You can turn ugly into beautiful too

March 31, 2011

I get triggered a lot during the day...but in some ways (and I discussed this

with my therapist yesterday), it keeps me more aware of how to parent my own

kids. Honestly, I have to make very deliberate choices in my parenting because I

rationalize in my mind whether something needs to be said or done and if so, how

do I say or do it. I try very hard to remember how I felt as a child and seek

to do for my kids what I would have wanted from my mother as a child. Believe

me, I'm not a fondue-dipping wonder mom. I make mistakes that I have to

apologize for and there are days when my youngest son makes me doubt why I ever

taught him to talk....lol.

This morning I was packing lunches for my kids for school. They eat later in

the day, so their teachers allow them to have a healthy snack before lunch. I

had run out of things yesterday and went to the store to pick up some yogurt and

strawberries. As I was washing them and cutting them up for their snack this

morning, out of the blue I could hear my mother's voice echoing, " you are such a

spolied, unappreciative brat! " I'm not exactly sure where it came from because

my mother never once fixed me a lunch to take to school or got up at 5:30 am to

make sure she was ready for her day before having to get me up. She never came

into my room in the morning, gently waking me up. In fact, I got up on my own

every day for school, dressed myself, never ate breakfast, and walked to school

(from 1st grade on) without my mother ever getting out of bed.

And I immediately felt this wave of sadness that quickly turned to tears. I got

a little angry with myself for feeling this way, so I decided to turn something

that made me remember how horrible I felt as a child into something special for

my kids. In a way, and maybe it sounds stupid, but I almost feel like if I can

do something GOOD for my kids where there was bad in a similar situation for me

as a child, it can help me heal from it. If there is beautiful in place of

ugly, perhaps that will take precedence next time I feel triggered.

So here is what I did:

I always put a napkin in their lunch box and today, I wrote them a note on their

napkin.

For my daughter (she's only 10), I put: " You are the best daughter in the whole

world and I love you and appreciate you more than you know. Thank you for being

who you are. "

For my son (he's 8), I put: " I love you so much. You are the most awesome kid

ever! I hope you have a wonderful day today. "

March 31, 2011

- I am in total AWE of you. You are such an awesome mom! I was wondering

if you would be interested in adopting a 43 year old? I'm housebroken and

everything! LOL!

Seriously though, I love your outlook on life and your approach to parenting. I

do similar things for my daughter. I don't think I realized just how sick my

nada was until I had a child of my own. There is absolutely NO WAY I could or

would ever say or do the same things to my precious little girl that my nada

said/did to me.

Just like you, I too got myself up, dressed and ready for school from a very

young age. I was also responsible for making sure my younger brother got up and

ready and off to school. Funny thing is, I never realized (until I was an adult)

that there was anything wrong with that. I thought everybody's mom stayed in bed

half the day. I also remember her SCREAMING half-asleep from her bedroom at my

brother and me to " keep it down " because she was trying to sleep.

Nada wasn't always that lazy though. Occasionally, she would manage to drag

herself out of bed and drive us to school if it was extremely cold or raining or

something. She wouldn't bother to get dressed - (just threw on a coat over her

pj's) or comb her hair or anything, and she would have this sourpuss scowl on

her face the whole time as if it were a HUGE inconvenince for her to have to do

that for us.

I agree with you that if there is a silver lining to our miserable

childhoods, it's that both of us grew up to be WAY better mothers to our kids

than our nadas could ever be. ((((HUGS))))

March 31, 2011

Your post is so beautiful it made me cry. You are a living example of achieving

what we all hope for: to transcend the damage that was done to us, and undo our

own pain by showing love, empathy, compassion and nurturing for our own children

and for others.

This is a marvelous illustration of what empathy is. You experienced real

neglect from your mother, so knowing how bad and even shamed that lack of love

and caring made you feel, you wanted to make sure that your kids KNOW that you

love them very much.

Thank you so much for sharing this. I think this is very inspiring, and

demonstrates that even if we experience abuse (even chronic abuse) ourselves

throughout childhood, it doesn't automatically make us abusers as adults.

Instead, it makes some of us even more determined to be loving and compassionate

human beings.

Kudos to you, .

-Annie

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> I get triggered a lot during the day...but in some ways (and I discussed this