Monday, July 6, 2009

Dogs Are More Loyal

When I was growing up, I had no choice but to grow up fast…not for the same reasons most did – like both parents working, etc. Oh, no. My childhood couldn’t have been that normal. My parents divorced when I was around nine, although the actual year evades me. (And I tell my psychiatrist their divorce didn’t affect me. Coincidence?)

My mother left my father and immediately moved in with another man. Now this may sound like she left him FOR this other man, but that was simply not the case. No – as with everything else, it couldn’t be that simple. But I’ll leave that for another blog.

For those of you who actually know me, you all know I dealt with some major issues in my past - from losing loved ones to not having a clue of what a normal relationship should look like. And most times I think all of this made me stronger than the average kid, but at the same time, it made me weaker too. I think at that period in my life I needed love more than ever, but I never got it in any way.

Sure. When I was very little my mom was awesome. However, after the divorce, my mother became a mere shadow of the woman she once was. But even before then – I was never my mother’s little girl. I was always her best friend. When I was little there were no hugs and kisses goodnight. No trips to the park or movies. No little moments. I was too busy being the one my mother confided in. Cried to. Lived through and not for.

And then after she moved in with what would one day become my stepfather, things only got worse. But again – that’s another blog in itself.

I learned only one thing from being raised by my mother. I WOULD BECOME THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF HER. I would make sure that my kids knew how much they meant to me and how much I loved them. I wouldn't verbally abuse them or make them feel like they were a burden for simply being there.

My mother thrives on the saying, "You don't appreciate anything we do for you." Bull shit. I appreciated all the times I got to listen to you complain about how your life was nothing like you wanted. If for no other reason that it meant I got to spend time with my mother. But ALL I wanted was some love and affection!!!

I was an only child until I was 14 and my mom had NO CLUE how to show love to me. As a matter of fact, she still doesn't. She'll never learn what it really means to be a good mom. Her window of opportunity slammed shut YEARS AGO. I started moving away from home when I was about eleven years old to stay with my dad. Living with him was the closest thing to what I knew to be a “normal family.” My mom was happy to have me gone too, that is until she’d realize that meant her child support would be cut out. And then she’d come to me crying about how she missed me, and me finally thinking she was going to be a real mom, would move back in. Back then I was too young to realize people don’t change.

And now this woman is claiming that I’ve changed since I got married?? That I no longer want to here about her escapades? That just once it would be nice if my mother called ME to ask how her grandchildren were doing. Or to take ANY sort of interest in MY life.

And then tells me this makes me a bad daughter. The daughter who has been her ONLY friend for YEARS. The one who takes money away from her own family to help her buy Cigarettes. Who buys her sister’s school supplies, pays her mom’s car insurance, and does with out just to be able to help her mom ONE LITTLE BIT MORE.

Well fine, I will give myself the Bad Daughter Award then...

I don't think that making my kids face the wall for doing something wrong is a crime, is it?? Or occasionally popping them on the butt with your hand? If it is, then I am guilty as charged. I was certainly never put in a corner as a child. I got spankings with a belt for not wanting to give my allowance money my dad gave me to my stepdad to buy groceries. And hours of “prayer meetings” from midnight until just before it was time to go to school. Or yelled out because I would wake my mom up to ask her if she’d get up to DRIVE ME TO SCHOOL. Oh, and lets not forget my stepdad throwing me up against a wall or two. And I am the bad mom? *rolling eyes*

I remember visiting my dad often as a young girl; he would ALWAYS hug me, kiss me and tell me he loved me. And don’t get me wrong – my mom said them too. But it always seemed like it was said with another agenda in tow.

I am sure some of you, as my readers, have had some bad experiences in your families as well. I can only imagine the amount of pain that we collectively have dealt with in our lives.

I haven’t spoken to my mother in just over two months now. Well, since the first of May. Long story short, she came over to my house to use the Internet to check to see if a MAN had emailed her, and while there tells me that my sister have her dad (my former stepdad AND drug head I might add) the 80.00s I had paid her to babysit that week. After telling my mom that my sister would not be babysitting for me again if she was going to give her dad the money, my mom got angry with me.

FOR TAKING UP FOR MY SISTER. And has the never to tell me that I’M HATEFUL and that I haven’t been the same person since I got married. To this of course I lose it. I’ve been bottling up so much so long until it just exploded. How dare she? Forget the money I’ve given her over the past 15 years. How about the fact she never comes over to visit with me or my children (when she lives .5 mile away)? Or that she’s there to check her SUGARDADDY.com membership? I could go on and on.To all this she replies that I was mean to her the day of my wedding. Now don’t get me wrong people. I was. I yelled at her. My wedding, for those who don’t know was at 4p in a Saturday. I bought my mom and sister’s dresses. I paid for their dinner at every prewedding event so they wouldn’t be left out. I paid for their flowers. I paid to have my sister’s hair done. And I had all intention of paying for her makeup, as well as my mom’s hair and makeup – but the week of the wedding things came up and I explained I wouldn’t be able to.

The day of my wedding my stylist does my sister’s makeup anyway, without me knowing, along with my mom’s hair. And I have to pay for it. Under normal circumstances I wouldn’t have gotten upset, but it was MY WEDDING DAY and I was a nervous wreck. And I yelled at my mom over it. BUT I APOLOGIZED. Then and several times since then.

But the day of this argument all this gets thrown up at me again. And when I bring up the fact that it was my wedding day, and that my own mother wasn’t there until 30 minutes before the wedding, she states “It wasn’t her job to be there for me.” So I look at her and tell her to get the fuck out of my house. Not pretty I know. And honestly, I remember nothing after that. My husband tells me I shoved the door on her foot and cut her toe, but I don’t remember any of it.

But you know what? I don’t feel bad. I mean of course I feel bad for saying that to her and for hurting her foot (and sending her to the hospital according to a text from my sister) but I don’t apologize for my feelings. I’m tired of feeling like a continuance of a cycle that my grandmother started, and that thankfully I’m choosing to end.

I now have a family that will stick by me through thick and thin and would do ANYTHING to make me happy...

I’m tired of wishing for the mother I thought I once had. I’ve only fooling myself at the time, but I really hoped and prayed that her motherly instinct would somehow magically be switched on now that she’s separated from my stepfather. (He of course has been her problem all along – according to her.) I have no idea why I would have thought that after years of her proving otherwise, but I still had the hope of the little girl inside of me.

I have been selfless in my love for my mother. I have cried for hours and days on end over the fact I can't have the relationship that I want with her. Or at least some sort of normal one. And I am finally tired of crying.

I mean what I say. She and my stepfather have screwed me so many times in my life and I am finally stopping it. My life has been more fulfilled in this past year than any other point in my life. I know the people standing by my side now actually love me and with that undying love, I have the strength to face ANYTHING. I have asked God for strength and He brought it to me in the form of tests, trials and loyal friends and family. You do not need to be blood related to have a real family - I have learned that much.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

"You do not need to be blood related to have a real family" -Amen.

I love you.

BeingT said...

And I love you too!