[BethW]

I find the worse things get in my life, the more I want to reach out to my mother and hope that this time, if I try to rebuild the relationship, things would be different.. things would be better.. I know they never will be, but part of me remains this little girl who just wishes her mother would love her..

All my memories of my mother growing up were of me not being good enough.. I would come home with a 94 on a test and be asked why it wasn't higher. When my cheerleading squad won 2nd in a state competition, she asked my coach what I had messed up that we hadn't gotten first. She put me into pageants and when the best I would place was 3rd, she would make comments that my sister always was the pretty one.

I remember being 7 and my mother buying chocolate foil-wrapped snowmen to hang on the Christmas tree.. when she went to get out the box, she discovered someone had eaten most of them.. She called my brother and I to the kitchen and made us both sit at the table until the one that ate them confessed.. After 5 hours of sitting there, I broke down crying and lied, saying I had eaten them.. I would have said anything to be able to get up.. she looked at me and told me no I hadn't, and neither of us were getting up until the one who ate them confessed.

My mother went through periods of rage where she would just explode.. One December, she decided noone in the family was doing a damned thing to prepare for the holidays and that she was going to take all the decorations down less then a week before Christmas. Christmas Eve, just hours before family was coming to exchange presents, she decided it was a disgrace to not have the house decorated for the family to see and we all were put to work reassembling it all..

When I was 9, she told me she hated me and wished I was never born. She had health problems after having me and those, too, were my fault. When I was raped by some neighborhood boys at 11, she accused me of provoking it and even called up the rape counsellor at the community center I had went to and told her there was no reason to keep my appointment since she had discovered I was lying and was trying to cover up my promiscuity.

Recently, through my therapy, I've uncovered even more.. When I was 13, my brother began passing me around to a couple of his friends, beating me whenever I tried to say no and threatening that noone would believe me if I said anything because mom had already told eveyone how much of a slut I was. Up until recently, I had repressed becoming pregnant and my mother setting up for an abortion for me, lying to my father that I was going in to the hospital for female problems because I always seemed to be bleeding more then usual. Her telling me I couldn't tell my father I was having an abortion because he wanted to believe I was a good little girl and would never love me if he knew I was a *****. I remember the baby being so far along that they had to induce labor and them doing something to the baby as it came out.. this poor little helpless soul that I couldn't even protect because I couldn't protect myself. I remember them bagging my baby up as if he was garbage and dropping him in a metal pan.. Laying there alone in my hospital bed crying afterwards because my mother wanted me to spend some time thinking about how much of a dirty ***** I was. (I was not sure about this memory at first until I called the hospital and got copies of my records verifying I had been there for an abortion)

In my house growing up, the only way you were heard was to yell louder then the next person.. and the way to get someone to back down was to find the meanest, cruelest thing to say to get them to back off. My dad knew things were bad, but I don't think he knew how bad.. he knew my brother beat on me and would try to punish him for it. He knew my mother was hard on me and would often pick a fight with her if he saw her starting in on me then give me a 'go on.. get out of here' look while they began to fight.. While my mother rarely came to my concerts, my games, the events I was in, my father came to everything.. He was the only one I felt I had growing up. The February before I turned 16, he woke up one morning, looked in the mirror and felt he was looking at a stranger.. he decided he couldn't take the fighting anymore and left.. walked out on his family.. walked out on me..

My mother spent the next three months either crying or screaming.. until the day she showed up at his work and shot him. I was first bounced around to different family members, none of which wanted me, then eventually found myself on my own.

I eventually ended up getting a place with the boy I had dated for a couple years during highschool. When I found out I was pregnant with my daughter at 18, I longed to have family in my daughter's life, so I swallowed all my hurt and went to the county jail to tell my mother I was pregnant. A couple hours after returning home from the jail, my uncle - my mother's brother - called up and told me he just heard of my visit and I should just get an abortion and that he and my mother feel I should stop shaming the family..

My mother was back home on probation by the time it was time to deliver my daughter and so, again, I tried to reopen the door to rebuild the relationship.. she made the entire delivery a fiasco, including as my daughter came out, before her first cry, my mother calling out "don't forget to check the baby for birth defects".. her actions shook me up so badly, that I stopped returning her calls..

Twice more, I've tried to rebuild a relationship with her.. when I was going to get married and brought him to her home, she got upset when she found out he was Jewish, but followed her comments with "at least he's not a ****** or a spic".. He was 1/4 Costa Rican.. the pain in my ex's eyes was almost unbearable.. When I heard she was diagnosed with lung cancer and was having part of her lung removed, I volunteered to help take care of her.. for 6 weeks, I rode 2 buses each way 3x a week to see her in the hospital.. after she came home, I walked around 5 miles each day pushing a stroller back and forth from her house, preparing meals, helping to clean, making sure she had what she needed.. after about a month, she blew up at me one day for "eating her out of house and home" for making my toddler a peanut butter and jelly sandwich because she was still hungry after eating the lunch I had packed from home..

Both times after I tried rebuilding the relationship, I soon saw nothing had changed with her and tried to cut ties again.. Both times, she lashed out afterwards by trying to file for custody of my children, making up crazy accusations of abuse like I was letting my toddler eat glass ornaments or that I was having 8-10 guys over at night, sleeping in bed with my daughter and me (my daughter had her own bed and I'd like to see anyone fit 9-11 people in a twin-sized bed).. The second time, the judge was nice enough to dismiss it with prejudice..

Now my mother has been seeing a therapist, but she had seen one for most of my time growing up as well.. the person she was at family councelling was not the person she was outside that room and she had a habit of switching counsellors whenever one disagreed with her. Each of the last few times I tried rebuilding a relationship, I'd still see the bouts of tears and the anger bubbling under the surface waiting to explode.. That, more then anything scares me, because if she could try to kill my father (yes, he did live, but moved across the country after and cut ties with everyone), what, during these rages, might she do to my children and me?

What I don't understand though is why, after all of this and so much more happening, why when things are worst in my life, is she on my mind and why do I have such urges to call her up.. to try to talk to her.. why do I still wish she would be there to console me? I know she isn't capable of being there for me like that and I can't understand why then that's what I seem to want most right now..

Beth - I wish I could put a stop to this innate wish we have for our parents to be someone they are not. But I can't. We do have it though - most, if not all of us. I know I do. I wish my father loved me, but he doesn't. Bummer me. I can't change that. All I CAN change is my expectation for his love. So, that's all I can offer. Maybe work on that? Work on your expectation for her to change into someone she may not be capable of being?

I think it's completely natural for us to expect our parents to be nuturing...that's their dang job,...but it turns out that a lot of them just may not have been qualified (This is usually because their own parents stunk at the job) I can't speak for you, but that's how I feel about mine. They just were not capable.

emmy

[Rapunzel]

(((((((Beth))))))))

I'm sorry you went through all that. Glad you are getting it out now.

Wendy

[ktp]

Beth:

Boy, can I relate ! I know how you feel. That is all I ever wanted from my own mother, but she abandoned me at age 4 and when she did come back into my life, she abused me physically and mentally. I was the oldest of her 5 children and I caught the brunt of everything. It was all my fault. I was to blame. I never felt worthy of anything. No love, pride, nothing.

I met my husband when I was 14 and we married when I was 17 and I haven't looked back. He is my one good source. He's the one who told me I was worth it. I was worthy and he loved me. Was that ever a relief to me! To finally have someone to lean on.

My mother had a crisis a few months ago. Was hospitalized and diagnosed with DID. She also have major recurrent depression, which, at this point she's not even seeing her pdoc or her therapist, says she cant afford it.

I have finally came to the realization that she will never change. Never. I have to be the best I can be and do the best I can without her. I think really, Beth, what we want is the idea of a mother. What a mother is supposed to be. I get that here, even though alot of people here are the same age as me or younger! They offer the support and caring without conditions.

If you'd like please pm me and I will talk to you. I know what you're going through, but I think sometimes we have to think about ourselves and I've cut ties with my mother, even though she only lives 6 mi. away, simply because it was unhealthy for me to have a relationship with her and that is so very sad.

I wish you luck. I hope you do know that people can relate, definitely this girl!

Take Care of yourself.

(((((((((((Hugs))))))))))))
Kimberly.

[bethannaTN]

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What I don't understand though is why, after all of this and so much more happening, why when things are worst in my life, is she on my mind and why do I have such urges to call her up.. to try to talk to her.. why do I still wish she would be there to console me? I know she isn't capable of being there for me like that and I can't understand why then that's what I seem to want most right now..

</div></font></blockquote><font class="post">

Beth, I found that the relationships I am having trouble in often bring up unresolved past relationships. I am dealing with that now. The worse the relationship problem becomes, the less I am able to cope with it - the more I obsess about a relationship in my past. When I finally resolved the issues in my own heart concerning my mother, it was amazing how the relationship I was in currently became resolved. I had new strength, new coping skills, a new outlook, and approached the current relationship much differently, and it did what it needed to do - resolve with peace. The relationship with that current person mirrored the relationship with my mother. It triggered those long hurts right and left. I am in a current relationship right now that is triggering another unresolved unclosed painful relationship from my past. I am going to my first therapy session in 15 years on Monday. . . I'm looking forward to gaining peace on both fronts.


Bethanna