I wrote this essay in 2015, almost a year after my ex and I separated. I never published it. But this past Christmas Eve, I got to spend time with my former mother-in-law, my boys’ Nana, who I hadn’t seen in years. I was nervous to see her, but she was as gracious and as kind as ever. We caught up like the two old friends it turns out we still are. “We will always be family,” she told me when she hugged me goodbye just after midnight on Christmas Day. I walked to my car smiling through tears, knowing my boys would be waking up with her and her son on Christmas morning. And my heart broke and swelled.

Dammit, I forgot the tomato again, I sighed as I chopped a celery stalk and dropped the pieces into the pot of boiling chicken stock. I always forget the tomato. I had made my ex-mother-in-law’s chicken soup recipe countless times, knew the ingredients and proportions by heart, could smell it in my sleep, yet always, always neglected to buy, dice and add that one random tomato she puts in there. Perhaps I subconsciously believe adding a tomato to chicken soup is unnecessary. More likely, I am subconsciously determined to make chicken soup my way, not her way, which by all accounts is perfect. Like everything else she does.

My ex-mother-in-law is one of those wizards in the kitchen, an Italian matriarch of a very large, very loud family. Her desserts are unparalleled. Her tomato sauce is legendary. She makes 10 kinds of Italian cookies from scratch at Christmastime, all divvied up into small mountains on king-sized plates that are paraded out at every meal. They are from recipes passed down through generations, frosted and dusted with the kind of love that takes genuine effort and gets rave reviews. That woman reaps what she sows.

Last year was the first Christmas in 19 years I had not had a single bite of those anisette-laced confections, as my husband and I had separated nine months earlier. Turns out my former mother-in-law’s oft-repeated mantra about her generosity with visiting loved ones — “You come, you get. You don’t come, you don’t get.” — was true.

I hadn’t gone, and I hadn’t gotten.

I tossed in the carrots I had sliced and sprinkled dried parsley into the pot until I thought she would say “That’s good” if she was watching. From the other room, I heard my 5-year-old, Evan, moan and turn over on the couch. He was home sick, his weak stomach and listlessness the reasons I was making Nana’s soup on this January afternoon. I hated that he didn’t feel well, but was secretly pleased to have a few hours alone with him while Kostyn, his 7-year-old brother, was still in school. One of the unspoken rules of a separation is that the kids are almost always a package deal. When you have them, you have them both. When you don’t, you miss them both. It is, essentially, choosing a life where your heart is always breaking or swelling. And this past year I had learned that a mother’s heart has the unique ability to do both at the same time.

The separation had not been a mutual decision, but it had been a fairly amicable one. In April I had helped to move Chris into a modest apartment about 2 miles from our small rented house. I had gone grocery shopping to stock his kitchen with treats for the boys, eggs and flour and coffee and other basics, and the essentials I knew his mother would have bought for him if she didn’t live five hours away: Olive oil, garlic powder, dried basil and oregano, some cans of diced tomatoes. I felt better leaving him with that stuff, vaguely consoled by the fact that his mother, though gravely disappointed with our situation, would feel better knowing her son could at least make a decent marinara if he wanted to.

Our boys adjusted shockingly well to the new arrangement. “Most kids only have one house, but we have two,” Kostyn marveled. And my heart broke and swelled.

I spent the next several months trying to make my time with them as normal and happy as possible, swallowing their early preference to stay at Daddy’s because it was new and cool and different. They treated it like a rare trip to a hotel, running from room to room marveling at the new nightlights and the balcony that faced the woods. And every time Chris came to pick them up and they skipped happily to his car instead of throwing a fit or crying because they were going to miss me — which is what I had feared might happen, what I had heard happens in these situations — my heart broke and swelled. Happy they were adjusting. Sad that they had to.

The first time they went to Nana’s without me, I packed their bags of toys and books, got them in comfy clothes for the long ride, kissed their heads and waved goodbye. They asked if I was coming but didn’t question my answer that No, I was staying home this time.

That weekend I puttered around my quiet house, knowing exactly how they were spending each hour, both because we had been there so many times, and because my in-laws are fiercely regimented about their schedule. I pictured the boys quietly playing with Nana’s pewter figurines they are not supposed to touch upstairs. I imagined them sitting at her kitchen table painting, and in her small living room opening the presents she’d no doubt hidden in gift bags beneath piles of tissue paper. I could see the dining room table where the adults would sit and have coffee and treats and talk for hours, probably about me in hushed tones. I knew my mother-in-law would be studying the boys for signs of emotional distress, and I prayed they were acting like the happy, well-adjusted kids they usually were.

I missed my ex’s mom that weekend in the same way parents sometimes miss parts of their kid’s childhood they know they cannot get back. I had loved sitting at that dining room table for hours. I had loved seeing the joy on her face watching the boys open their presents, and listening to their latest phrases and songs.

They came bounding back into the house after that weekend with new sweatsuits on, and when I pulled them close for hugs, I inhaled the faint scent of my former mother-in-law’s house, traces of Pine-Sol and bath soap that made me nostalgic and sad.

They had made the same trek up to Nana’s a handful of times since that first visit as a threesome, and each time it got more normal for Mommy to not be riding shotgun. They started to share fewer details of their visits when they returned, as one trip without Mommy stretched to five, and the memory of Nana’s cookies began to fade from my palate.

By the time the soup had simmered and the house smelled as close to Nana’s kitchen as I could get it, my older son was home from school and the younger one was asleep on the couch. So what was intended as a healing supper for one became a bit of a Mommy-son date night for the other. Kostyn helped me set the table for two while I boiled some ditalini to add to our bowls.

As we slurped we judged the meal against Nana’s Original, a chicken soup ritual. That night, she took the top spot.

“This is really good, Mommy, but Nana’s is the best,” he said.

“Absolutely,” I agreed, thinking I bet if I had added that tomato…

Then he stopped my spoon in the air with his next question.

“Did you ever go to Nana’s house?”

A lump grew in my throat. I studied his face to see if he was kidding. “Yes,” I said. I did not mean for my voice to be quivering. “Many, many times. You don’t remember?”

“You did?” he marveled. “WHEN?!” I remained as expressionless as I could as a thousand thoughts crashed through my mind and battered my heart. Way back when we had separated, people had told me of this phenomenon, where kids who are younger than 7 when their parents split up begin to forget what their family was like when everyone lived under one roof. At the time the idea had brought me comfort, thinking that if Kostyn and Evan eventually didn’t vividly recall our original foursome, perhaps it would hurt less to no longer have it.

But hearing it happen right there at my kitchen table felt like a kick to the gut.

In that moment, I was reminded of the final days of my pregnancy with Evan, when I lamented the ticking clock and the kicking fetus and wanted to slow down the last moments of having an only child, of Kostyn having Mommy all to himself every day. Because I knew that eventually he would not remember such a time ever existed. And how could that be, when it had been the best time of my life?

I was not sure how to handle this moment. If I reminded him of specific times we were there together, would he become sad? Would the realization of what he has lost settle into a deeper place in his heart than it already has? Still, I wanted him to know we share a past, present and future, that I have always been and will always be with him, even when I am not.

“When you walk into Nana’s house, through the garage,” I started, our eyes locked, “you walk right into her little kitchen. And she is always there with a big smile, wanting to grab your face and kiss it and wrap you up in a hug.” Kostyn smiled, his brown eyes surprised we shared the same memory. “Yes!” he said. “And Papa, too.”

“Of course Papa too,” I said, smiling. “His favorite chair is in the living room, facing the TV. It is really comfy and you can put your feet up in it. But he doesn’t like anybody else to sit in it, does he?” Kostyn shook his head and laughed.

We continued to eat Nana’s soup and tour her home in our minds, pointing out the basket of cozy blankets she keeps by the loveseat, and the funny button you push on her toilet to flush it, and the pictures that line the staircase to the bedroom where they sleep.

That night we built memories together of a place we might not set foot in side by side again. And my heart broke and swelled.