A few years ago my mom told me something I'll never forget. During a moment when it was just the two of us together, she turned to me and said, if she could do it all over again, she wouldn't have had children.
For the longest time this has played over and over in my head, and I have not been able to help but feel a little hurt.
But I recently stumbled upon a realization, after replaying it in my head for the zillionth time.
It wasn't about me, my quality or worth.
It was about her.
I think it was her way of kind of saying sorry.
6 comments:
My mom's lecture on the birds and the bees contained the information that my brother was a "rubber baby" and my sister and I were "diaphragm babies." She followed this up with the exclamation, "Thank god your generation can get The Pill."
Really, a statistical analysis of birth control efficacy would have been more informative and less painful to hear, especially since each time I told her I was pregnant she greeted the news with a heavy sigh and an "Oh, dear." First miscarriage evoked "It's just as well." THIS from a woman whose position on abortion was, "Nobody's going to murder MY gene pool."
Just saying, moms mean well, but sometimes their communication is a bit wack. I'm sure I've offended my kids once or twice. Or a zillion times :-)
So many older moms have this same talk with their kids, and so many times the, now adult, kids are so focussed on how wounded they are that they don't hear the actual drive behind their mother's words...
good for you, to put yourself aside and truly hear/see her...
I'd have been hurt, too, but not surprised.
I think we forget sometimes that our parents are human beings, with insecurities, obsessions, complications, and gigantic Godzilla-like flaws..
When I had a talk with my Dad last year before the Alzheimer's really set it, and I unloaded all the resentment from my childhood, but also tried to give him respect and understanding as well, it dawned on me that he had me when he was 23...so he wasn't even as old as I am know when I was in my early teens and lost in my own insecurities, obsessions, complications and flaws...I'm almost 40 and this stuff isn't easy and I remember was 23 was like.
If that was indeed your mother's way of saying sorry, I hope that you'll take that and hold on to that and even find some comfort in it.
Ditto Angie.
I love you, Sarah.
I'm sure my mother is cursing my birth as I type right about now.
See I was supposed to go to the family Christmas tonight, and I'm not. She'll get over it, or not. Whatever.
My mom told me that I was the product of rape. I was like, "Um, mom, even if that is true, and I seriously doubt it, you probably should have kept THAT information to yur self."
xx
Post a Comment