How do I start; where do I start………………. Lord Google has no answers for this one and there is no book. We are the writers in our own stories, the dictators of truth/ perception, and unraveled secrets. So, I guess I will start with this, my Mom and I have a difficult relationship. Difficult to live with, difficult in all sense of the meaning difficult, needing much effort or skill to accomplish, deal with, or understand. Yesterday my amazing Brother graduated with everything he has come through.
I got this sudden feeling like I should call my mother. Like she needed to know; I wanted her to be proud, I wanted her to care. I know we do not always get what we want, I know life is not fair. But is it too much to ask for? At this point I did not understand what I was about to ask, what I was feeling.
So, I waited a day picked up the phone prayed for some strength and called. What was I about to get myself into? Lord! See the last time my Mother and I talked she decided to yet again turn things around yell at me and told me I wasn’t aloud to worry or feel how I was feeling, told me I was being Bipolar and hung up the phone on me after I told her I deserved an apology. I am only Bipolar when it is convenient for her. COVID-19 had just become a big thing. I called to check on her because she lives in a different state and it became a thing. She was off her meds at the time, yet I was being Bipolar because I supposedly was concerned and wanted to check on her.
Anyway, I am getting off topic I have had a whirlwind of emotions within a few hours. So, I called, and she unexpectedly answered no apology, nothing had ever happened. She began a conversation, so I played along for a couple of minutes. I said to myself I am not doing this and jumped right to it.
I said “Mom my brother graduated (her son) yesterday. He has been asking about you a lot lately. Can I give him your number because I’d rather not be in the middle of this?”
All the sudden she gets hype and starts yelling.
I asked her simply “Why are you yelling at me because it’s making me anxious and it confuses me.”
She calmed and said. “No, the TV is on and I can’t hear.” (the lies, the deceit, the audacity).
So, I said. “Oh, well I didn’t hear the TV.”
Mind you the whole time I am very aware that her newest abusive controlling ass hat of a one night stand that’s seems to always last between 1 to 10 years until she has a new one night stand and then the cycle continues literally; he is sitting very close as we are having a conversation on his cellphone because he made her get rid of hers and then tells me it was her choice as if to cover up what I already know.
She made several excuses and told me no. That there were factors in why she could not talk to him……… I dug deeper, she then said.
“I don’t want to mess up his home life, I have to get the dads permission.”
I asked her. “If those home factors weren’t an issue would she want a relationship with him”
She said “Of course.”
Then it became a lot more bs excuses, she must figure out if she wants a relationship with him how much of one, she wants, and she must do it in her own time. Which translates to never. From there she brings my sister into it (my siblings and I do not have the same parents we either share one or the other but not both). My Sister on my Mothers side was given up for adoption. My Mother has been telling me for I do not know how many years that she would call the adoption agency so that I can meet her since it was an open adoption. Yet she has not.
This one really tipped me over the edge. I told her. “Mom this isn’t about you she’s my sister I deserve to know her you may not want to, but I do. My brother has questions, his Dad has told him that he has another sibling. What am I supposed to do lie to him? No, I told him the truth.”
She then jumped to. “Well he may have questions and I don’t want to cause issues” (now you choose to care no nice try).
Again, I told her. “It’s not about you it’s about him he wants to know you, he’s lost, he wants to connect. He deserves that and I honestly know how that feels. I know what it is like to want you to care to be there to hear your voice to want to connect. With everything we have been through together with our history our past with everything you have put me through I have looked the other way because I just wanted you to care. Why can’t you be there? You didn’t keep My sister or my Brother you kept me and kidnapped me” (this actually happened another story for another time).
Her response was “Well Teneshia I’m closed off to everyone.”
I replied with. “I’m your Daughter, why me, what are you afraid of.”
Her answer. “I’m not afraid of anything.”
I said. “You must be your guarded it seems like you’re afraid to be hurt I’m your Daughter how can I possibly hurt you. I feel like it’s my fault I feel like I did something wrong.”
She says. “No, you didn’t you didn’t do anything wrong.” She tried to change the subject by asking about the dog.
So, I said. “Then why can’t you love me. No matter your intent it still feels like I must have done something wrong that I am somehow not worthy of my Mother’s love. It is stupid because I am 28 and you are failing to raise this man’s dysfunctional children and I am jealous sometimes. Making them lunch and dinners remembering their Birthdays. I do not exist I am inconvenient. You never had a chance to fail at raising me you just did not. It is still so stupid that I am 28 and still want my Mother to just show me she cares. Remember when I was little and BLANK (he who shall not be named) tried to come after you and I said Mommy you want me to beat him up for you. You remember you were crying standing in the doorway. How old was I?”
She replied. “You were 8.”
I stated. “Even then Mom even then I knew. He hurt me in a different way and I still put my feelings to the side for you I have always done so, and I still do because you cannot cope. Even then I knew even then I protected you.”
She told me. “You don’t have to protect me.”
I again stated. “I never had a choice no matter if it was a learned behavior or not it is now part of my very being. I must worry that you will die or start your drug habit again or worse. It was your job, you are my Mother.”
She tells me. “You don’t have to worry you need to take care of yourself.”
So, I tell her. “I am because that wasn’t ok this isn’t ok this is just not ok. You know my therapist once said to me that I am not ok with not being ok. She was right, but right now I’m going to acknowledge that this isn’t ok and cope with it because I personally can’t continue to close myself off I won’t do that to myself anymore especially with the few people I have in my corner. I am taking care of myself because I must be ok, so I can have the life I want I have to do better be better no excuses. It hurts to love you” I won’t be like her.
I realized that it is not that she cannot remember; it is that she realizes what she did and is hiding from it. If she were to let it in it would destroy her. That is the reason she cannot be bothered with me, with anyone. To live with the burden of the lives she has recked, the memories of people that she has broken. The wall keeps her safe; it is a wall of lies, a wall that she has crafted time and time again. Suppressing the guilt so far down that she fails to remember, fails to recognize. She cannot love! She does not know how. From her perspective she was never loved. But I loved her she is my Mother. She is lost just floating adrift, ashore of emptiness, a ghost in the shadows of hidden past no present. She dwells in the future of sickness buried deep. She feels she does not deserve love so therefore in conclusion she cannot love. In-spite of everything I still try to love her, watch out for her and want to protect her nurture her. I am a Mother to my Mother.
My mother knows no sacrifice only sacrilege. She destroys what must be held dear. I am so tired of just accepting that I am not allowed to feel because other cannot seem to care. I am surrounded by people that I describe in terms such as amazing, intriguing, fascinating, wonder filled, inspiring, as I sit in awe. These people are amazingly profound. Everyone looks at me judging as I sink to the background seeing only what I allow, nothing at all only what is on the surface. Yet some come, they see what I hide. I fear what they see. How can you see any different in your version of normal?
Fences meant to guard and keep you safe, 4 Walls in which a foundation is built, An Empty House full of people who drown into the void, Broken-Down Buildings that’s what it boils down to undeniably shattered, not hole, not complete. FENCES, 4 WALLS, AN EMPTY HOUSE, AND BROKEN-DOWN BUILDINGS.
I am signing off ladies, gents, unicorns, beings from another world or whomever you choose to identify as, this is Teneshia La’Rae from Bipolar Daily!
