I used to love Mother's Day. I LOVE being a mother, and my husband has done a great job of celebrating me as a mother.
I used to love Mother's Day. I LOVE my Mother-in-law. She raised an amazing son, and I am eternally grateful for that gift.
I used to love Mother's Day. I was so proud of my accomplishments as a mother. I had six amazing children, and they have grown to be amazing adults, and their love makes my world so much better.
For many years, I dreaded Mother's Day.
Not because of my children, or my in-laws, or my husband.
I dreaded the celebration of Mother's Day because of the train-wreck that was my relationship with my own mother. Many years ago I went very low-contact with my mother to protect my own mental health. I had realized from a very early age that things in our relationship were not healthy or right, and that I was not responsible for the mess of our relationship...and that I was unable to fix things, no matter how hard I tried.
The realization that I was not good enough, pretty enough, attentive enough, or willing enough to give in to her whims and control tactics made it seem like I was the problem.
But the problem was never me.
There are probably a dozen or more explanations for the problems. Maybe half of each one is accurate. I probably won't ever know the why of the the terrible relationship.
I do know that since she died almost 3 years ago, I have not cried a single tear missing her. I cannot. I don't miss her. I did all of that missing her back in my 20s and 30s, when I was missing the mother I needed but didn't have. I cried a LOT during those years.
Frankly, I am relieved that she is gone.
I think about this a LOT. Most people probably could not see how bad things were. They did not see the physical abuse, the gaslighting, the guilt manipulation, the controlling, the verbal and emotional abuse. All most people saw was the veneer created to keep others out, to make things look good.
I used to think a LOT about the way things actually happened and who I might have been had I had a different mother. Now, instead, I just try to be the best mother I can be. I learned from her what NOT to do. And because of her, I have had a LOT to overcome in order to be the mother I really wished I had as a kid.
None of this is to say I didn't love her. She was my mother. And she was a brilliant person. But she was NEVER my friend. And she was my first abuser. I loved her like only a trauma-bonded abused child can love their parent who abused them.
I hope I have been able to break the cycles of trauma and abuse in my family of origin, so that my children don't have to look back on their childhood and work to break free of things to which I subjected them. I pray I have been successful in this one thing. If I have been successful in this one thing, I have accomplished the one thing I always said I would do.
Today I am able to appreciate and celebrate Mother's Day again...celebrating my Mother-in-law, and my lovely friends and their mothers....but also celebrating ME, and the growth and change I have seen in myself as a MOTHER.
