cousin tiptoed inside to get something, thinking my grandmother was taking a nap. Absolutely not; she was sitting at her table, waiting to go off on one of us about our kids. When I was little, my grandmother called me “Meme” and always said, “I love you,” when we hung up the phone. That ceased when I got pregnant at eighteen. But then, in the months before she passed away, the “I love yous” were back.

​My mother’s mother, Albertha, was another story. I was raised under her roof, so my relationship with her was even more complicated. When I was little, I was her star. I wanted to be everywhere my grandmother was. When asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, I said, a nurse, like my grandma. Her bedroom furniture, in true 1970s fashion, was white wood and mirrors. Her closets were packed to the gills with women’s skirt suits, sequined dresses, and wool and fur coats in garment bags. The first two drawers of her chest of drawers (which I grew up calling “chessa-drawz”) were loaded with both real and costume jewelry and accessories. This woman didn’t get dressed without a brooch on her lapel or scarf. Her dresser had bottles of perfume and a gold comb, brush, and mirror set that she never actually used. (I used the brush when I snuck into her room to play with her things.) She went to church every Sunday and sang in the senior choir, which led to me singing in both the children’s choir and the youth choir. She worked a 4:00 pm-12:00 am shift, but on her days off she read bible stories to her grandkids or took us places… and then I became a teenager and things went left. Honestly, I wasn’t necessarily rebellious against her. It’s just that the rose-colored lenses she had me wearing no longer fit. I joke about her wanting me to wear a slip under my dresses, but that might be where it started. EVERY SINGLE THING became a battle. I would go to her with what I thought were small requests, because grandmas were supposed to say yes when the parents said no, but I still got a no from her and watched my brothers get a yes. Unlike Miriam, Albertha was happy when I told her I was pregnant, but then I didn’t seem to be doing motherhood right or good enough for her. Things got so bad that there was a situation that I won’t get into detail about, but I was in my early twenties, and because I wasn’t doing what she thought I should be doing, she cold-slapped me across the face. She’d never hit me before. I was stunned and devastated—because we weren’t even arguing. I hadn’t raised my voice at her, and I didn’t cuss. I simply stood my ground, and the response to that was an open-handed slap. Later, in my thirties, I was constantly bombarded with accusations that I didn't love her. The message I derived from that was, “You not letting me control you means you don’t love me.” Living with that sentiment from your grandmother is crazy. But as things would have it, in the last four years, she became loving and semi-understanding again. She ended all her text messages with “love you much-ly.” By then, I’d set firm boundaries and limited communication with her. I wasn’t the only one who’d been her punching bag one way or another, and I really hadn’t experienced the worst. When she passed, I found out she apologized to the person who’d caught unfiltered hell from her, and that cleared so much tension in my chest. Who knew?

(Left to right) My little sister, my daughter, and Grandma Albertha. (She was taking them out for NYE--to church lol)

My daughter, with Gramma Miriam in Antigua. (I don't remember if this was before or after I didn't "check muh pickney.")

Anyway, yeah, my grandma died. My bookends are gone. With all their complexities and dysfunction, they managed to nurture their grandchildren better than they nurtured their own children. Arguments and all, I slept in Albertha’s bed until I was pregnant. At Miriam’s house, I knew I could cuddle up next to her at any time (evil side-eyes and all). Miriam wasn’t happy about my pregnancy, but she was happy when I brought my baby home. Both of them loved on their great-grandbaby and helped me however they could with advice, money, or just holding my baby for me. They were both hardworking hustlers, devoted to God, and perfect ladies.
 
When I was little, Miriam had a stroke. I would either call her or see her every Sunday. For maybe two or three Sundays in a row, my Grampa Percy kept saying, “Gramma is sick. She has a cold.” It was weird. After a while, my mother got involved, and somebody told her about the stroke. My mother wanted to bring me to see her, but Miriam did not want any and everybody looking at her in her state. It wasn’t until my father came into town that I finally saw her. This woman, who kept a neat jherri-curl, had chunky braids in her hair and could barely move. I get it.
 
Before bonnets became a thing, Albertha was the only woman I knew who slept with a bonnet on her head, and that bonnet never made it to the first floor of our house. Head scarves and bonnets were not to be seen anywhere but your bedroom, and yeah, okay, the bathroom. They were not for public eyes. They were not for daytime.
 
Perfect ladies they were.

My grandfather Percy died in 2012. I was twenty-eight (going on twenty-nine). Four years later, Miriam was gone in 2016 (I’d just turned thirty-three). 2020, the COVID fog took my grandfather Jack (I was thirty-seven). My grandparents were leaving me in four-year intervals. I thought I was gonna lose Albertha in 2024. I tried to mentally prepare for a life with no grandparents. Then 2025 came, and Albertha was still here, so then I didn’t know what to do. Eventually, as her mobility declined and her mind deteriorated, I let go of trying to be prepared; it was happening in slow-motion.
 
Hours after she’d taken her last breath, I waited for all of my siblings to go into her room—not to say goodbye, but to tell her no matter what she thought, I love her. Somehow I knew I needed to be with my heartbeats for that moment. If you know me, you know I hate crying in front of people, and I am terrified of vomiting. So, on the way to the nursing home and outside her room, I shed some quiet tears and whimpered a little bit… But when I crossed the threshold and the curtain was pulled back, a cry erupted from me like projectile vomit, and at first, I couldn’t stop. The room started to spin, I started sweating, and I couldn’t even stand up straight. My siblings and my daughter had to hold me up. They all waited for me to gain composure before moving forward.
 
It was hitting me—“Oh shit, they are all gone!” I am on this earth with just my parents (thank God they’re both still here)! But just Jackie and Andrew?! Did y’all finish teaching them everything?? I grew up; I had adulthood with the security of all FOUR biological grandparents. What a blessed and enchanted life I was somehow chosen to live. Now what?
 
So yeah, my grandma died. She was the youngest of my four, and she made it to eighty-eight. The others got as far as eighty-five or six, I believe.

People love to tell you, "Life is short; cherish the moments you have with your grandparents,” etc. I don’t know about the rest of y’all, but it was said to me in ways to guilt me for setting boundaries with Albertha. The truth is, though, the boundaries helped me love her more and truly cherish the good times with her. I can say, not just in writing but out loud to anyone who asks, that my grandmother was difficult and I don’t regret the boundaries and space I put between us. It never meant that I didn’t love her. In fact, I did what I had to do to protect my immense love for her, and I never wanted her qualities to be weighed down by her flaws.
 
I don’t know if this blog is coming off like a grief-ramble, and I don’t necessarily care. I knew I would feel the urge to write about and share my feelings again when Albertha finally crossed over. And I still didn’t say everything. But I’ll end this part with this: Black women have the most difficult history. We are literally the earth mother, and we are treated the worst. This is why my grandmothers had hard exteriors. I understand that. But we now live in the age of information, access to therapy, and, personally, I am keen on reflection. It is totally okay to protect yourself from the dysfunction of older Black women in your life. It helps you better understand them, and it deepens your love and compassion for them. You don’t have to be their punching bags to love them, and it’s okay if they don’t get it at first. At the end of the day, we all mean well.

​Thank you, Miriam and Albertha. I’m praying that people see the lady and the hustler in me that you both had in yourselves.