Sometimes I believe I have written about this too many times, but there’s so much to say. So many feelings all under one topic, the majority of my life. So again, I start from where my memory begins, in a happy home with my mom and dad. Those first years are like a fever dream in my mind. For my little brain everything was perfect;, I had my mom and my dad and that’s all that I needed. I still remember the day my mom changed for the rest of my life. I still remember the days I felt crazy out of my mind, and the days I felt crazy loved. Days went by slowly but weeks flew by until the clarity came to me, and the freedom as well. So now I sit here writing about what I never knew, and what I still don’t understand now, why doesn’t she love me?

The number one thing I hear from strangers when I speak on this topic is, “she’s your mother of course she loves you,” but they never truly understand the situation at hand. The very first time I realized things would change was as soon as I turned twelve. Everything turned into a competition, and I wasn’t winning. Getting dressed in the morning was a competition, shopping for new clothes was a competition, and even simple conversation became a competition as well. I’m not quite sure why it started then, maybe it was because she began seeing me as someone who would one day replace her in this world, or possibly she just wanted to be me, but either way I will never understand how one can compete with her daughter in this way. Each day I try to get closer to understanding what growing up had to do with sparking some kind of hatred in her, but I can never figure out what I did wrong. 

The more I continue to write about my mother and everything she did over the years, the more I start to piece together the events. My therapist told me that she probably has borderline personality disorder, but how could that alter the love for your own child? Me and my siblings worked hard growing up trying to stay sane in a house filled with war and never ending battles. Unfortunately I did this on my own because by the time I was old enough to take the hits instead of being defended profusely by my mom for being too young, they were long gone. This kind of environment was obviously not ideal, but it wasn’t all bad. Some days it had felt like maybe we were going to be happy and calm for a while. Like when she would take me shopping and buy me the things I had been wanting, or the times after an argument when she would say, “Just tell me when I’m being too mean.”. But eventually I became conditioned to the switch back into her usual angry, fiery self.  I was framed as being ungrateful for her shopping trips, and there was certainly no possibility for me to tell her she was being too mean. 

The idea of moving out bounced through my mind a lot when I was about 12-13 years old. But I think it was the uncertainty of it all that kept me around. The idea that maybe we could one day be happy, or the fact that she did do all these nice things for me in the past. But eventually the fear was what drove me out. Never being able to understand why I constantly felt like the problem was something I struggled with quite a bit when I was younger. In her presence I watched myself closely to make sure I didn’t say something to set her off or make her upset. Typically my efforts couldn’t make her mind up, she had already decided before I even opened my mouth. We went back and forth for years, angry for days, then one day we’re best friends again. I was just a confused child witnessing the absence of my mother’s emotional control. 

Honestly it’s demoralizing sitting in your room the way I did after she tore me apart. The rattling of footsteps in the other room and the booming TV volume in the background still echo in my mind as a form of PTSD. But how did all of this go unnoticed? Somebody had to have known this whole time. Men came in and out of the house but somehow nobody said anything. Nobody dared to. I remember the feeling of real, live rage forming inside of me as a result of being stuck in the same nauseating situation. I questioned everything fervently at these moments. I remember bloodshot eyes and a stuffy nose beyond belief. In my mind there was a strong desire to rip the walls apart piece by piece to expose what really happened in that house. Although the desire is less strong now, it definitely isn’t nonexistent. 

Reflecting on my past I don't think I detail enough of how it truly was. But how can you put endless nights of pain and relentless anger into detail in only a couple of lines. It was worse than I could ever write. No words can describe how trapped I felt, drowning in everything around me. My grades were declining and so was my mental health. She didn’t see that though. All she saw was an empty shell of who I used to be, someone she regretted losing deeply, but could never get back. She missed the days when I was young and carefree and everything around me went unnoticed in my young eyes. I was being punished for something I could never change. 

I never asked to be born into a broken home with a mentally ill mother, but here I am, taking life as it comes. Someday my anger will subside, and my fears will all seem so small. In a perfect world I will grasp my mother’s mind and learn how to overcome my resentment to come to a simple conclusion of peace. But the ups and downs still continue for her. For us. Although I am not conscious of it now, and I would never admit to it, maybe the strangers are partly right. I do not forgive her for what she did to me and my siblings, but maybe somewhere in her heart she does love us and wants the best for us. Maybe she can’t help what she says. But either way my mind will never change, she knows what she did and has no remorse. Maybe someday she will learn how to be better, and maybe someday I will learn how to forgive.