March 25, 2025
***I wrote this back in March, but was scared to publish because I was in such a dark place mentally.****
I was 99% sure that at some point during this session I would end up dabbing tears away from my eyes. My mom was in town. I haven’t seen her in 6 months. Not since she suddenly left one day to move to the other side of the country to be closer to her religious cult she now so blindly followed.
She was the catalyst to me signing up for therapy. I had a call with her that Sunday, were I confessed I started going to therapy. She said she was happy I was doing that and I told her that if she wanted to help she could get rid of the storage locker that she had thrusted upon me to finance.
Upon her move back in September, my mom had placed everything that did not fit into her new life on the east coast into this locker. It contained everything from when we were a family: family photos, memories, cameras, hobby materials, furniture. Everything from back when we were a complete unit. I thought by her renting the storage locker, that meant she had plans to return one day to the west coast. When October rolled around, she had dashed that hope by declaring that the storage locker was all mine now and asking me to take over the payments. My mom texted me later that night telling me she’s sorry that she had forced the unit on me and that she would work on clearing it out.
The next day she calls me saying the unit is almost cleared. I asked her if she kept anything and she said no. It surprised me, the way that she was so okay not keeping anything. Like she didn’t care about the family she had built anymore. I couldn’t help but feel like I was being discarded along with all the memories. It felt cold. I couldn’t understand the new her, the indifference. The mom I knew treasured her family. She always took pictures of everything, she wanted to document every milestone and event. She got joy out of her kids joy. Her family was her happiness. I didn’t recognize this women who so coldly would toss aside all of these momentos as if they were junk. I don’t know this woman. I felt like my mom is truly lost and gone.
I snapped back to the small comfy room of my therapist office. “It’s so sad,” my therapist was saying, “IT’s kind of like you lost both parents. I mean, they’re still alive but they’re both gone. It’s almost like you’re grieving their death.” I nod at the realization as a tear streams down my face. I think my situation might be worse than if they both were dead. I’d rather have had them die and know they died loving me than have them live and know that their okay not having me in their life anymore. They’re okay not cherishing me. I wonder if this is my doing. If I was a failed daughter. It takes a lot to out right reject your offspring. It’s unnatural, isn’t it? To spend your youth raising your child and then when the become an adult being okay with not speaking anymore?
This whole situation is backwards. Typically if the parent and the child drifts apart, it’s because the child moves away, stops calling. It hurts all the more when it’s the opposite. So much for unconditional love. I hate that my brain wraps this situation up with one word: unlovable. I am unlovable. This is my curse. I think I would live out the rest of my days trying to prove that to be untrue. Trying to find a crack in this sentence. I hope that I can.
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Honey to Bear 