I can't sleep. So much runs through my head at night. Most of it is grief related. My Mom passed away last May. Almost a year now. Since then my world has been upside down. Sadly it isn't because she and I were close. We weren't. Quite the opposite, I have some deep seeded resentments towards her. If you haven't gathered from my previous posts, she wasn't exactly a nice woman. Well that's not necessarily true either. She was great in public. Not much of a Mom unless you consider physically abusing and neglecting your kids being a good mom. But you don't. The majority of people know it's wrong. I don't think she did. I think she thought it was totally ok as it was happening. Then I got old enough to fight back and I fought back. Of course, then she found ways to control me with her shame and guilt trips. She may be gone but to this day, I still live by her insane rules that are trapped in my head. I don't trust myself. I don't believe I'm worth much. I believe I am the source of most everybody's problems around me and I believe I am very sick of it.
Since she's died, I've been scrambling. I don't know what in my life is real. I'm not sure who I am. I want nothing to do with anything she was involved in. Especially not my marriage. Sucks really. This was doomed from the start. I knew it but I've spent my whole life doing what she wanted, I figured this was just another thing I had to do. I couldn't trust my own judgement. But that's the problem. I can. Or at least I think I can. My kids have turned out amazingly. So if I can be trusted with the lives of children, you would think I could trust my capability to make responsible decisions.
Yet I look back at the poor choices I've made under the duress of my childhood and see how foolish I've been. My therapist says I shouldn't hold myself accountable for all of those actions because I was doing what I knew to do. I was trying to cope and trying to find a way to make my life manageable. I never found manageability until I stopped fighting, accepted the shame and guilt and did what I was told. Once again, put my head down, keep my mouth shut and do what I think I'm suppose to do. It's more peaceful that way and since I'm a master at sacrificing myself, why not? But she's gone. And I'm left trying to sort out the pieces and realizing that she picked another controlling person to be my husband. I wonder if it was on purpose. I'm guessing it was. She did tell me that she wanted me to be with someone that could keep me in line....
Keep me in line. Am I really that horrible? Am I really that impulsive and unpredictable? Am I really that stupid? Am I really not trust-worthy? Sad that I question those things. If my kids thought I thought that way about them I would be heart broken. I know that it's been hard sometimes but I raised my girls to question, to stand up for what is right, to be thankful, to earn what you get, to fight for themselves and say what they want and need. It's a challenge at times because they practice on me and as maddening as it can be, I am so proud of them. I don't think I've ever made my Mom proud. If I did, she certianly didn't let me know. Yet there are moments with my kids that I'm giggling and smiling because I am so proud of them. Took them a little bit to understand it. But they get it now and it is good.
Despite the mud I'm trudging through right now, they are my saving grace. Even if I decide to stay where I am and not get healthy emotionally, I know the way I've raised them has broken the circle of abuse. Their children will have different lives than the one that my Mom and Dad had and the way I had. And for that I give praise to God because it could have continued. I didn't have to be aware. I didn't have to know that it was wrong but I did. Even as a little child I knew that wasn't the way you treated people. I could have been a bully. I could have been narcissistic. But I am not and somehow God made sure in my heart that I would always question the treatment I received. It's phenomenal really. A miracle of sorts. Something that has caused me a great deal of emotional and mental pain but one that I believe will also save me from an unfulfilling life. I guess time will tell...
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