Having a very mobile and energetic 9mth+ old has definitely made posting here near the bottom of my priority list these days(the very bottom of the list includes but is not limited to, folding the finished laundry, scooping the dog doody in the backyard, and lets not forget, actually bringing the recycling to the curb) Motherhood is a busy but rewarding job for me, it's something I've always wanted to do. It's pretty blatant that my mother's dreams had little to do with mothering. I'm still not sure what her dreams are, I don't think she even knows, though I suspect that deep down what she really wants in life is freedom.

Parenthood on the whole is a crazy adventure. New parents turn to their own parents for advice and tips on child-rearing, they don't always agree with the advice, but often take it with a grain of salt. I know there are many of us out there who don't turn to good ol' ma' and pop' for parenting tips, there's not a lot to be learned from those who abused or neglected us. My mother was not a good parent, she wasn't even really a parent, but my dad on the other hand was pretty amazing considering what he had to deal with.

What kind of parenting skills did I learn from my dad? The important one's. First, I learned that spanking isn't necessary, I received two spankings from him that were very well deserved, but that was it(My mother on the other hand, practically beat me on a daily basis before she left). I also learned that children are not stupid and should not be treated as such. My dad hated the word stupid, so he never used it and he never once talked down to me or my siblings. I always felt special because my dad not only talked to me like another adult, but also because he'd debate with me about social and political issues, even though I was only 11. In contrast, whenever I voiced my opinions about similar issues with my mother she would tell me I was too young to understand what I was talking about. My dad never grounded us, he thought it only encouraged rebellion, and he was right as far as I'm concerned. My dad only ever told us to do something once, we were never allowed to debate his decisions, he stood firm at all times. My dad let us question authority, I was always encouraged to be outspoken, especially when it came to ethics. My dad was supportive as a father, but there are some things I learned he didn't intend to teach me. My dad swore too much and yelled too much, I do remember being scared of him for a time, especially after my mother left us. My dad wasn't home enough; between working long hours or working out of town for months, we sometimes only saw our dad half the year, but he didn't really have a choice. My dad went out too much and put too much responsibility on me at too young of an age.
My dad is amazing and I love him, but he always went to the bar to "sign in" after work, and on weekends he would leave the house by 2pm to go "run errands" and then not come home until 11pm or later, my siblings and I missed more then one activity as a result of our dad's drinking habits. I learned that you really have to pay attention to your children and what they're doing. I was very depressed for close to two years as a child, I would fake sick on a daily basis, I would stay home after my dad left for work, I even did self-harm and had thoughts of suicide. I managed to figure things out for myself, but my dad didn't understand what was going on, he wasn't around enough to see that I was depressed and suffering from extreme social anxiety.
Everyone has their challenges in life to deal with, I'm thankful for my experiences, good and bad, because I know that I will be able to help my children the way my mother, and my dad, couldn't help me growing up. Thankfully I have the ability to empathize to the nth degree, I don't really have any questions as a parent to ask my parents, but I do wish that I could talk to my mother about challenging situations and know she was telling me the truth. Instead I get to listen to her "helpful" advice about what I "need" to do, along with what she tells me she believes she did with myself and my siblings. I guess the only truth I can really count on is my own.

My brother was over the other day and we were chatting about our Mother, something he's only really just started feeling comfortable with. I was describing the last post I wrote, and how this blog has really been helping me sort through my feelings. My brother told me he still can't process what happened last summer, because he was still mad and hurt that our mother didn't come back "home" last spring like she had promised. It's funny, but I have spent so much time being frustrated with my mother over the fight with my sister and her husband that I completely forgot about the spring incident.

Last spring my mother told myself and my siblings that she would, most definitely, be moving back "home". For about 3 years she's been lamenting to me about how she feels so distanced from us all(because once a week, 4 hour visits for 10 years made us so close), how she misses us, and how she just wants to get back to normal, whatever she thinks that is. 3 years ago my mother ended the relationship she had with the man whom she left my dad for, the longest relationship she ever had. The man she left was a total prick, there's nothing good to say about him. She left him, lived on her own for maybe 2-3 months, then moved in with a new man. Prior to her planned move, I expressed my and my siblings feelings about her boyfriend, and those feelings changed all of her plans. Her boyfriend happens to be an alcoholic criminal, with an extensive record, so, understandably, not one of us, wanted him around. I brought up to my mother a few incidents with this boyfriend of hers last march and she was mortified(Her boyfriend had called both my sister and I while extremely inebriated and crying(on several occasions) about nothing audible while my mother was not even home). She was going to break up with him and move home by herself but apparently her boyfriend really was a good guy and was going to change, so she would be staying where she was; sounds like the earmark of a co-dependent person I do believe.

How did I manage to forget my Mother was supposed to move home last year? I didn't so much forget as I just gave up caring, and of course her lack of help and support through the most important milestone I've had yet-to-date really over-shadowed her last minute change-of-heart. When my brother brought up how my mother backed out of moving home, I remembered how mad I really was. The difference between my brother and I is that I wasn't mad at my mother, I was mad at myself for believing her, after 20 years I should really know better. *sigh*

I think it's safe to state that most mother's know their children's likes, wants, and needs, and often times, better then their own. I have personally encountered this dynamic through the various friendships I've held over the years, and through extended family. I do not have this relationship with my mother, and neither do any of my siblings. In fact, my mother knows so very little about us, that we are no longer shocked by her absurd generalizations of our personalities, though I can't say that I have always been indifferent to my mothers strange perceptions.

My mother is the type of person who gets very distressed if you do not absolutely love something she has given you. On my tenth birthday my mother bought me a pair of tapered jeans with charms on the pocket. The charms were neat, but tapered(which went on to evolve into "stretch skinnies", for the younger crowd who may be reading) jeans were not in fashion. If I went to school wearing tapered pants I would be guaranteed to be made fun of, and I had enough things to deal with already(or so I believed). I told her the jeans were nice but I didn't like the cut and asked if I could exchange them. My mother went on for half an hour about how nice the jeans really were and how silly I was for worrying about other's opinions. She made me feel stupid and selfish for wanting something different, especially after she put so much thought and love into this gift of all gifts. Even my mother's jerk boyfriend explained that they just weren't the "style", but it didn't stop her from ranting. The next visit I was presented with the exact same pair of jeans one size up, because apparently one size up made the jeans completely different and lovable.

My mother thought I loved tapered jeans just as much as my tom-boy sister loved elegant jewelry. For some reason my mother generally bought things my brother actually liked, though as he got older she started buying him more "sensitive" or "new age" items including a dream-catcher with purple glass accents(I love it, it's in my porch), and the odd "collect-able" knock off like the "one ring" from lord of the rings. My mother's gifts to us are a pretty good representation of what she believes our personalities to be. I'm not kidding when I say that she gave my tom-boy sister(who's actually transgendered) dainty jewels . My mother viewed my sister as a delicate flower, just waiting to "blossom" one day. In my mother's mind, my sister would stop wearing mostly men's clothing and accessories and finally accept that little woman inside her. Actually, I always loved the jewelry my sister was given and often ended up wearing it. My sister would get mad at me, not because she liked the jewelry, but because I was wearing something she received from my mother(she always equated my mother's gifts as my mother's love).

My mother had a habit of buying me things she thought were trendy, which, like the tapered jeans, usually came 3 years too late. She always thought of me as a bit of an airhead, and told me last year that Jackie from "That 70's show" always reminded her of me. I was none to thrilled to hear that comparison. For one, I was never a cheer leader. I had boyfriends in highschool, but I wasn't boy "crazy", I often was broken up with because I wasn't a slut. That comparison brought back the memory of an equally inaccurate and anger inducing statement made by my mother during a visit I stayed home from. My sister told me that one night my mother, brother and her were watching tv. A commercial for "Girls gone wild" came on and there was a girl who flashed the camera, laughing and drunk. My mother laughed and exclaimed "There's Leslie in ten years". My sister was mortified and promptly defended me saying I was nothing like that girl, to the apparent surprise of my mother.

These are just a few examples of how little my mother knows about any of us, or maybe they're examples of the lives she's mentally manufactured each of us to live. I wish the life she envisioned me to have involved more then some bimbo persona, it's disheartening knowing that someone you love thinks you're literally "too pretty" to think reasonably. I shouldn't let it get to me, but sometimes I get so exhausted trying to rationalize my mother's thoughts that I just let go and allow them to infiltrate my mind. At least I have the ability to shake my head out and remember I'm not the one with the problem, thank god(or whomever you choose) for that!

Forever Questions

Sitting down and feeding my baby is an amazing feeling; when I breastfeed I think about how incredible it is that this now 6 month old child grew from a few gamates, into a zygote and blastula which turned into this amazing little human being. I look at him and think "you're so perfect". I look at him and stroke his cheek and kiss him on the forehead, and I wonder, did my mother ever feel the way about me that I feel about him?

I'm the only child my mother communicates with on a regular basis. Whether by text message, email, phone call, or skype, my mother speaks to me. I feel guilty about this as my siblings who crave my mothers attention and love never seem to get what they want, and it's always been this way. I have spent out of all my siblings, the most time with my mother. Between growing up, the random outings, and now the communication, I know far more about my mother and her reasoning then my other 3 siblings combined. Sometimes, I wish I didn't.

My mother confides in me. She has told me things that both help and hinder our relationship, but she withholds the same information from my siblings, and I really don't know why. I often wonder if she places value on me because I have a solid grasp on reality where she doesn't. I'm strong, I really am, and  as I've said, I can empathize with almost anyone. When my mother is having problems, she talks to me about them, and I help the best I can. Normally I think this would be fine, but this is not a reciprocal relationship, at this stage it never will be.

I sit, and I look at my son, and I pledge that I will never ever rely on him for my emotional well being. I'm never going to call him looking for answers to problems I've created for myself. In life, things happen that are beyond our control, but at some point we have to re-assess the things that seem to recur  and decide whether or not we are perpetuating them.

When I was born I'm sure that my mother loved me, but I'm also sure that she didn't believe that she'd be looking to me for advice. Sometimes I think that she resents my knowledge, especially when she gets an answer she was hoping to avoid. When I was born my mother loved me, but I was just a child to her, not a person with an opinion. Even now, when I give her my input, she finds a way to belittle my thoughts, the difference being that now I realize she's just trying to cope with the reality that she hasn't grown up yet. Still, she ask's what I think about this idea, or that circumstance, and I feel obliged, but also feel an innate duty, to answer her honestly.

I feed my baby and wonder, what did my mother think her life would be like?

I can try and understand

When I was growing up people would always comment on how it must be hard without my mother around. When I was 19, I met an old family friend who admitted when she heard what my mom did to us she wanted to "knock her out". I have never met a person who said "she must have had her reasons for leaving" and I find myself mostly blaming her selfishness and co-dependency problems on her clouded decisions. I would be lying if I said I didn't understand to an extent about why my mother is who she is, I've been gifted with the ability to empathize(not sympathize) with almost anyone, so here are some thoughts.

My mother lived a very traumatic life as a child. Her father beat her mother to death in in a drunken rage while both my mother and her brother were home. She lived in foster care, where my own dad suspects there was abuse based on things my mother has said, and when she was 11 her father was released from prison. My grandfather married a woman with 5 children so he was granted custody of his children after release, a very big mistake. My mother and her brother were physically and sexually abused, their father would beat them, and one of their step siblings molested them. My grandfather died of a cardiac arrest as he was strangling and beating my mother when she was 13 or 14. I'm not sure if she continued to live with her fathers second wife, or went awol, but all I know is that by 18 she was pregnant.

Not everyone who's victimized ends up like my mother, but unfortunately with no stable household, my mother was never able to learn how to deal with trauma. My mother is a runner, she runs from anything that is stable and thrives off of chaos. It is frustrating to deal with, but I do understand it to an extent. My mother is unable to empathize with anyone else's shortcoming's, and is socially inept, she has no friends, and she has had to move jobs due to conflicts with women she works with. My mother is incapable of accepting the blame when she does something wrong, she always blames others for her actions. Oddly, if her spouse is angry at her, she "knows" she did the "provoking", spoken like a true victim.

When I was 11 my mother told me that no matter what, your spouse will always be there for you, your family grows up and moves on, that simple idea reveals some of her fears. My mother has a fear of abandonment, she is always the first to move on in a relationship, and she only moves on once there's a sure thing lined up. She left us for "greener" pastures, but has only been in abusive controlling relationships since. I sometimes wonder if my mother's choice in men helps her numb the pain of leaving her children. I wonder if she left us because she worried we would become victims. I also wonder if she was able to make false memories of us because of all the drama she has had to endure with her partners. Maybe those inaccurate memories helped her cope with the reality of an abusive boyfriend. Only she knows, but I have a feeling there is truth to my speculations.

We weren't the first

My mother had my siblings and I while she was with my dad, but we were not her only children, nor the only family she had ever created. My older sister was born ten years before I was when my mother was 18. Life was hard for my mother, she did not have an ideal upbringing, and she has never made good relationship choices. As a result of the wrong choices, my mother found herself pregnant, and alone.

When my mother had my sister she was young and confused. Though she wasn't ready for a baby, she kept my sister for quite some time. My mother lived with my sister's great-grandmother for a long time, though from what I understand, it was the great-grandmother doing a lot of the baby care. Eventually, my mother moved out with my sister and that's where things took a downward turn. My dad has told me many stories about my mother, many I thought were exaggerations, but after hearing the same stories from other people, I know they were true. My dad told me my mother was confronted one winter day by my sister's aunt and uncle, they stopped her as my sister had no mitt's on, was very soiled, and my mother was dazed. They took her back to their house and spoke with her about how she was neglecting her baby and if she couldn't care for her that she needed to find someone who could. Shortly after the intervention my sister went into the care of her paternal grandmother and my mother never looked back... that is until my brother contacted the long lost sibling he(we all) craved to meet.

My sister was around 14 months old when my mother walked away and moved to a new city, this is something I can not fathom, but was likely for the best. How could she do this not once, but twice? I always felt bad for my sister even though I hadn't met her, I felt sad that she was abandoned by my mother and that I didn't know her. It's silly to think about that now, as my mother abandoned us too, and it was probably more traumatizing as we had a longer working memory of my mother. My sister was likely miserable without my mother initially, but baby's can be very resilient to stress; 4,5, and 7 year old's aren't as quick to bounce back from abandonment.

How do you feel about mother's leaving their children?

A Christmas to forget

Growing up in an environment where the parents are not getting along is very traumatic for the children involved. Some children block out the negative memories in the years that follow a divorce, while others can't forget. My siblings have, in varying degrees, blocked out most of the difficult situations we were faced with while our parents were together. For many years they selectively remembered particular things about my mother and as a result had a much different view about her than I did. My youngest brother once told me that he couldn't remember anything before the age of 5, my other brother said he can't remember much before 4 years old. I remember being in my walker, very vaguely, but I remember it. 

What's my point here?

Memories are very powerful things, they can dictate how you feel about a season, a month, or a day. I have a memory that is forever linked with Christmas eve, and I believe my brothers have the same memory, whether they admit it or not. It's still unpleasant to think about, and I may indeed cry when I write this.

 

Christmas 1993 was the last Christmas my parents were together; it was the last Christmas in our home; it was the last Christmas at the school we attended; and it was the last Christmas we would wake up to our mother. It was Christmas eve and I remember being excited to sleep in the attic with my brother, we knew that Santa was coming and remembered that we had heard the reindeer on the roof the year before. My youngest brother slept in his room, he had just turned 4 and was still scared of the attic. I remember waiting for my dad to get home but my mother had sent us to bed before he could make it. 

My brother and I were lying in bed, starting to fall asleep while waiting for reindeer to land on the roof. Just as I was feeling very tired, my dad opened the door to the house. The stairwell to our attic was directly across from our porch door, so I heard the door open loud and clear. My excitement for his arrival immediately turned to devastation as my mother lit into my dad about being home late. I remember her screaming at him, she swore with every other word. She called him names, she accused him of being drunk, she yelled that she was sick of his bullshit, and she said she had had it and was leaving. I heard the door slam shut, the truck start, and then pull out loud and fast from the driveway. At this point, my brother and I came down from the attic, sobbing. My youngest brother was coming out of his room from behind the kitchen, balling and crying for my mother. We went into the kitchen where my dad was sitting at the table crying, and we all cried together. Hardly the Christmas eve I had anticipated an hour earlier. After a long and sad night, we all woke up to open presents and were very happy to see our mother home.

It wasn't until February that my mother talked to me and told me that she would be leaving due to an impending divorce. Why on earth anyone would ruin their children's Christmas, and not even leave for another 3 months, is totally beyond my understanding. I later found out that my mother had spent that terrible Christmas eve with the man she had been having an affair with. She left my siblings and I in tears, just so she could spend the evening on the other side of the grass.

Sometimes memories can haunt you for years, sometimes they can haunt you your entire life. I wish that my mother would have thought things through that Christmas eve. I wish she would have put our feelings first and talked to our dad alone. Instead, my mother acted selfishly, and left me to remember every Christmas, how selfish she really is.