I know what my mother is like. I know that she won't ever be different. I get that. On an intellectual level, I get that. I understand that she lacks the capacity to behave any differently than she does. I don't talk to her much, and when I do, it's very surface level. I don't talk to her about anything real. But there is still this part of me, when something goes wrong, that feels compelled to call her. I don't know why. It's like that has never gone away. I call my sponsor instead. That part of you that would know to seek comfort there, from your parent - except that I don't actually get any comfort there and I never have, but I still know that's the right thing to do, if your parents are normal. I wonder if I will always wish, no matter what the circumstances are, that she were different. Do you always feel disappointed, or do you eventually get over that?
I talked to my mom on Thursday night when I was in the airport, waiting to fly back from North Carolina. She was drunk. I don't know this because she told me, I know because I can tell. I can tell over the phone within seconds of hearing her voice. She talks in a certain way and she says certain things. I can just tell. I didn't bother to mention it, because she would have lied. And what's the point anyway? She told me back in March of this year that she was stopping drinking - or that she had stopped, in January. She told me she could do it on her own and I told her she needed to get help - almost no one can do it alone. Never mind the fact that she has tried before, so many times. And she's been lying about it ever since. It's no surprise that she would lie to me. I have tried, everything I possibly can, to get her to get help. Of course I would be the last person she would want to admit that she was drinking to. So I can talk to her from a place of "sameness" when it comes to this disease, but it is more like a barrier between us. Because unless and until she gets sober, it will never be different.
I have given her a Big Book, with pages marked. I have given her open talks on CD. I even invited her to mine - the meeting I spoke at back in March that I have the CD of - I invited her to that. Even though I knew it would be painful to her on some level, to hear me tell my own story of my childhood, the pain and unhappiness, and my own alcoholism, she would also have related - there would have been understanding on a level that only those of us who have this problem can get. And there is hope there - in my story, and happiness, and miracles. There is a solution. She wouldn't come, so I decided not to give her the CD. I've given her phone numbers. I have offered to have someone pick her up and take her to a meeting. I've offered to take her myself. She won't go. My mother's mother died of alcoholism also. Mostly I feel sad for my mother.
Despite everything I know to be true about my mother, and the way things have always been, I find myself sitting here and wishing, that if just one person could remember what Wednesday is, I wish she would remember. It's silly, I know. Wednesday is the one year anniversary of me surviving breast cancer and I wish my mother would remember that and even just call me to acknowledge it. But she won't. She won't remember. My dad won't either. Neither of them probably even know the date. My dad forgot my 30th birthday this year. I usually remind my brother to remind him so that I don't have to feel embarrassed for him when he forgets. But this year I didn't have him reminded since my brother was living in Germany - and, he forgot. For some reason, and I don't really understand why, that date is significant, the date of me surviving. It means something to me. And because it is significant to me, I want it to matter to other people, but I know that it doesn't. I just wish that it did. I know, some people would just say I am being self-centered in wanting someone to care or acknowledge it. Maybe so. But I still wish that someone would remember.
Anyway, so, what should I do for myself for that anniversary? Send myself flowers to my office and pretend they came from someone else?
1 comment:
I once stopped talking to my mom for five years. I, we (some of her friends) had setup an intervention. My brother was her hero and warned her about it, she demanded an apology from me, I wouldn't give in and told her that our relationship would cease, until she found some kind of help to stop her drinking. She was always the victim in every thing she did and it was so draining.
Five years later she came back into my life. I had a choice to accept her as she was or never have anything else to do with her again. I chose the former. In the long run, it's the best answer, because I know that when she dies that it will snap me in my ass, but I do have trouble from keeping myself from getting emotionally swatted, over and over again.
I think that you need to find yourself and surround yourself with new friends and created family. That will come with time.
Sending flowers to your office and pretending they came from someone else, at least to me reads that you care TOO much what others think about you. Otherwise, why not send them home where you can enjoy them?
How do you celebrate? By doing something healthy...getting a massage, a facial, having a private pilates session. Signing up for a series of classes, where you could meet people with a passion that you share, whether that be painting, pottery, cooking, giving massages, whatever it is. Find you passion and that will help you meet people that you will want to be around.
If you ever need someone to talk to, feel free to email. This children of alcoholics business in not east. at all.
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