My mom was my roommate for a year. I got to see her for who she really is.

• After my 96-year-old grandma died my mom was diagnosed with cancer.
• I started taking care of her, cleaning the house, cooking, and running errands.

I glanced down at the stove, knitting my brows together. I thought I had the vegetables sautéing at medium heat, but now the stove knob read low. I looked over at my mom, who was sitting at the kitchen table.

"Did you lower the heat?" I asked her.

"Yes," she said simply. "You had it too high, it would've burned the vegetables."

I sighed.

After not living with my mom since I was 18 years old, we became roommates for almost a year.

We moved in together when I was 31

Growing up, I'd replicate everything my mom did because her way was the only way I knew. But as a 31-year-old who had lived on my own and developed my own way of doing daily tasks — like, say, sautéeing veggies, my mom and I quickly realized we'd have to compromise in this new version of our old living arrangement.

Our renewed roommateship was because my 96-year-old grandma had died, and my mom and I were cleaning out and preparing to sell the house my mom's family had lived in since 1960. It was already a Herculean task to go through the items of a Depression kid who saved everything, and then, unexpectedly, my mom was diagnosed with breast cancer.

I had to take care of her

Suddenly, our relationship morphed into one where I was taking care of and parenting her when, for so long, it was the other way around.

Instead of her driving me to ballet lessons, I drove her to doctor appointments; instead of her brushing and braiding my hair, I helped her pick out a wig due to hair loss; instead of me playing with toys while she cleaned the house, I did house chores while she napped after chemo; instead of her waking me up with a cup of chocolate milk, I took charge of making breakfast.

Despite any frustrations that came with compromise, it was my honor to take care of my mom, who had sacrificed and given me so much over the years. With her a single mom and I, her only child, we were already "Gilmore Girls"-level close, but through laughter, tears, and conversations, the experience brought us even closer.

I saw her as her own person for the first time

As we sorted through the family artifacts of my grandma's house, I got to see my mom as her own person — a full, multidimensional person — uncovering stories and emotional heirlooms that gave me a better understanding of the woman who raised me.

I cleaned out 95 Mason jars that prompted anecdotes about my grandma teaching my mom how to can. I touched the spool of leftover ribbon that decorated my mom's bedroom curtains when she wrote her Valedictorian speech. One of her childhood friends became a frequent visitor to help us with household projects, sharing tales of their youthful adventures across the neighborhood.

Cosmically, the day my mom finished her final radiation treatment was the same day she signed the papers to sell the house. As we drove back to the house one final time, we rolled down the car windows and ate the fistfuls of candy the real estate office gave us. The sunshine warmed our faces, filling us with a giddiness similar to the final day of school.

With Willie Nelson's "The Party's Over" as our soundtrack, we made one final toast, cherishing the memories from our year as roommates.