Things really do change
In reading over the past journals last month, I was struck hard by how much my relationship with my mom has changed over the last few years. If you remember, she had next to no interest in us for the longest time. When I was so terribly, terribly sick when Jonah was a baby and had spent 5 days in the hospital she came down to help with Jonah while I was actually hospitalized, but she left literally half an hour after I got home. The weeks of recovery that followed were some of the hardest and more tiring weeks of my life. I can't count the number of posts I saw where I talked about how my mom had promised to come help and then begged off at the last minute. The ridiculous hoops she made us jump through to come visit her. The rarity with which she came out to see us.
Now it's completely different. Every single time I talk to her (and I try to call her several times a week) she begs, begs me to come out with the kids. She longs to have the kids stay overnight with her and asks for them to come regularly. Even Benjamin. Even Benjamin!
She's mellowed. The kids have grown. She's sad and lonely and facing a painful end to her life with no hope for what lies beyond. There's nothing bigger than she is in her worldview except maybe Family and that's what she's throwing herself at full force now. She didn't need us then and we were a difficult burdensome complication. Now we're her life raft holding her up over very stormy waters and keeping her sharks at bay.
I would have thought I'd feel terribly resentful about this. I certainly felt hurt enough at the time to warrant a whole lot of resentment now, but I don't. I feel so sad for her. Sometimes she still drives me a little twitchy- this isn't a fairy tale. She regularly reconstructs my childhood into some idyllic happyland which is so far from the truth that I can't do anything but blink at her when she does it. She was a lousy mom and I get all my lousy mom habits right from her. I see them clearly in myself and because of that they stand out in her. Even so, forgiveness has snuck in when I wasn't paying attention. I wish she lived closer and I hope, truly, that some day she brings her frustrating, complicated, ornery self over her to live with us. I don't think she will but I do try and make she she knows that she's welcome and hoped for without being pushy. I love my mom. I wish she had been different. She'd be happier if she had lived differently, but I can accept her in her weakness and I'm so grateful to have landed here in our relationship. It's a good place to be in with her.
Now it's completely different. Every single time I talk to her (and I try to call her several times a week) she begs, begs me to come out with the kids. She longs to have the kids stay overnight with her and asks for them to come regularly. Even Benjamin. Even Benjamin!
She's mellowed. The kids have grown. She's sad and lonely and facing a painful end to her life with no hope for what lies beyond. There's nothing bigger than she is in her worldview except maybe Family and that's what she's throwing herself at full force now. She didn't need us then and we were a difficult burdensome complication. Now we're her life raft holding her up over very stormy waters and keeping her sharks at bay.
I would have thought I'd feel terribly resentful about this. I certainly felt hurt enough at the time to warrant a whole lot of resentment now, but I don't. I feel so sad for her. Sometimes she still drives me a little twitchy- this isn't a fairy tale. She regularly reconstructs my childhood into some idyllic happyland which is so far from the truth that I can't do anything but blink at her when she does it. She was a lousy mom and I get all my lousy mom habits right from her. I see them clearly in myself and because of that they stand out in her. Even so, forgiveness has snuck in when I wasn't paying attention. I wish she lived closer and I hope, truly, that some day she brings her frustrating, complicated, ornery self over her to live with us. I don't think she will but I do try and make she she knows that she's welcome and hoped for without being pushy. I love my mom. I wish she had been different. She'd be happier if she had lived differently, but I can accept her in her weakness and I'm so grateful to have landed here in our relationship. It's a good place to be in with her.