Why am I crying?

[Guest guest]

I am finding myself bawling tonight after reading this website.

http://www.guesswhatnormalis.com/

Especially the article about the author's mother. I just find myself

feeling...such pity for these mothers who obviously don't know what the hell

they're doing. I mean, it's really extraordinary when you think about it: all

the little instances when you can see that they're *trying* to be who they want

to be. It's just unbearable to think about it that way. Birthday or Christmas

presents that don't make any sense to you, but for some reason, it made your mom

think of you and she bought it and wrapped it up intending for it to please you.

I just don't know what it is about this thought, but I can't stop crying, so I'm

silently sobbing in the living room to keep from waking up my husband (who has

had to deal with me and my anxiety/depression for way too long...almost 20

years, and it's starting to take an obvious toll on him).

I mean, I have this one Christmas card that my mom wrote me that I kept because

I thought it was so over-the-top and full of crap that I just had to keep it to

remind myself of how two-faced she was. I was only 12 at the time I got it, but

reading all the positive things in the letter made my stomach churn. I couldn't

believe my mom would write something like this about me, let alone give it to

me. And I remember the stalking stuffers that year... They had all been

dinosaur stuff, which I loved, and it was so odd that for once she had gotten

something right. Like, I couldn't trust it. It was like, when is the other

shoe going to drop? The only other present that I got that really made me feel

good was my electric guitar when I was in high school, and it was such a weird

feeling. It was so hard to acknowledge that maybe, just maybe, she was paying a

little bit of attention. So much was going wrong in my life and here was this

shiny new guitar for me. I mean, a present that cost over $100? For me? How

much was I going to have to pay in the long run for something like this? I just

couldn't shake the suspicion that I felt...like it was going to be taken away if

I really showed how excited I was to get it. But I have to think that at some

point, mom thought, " You know, she's really going to like this. "

How many of these mothers (and maybe fathers, too), wake up and decide, " Today

is going to be different, " only to see it follow the exact same script as the

day before and collapse at night in a crumpled pile of fail? Surely nobody

WANTS to be like our moms. Nobody WANTS to deal with the near-constant threat

of abandonment. To think that there was such a time that my mom loved me so

much that she thought the idea of abandonment by me would be fatal is just too

much to think about.

99% of the time, I'll argue 'til I'm blue in the face that my mother must not

have loved me. How could she love me? She sure as hell didn't act like she

loved me. But maybe what I've been doing is just denying these feelings that

threaten to crush me: she loved me like I was a part of her. She loved me so

much, and she STILL got it wrong. It's so much easier to think, " Clearly, this

woman didn't have any care for my wellbeing at all. " It's so much tidier that

way. It's easier for me to distance myself from that, because...well...who

wants that? Who would willingly be a part of a relationship that brings on so

much pain? But to argue the opposite, that she did these things to me AND ALSO

LOVED ME... The contradiction, the mental acrobatics required to hold those two

thoughts in my one brain simultaneously is...really difficult on many fronts.

I mean, these women had hopes and dreams, too. They didn't want their lives to

turn out like this. Nobody says, " When my kids are adults, I hope they shrink

away from me in fear because of my unpredictable mood swings and inability to

function on a day-to-day level. " I sure as hell don't hope that about my

future.

And yet, look at me? One would hardly argue that I am a model of functionality.

On my best days, I'm liable to have faulty interaction with other humans. I

can't keep a job because I've got some deep-seated beef with authority figures

that I can't seem to shake. I have no sense of future... I never even planned

on being alive this long. I don't know what to do with myself! And my husband

is patient and loyal, but how long is he going to put up with this crap of me

being unmotivated and having no energy to do even the simplest things? I mean,

for god's sake...WHY CAN'T I EVEN WASH THE DISHES EVERY DAY?! It seems like

such an insignificant thing, but it's just a thousand little insignificant

things that pile up and never get done and then I am up to my armpits in failure

and I need help digging myself back out of it.

I'm rambling, and I'm soggy, and I can't breathe through my nose anymore, so I'm

going to try to wrap this up into a coherent ball of emotional turmoil. My mom

loved me and that's probably one of the hardest things I'm ever going to have to

deal with.