I had heard the acclaim for Michelle Zauner’s Crying in H Mart for months before I actually decided to read the book over winter break. I had no expectations when I started reading; mostly, I just wanted to be able to say “Yeah, I’ve read Crying in H Mart,” so that I could participate in the discourse surrounding it, as one does. In other words, I was utterly unprepared for the emotional sucker punch that the book is. With every successive chapter, Zauner dug a serrated knife into my heart and I kept thinking, “there’s no way it can get any sadder or more painfully relatable,” until the next chapter began, and the knife was pushed even deeper still.

Zauner dedicates Crying in H Mart to her mom, who passed away from pancreatic cancer in 2014. She tells the story of their relationship and how it changed over the course of her life, including during her mother’s battle with cancer. Zauner doesn’t shy away from describing the hard and devastating moments of witnessing her mother’s decline in health; in fact, she yells it from the (metaphorical) rooftops in this memoir. We often feel the need to hide our grief for the sake of others because it makes them uncomfortable, but Zauner does the opposite. I think her refreshing honesty is why so many people have found refuge within the book’s pages; it allows them to work through their own complicated feelings without any shame, giving them the words to say all of the things they haven’t been allowed to.

While reflecting on her mother’s illness, memories from Zauner’s earlier childhood are often interluded, one moment in the past triggering another memory to resurface from a more distant point in time. These flashbacks aren’t usually of any particularly memorable event. Instead, they depict the deceptively mundane, showcasing how special “ordinary” things can be, such as the love between a mother and her daughter. In particular, such scenes take the reader back to times where Zauner’s mother showed her love in quiet, unassuming ways that were lost on Zauner until much later.

Of the many flashbacks in Crying in H Mart, there is one that stands out to me as the most relatable. Zauner recalls lying next to her mother’s hospital bed, comfortable in the warmth of her mother’s presence. From that memory arises an earlier one from her childhood, when her mother would press Zauner’s cold feet to the inside of her thighs in order to warm them at night. She then remembers how the symmetry of these situations dawned upon her and she “wished desperately for a way to transfer pain,” referencing her desire to reciprocate all the years her mom had suffered to ensure Zauner’s comfort, all of the seemingly small sacrifices that pile up over time. Zauner’s chain of reflections caused me to remember so many nights of my own mother pressing my cold feet to the inside of her thighs, back when nightmares plagued me and I’d walk barefoot across the cold, wooden floor of our house so that she could me console me back to sleep.

In Zauner’s recollection of this moment, she writes that her mom “whisper[ed] that she would always suffer to bring [her] comfort, that that was how you knew someone really loved you.” I could only hear my mother’s voice while reading this line, and in that moment I realized the true impact of my mom’s actions; she showed her love for me by suffering in small moments such as these, hoping that I would recognize and understand it. However, I never fully did until I experienced it through the lens of Zauner’s writing, in which she evokes the feelings behind her mother’s silent sacrifices, even the ones that she took for granted as a child. By immortalizing the fleeting and seemingly mundane moments of life, Zauner renders them profound, deciphering the unsung acts of love shown by not only her own immigrant mother, but of mine and of all of ours as well.

Beyond being a poignant ode to motherly love and an honest portrayal of grief, Crying in H Mart also provides insights into the nature of love and forgiveness and, by extension, further insights into my relationship with my mother. Zauner candidly details all of the ways in which she was a difficult child, leading to immense feelings of guilt when she found out she had limited time left with her mother. It spoke to my occasional fear that I was too ungrateful as a child, that I shouldn’t have taken all the things my mom did for me for granted, and that I should have listened to all of her advice because one day she will be lost to me. But, seeing Zauner spend time as her mother’s caretaker made it obvious how amazing of a daughter she actually is, how she overcame her past as a “difficult child.” She showed me that one can confront and regret their past actions, but should also forgive themself.

Guilt and forgiveness, grief and love. Crying in H Mart explores how no emotion is possible without the presence of its opposite, painting them as two sides of the same coin. More than that, the book is deeply cathartic. By following Zauner’s journey towards overcoming her inner turmoil regarding her relationship with her mother, I was able to do the same.

Perhaps, though, the way that I felt while reading Crying in H Mart is best encapsulated by the song “Nobody Sees Me Like You Do,” a cover of the Yoko Ono classic, performed by Zauner’s band, Japanese Breakfast: “Even with your warmth and closeness/These feelings of loneliness hangs over like a curse/No one can see me like you do.”

Despite all the ways my mother and I come into conflict with each other, I will never forget all the nights she spent beside me, warming my feet. Truly, no one else sees me like she does.