Anne, I just wanted to commend you for recognizing the subtle ways in which the issues of the parent end up getting handed down to the child if they aren't dealt with. That happened very much with my mother and me -- her own abuse, which she hadn't dealt with, permeated our relationship. The way she would get furious at my perceived timidity. The way accusations seemed to be constantly flying about my obsession with boys, when I had zero interest in dating (even more bizarre, when I wanted to paint my nails pink at the age of 9... apparently I was trying attract male attention?). The message was clear: if someone overpowered me, it was my fault for not standing up for myself; if someone was sexually inappropriate with me, it was because I was asking for it. I got all the messages that abused kids give themselves -- except, thankfully, without the abuse.

Actually, for a lot of reasons that would take a long time to explain, I was in real danger of being sexually abused as a kid, and thinking back to the way it was then... she always SAID to tell her if anything ever happened to me, but she always ACTED as if anything like that would be my fault -- because she hadn't yet stopped blaming herself for her own abuse. I would never have told her. Thank heaven it never happened.

Sadly, this also meant that some of the screamingly obvious signs of emotional troubles with me went totally unnoticed (or were attributed to my "shyness" or "unassertiveness", or insert whatever adjective my mom didn't like about herself here). I looked back at old report cards all the way back to preschool, and there were red flags EVERYWHERE for depression, as it manifests itself in childhood. Thing was, I was a great student... so no one did anything. A couple decades of untreated depression later, and I'm still digging myself out of the hole.

So I wanted to say, thank you for trying to handle this. Some healing has taken place between me and my mom... as she finally dealt with her own abuse, she was able to deal with me for the real me, not the projection of herself she placed on me. It's never too late, of course... but the earlier the better.