I have a mother who keeps breaking my heart. She never even acknowledges any wrong doing. If I get all the things I want to say to her out of my system maybe I will be able to forgive her once again. She has never asked for forgiveness. She never says I'm sorry. She never says she loves me or that she is proud of what I have become. She loves her son and daughter who have to depend on her for everything because they have made choices favoring alcohol and cigarettes over rent and electricity.
My first series of blogs will be true events in my life. Choices she made. Things I need to forgive her for if I want God to forgive me.
When I was 12 I helped my mother escape my fathers abuse by lowering her garbage bags of clothes out the bedroom window in the middle of the night. Then I stood in the doorway with him while he fired shots in the air with a pistol, as she ran down the road. He wasn't shooting at her, he was warning her not to come back. Later as I was sleeping on the couch my father interrupted my older cousin Billy as he was trying to convince me to have sex with him. My father held me by the hand and led me into his bedroom saying "I'm gonna keep you straight as long as I can". He held that same pistol in his other hand and carefully placed it on the pillow by my head. What he did to me in bed that night was anything but keeping me straight.
I know my mother did not intend for it to happen. I think she blocked it out just the way I did. I don't blame her for it, I just wish that she would have acknowledge it. I put it out of my mind and went on with life as though nothing had happened. I never remember thinking about it again. It was not a big deal to me, my dad was not the first family member to want to have sex with me. My granddad tried, and most of my cousins on my dads side. Even my moms younger brother, Glen. He played nasty with me as long as I could remember. Until he moved away and joined the service after high school. I just thought I was desirable and they all wanted to be my lover. Momma never told me it was wrong. I never mentioned it until he tried again when I was just starting to date. When he tried this time she made him move out and we all moved to Pennsylvania. She let daddy move back in with us even after he admitted what he had done to me. At least he acknowledge that it was wrong. Unlike my mom, who forced me to confront him with what he had done to me. During one of their fights they were sitting on the sofa at the bottom of the stairs in our house in PA. I was almost 16. I was the oldest of five and we were all upstairs in our room and they were downstairs were yelling at each other. It was nothing new, we only got excited when he started hitting her. During their argument she yelled for me to come down stairs and join them. "Tell your daddy what he did to you" she said.
"He knows what he did to me" I said, now halfway down the stairs.
"What the f... you want me to do? Apologize? he said" to her, not to me.
I turned and went back upstairs. She let him move back in and I moved out.
That was it no more discussion, until years later when I was married with two children.
My parents were divorced and I was about 21. My father showed up drunk for Thanksgiving dinner at my house. He and my cousin Billy(the same one from earlier) were in the driveway. My dad told me to go fix him a turkey sandwich and I told him no and went back in the house. Later that week my mom lied to me about how and where my three year old daughter got bitten by a dog while in her care. When I found out she was lying to avoid a lecture from me we got into an argument. I was mad at her because she had taken my little girl to the home of some unfavorable characters in a really rough neighborhood after I had forbidden her to. During her visit, while she was inside with her skanky male friend, Marsha, my three year old, wondered over to a chained up dog in the yard, and he bit her (it was bad enough that the skin was broken). I discovered it, she did not show it to me. When I found out from someone else who witnessed it a few days later we had an argument. In her mind admitting she should not have taken Marsha there was harder than telling the truth and letting me make sure the dog had his shots. Instead she opted to fabricate an unbelievable story about some stray dogs in the park. She knew she should not have taken her grand daughter to that house and left her unattended while she did whatever with that skanky man. Anyhow, during our argument, (the whole point in this story) she said I was cold-hearted and held a grudge too long. She was talking about me not making my dad a turkey sandwich. I argued that he got treated better than he deserved. Then, even after he had admitted sexual misconduct with his 12 year old daughter, she accused me of lying about what he had done. I didn't speak to her for quite awhile. I believe that this incident was the exact point when I started realizing that my beloved mother was not such a good person.
That was 26 years ago and just the beginning of many more such incidents. Not one does she acknowledge as unacceptable. She doesn't even admit that she was not such a good mother. I can forgive her and I have many times. I just wish once, she would say "I'm sorry" or "can you forgive me" or "I was wrong for doing...".
When I confront her, which I totally avoid whenever possible, she always denies doing such horrible things. She says she can't believe I would say such things to her. She calls me mean and cold. She made me mean and cold. I had to become estranged to her or I would have been crushed thinking she could treat her children the way she does. My brother who is eight years younger advised me well a few years ago. He said I expect too much from others. He told me to stop expecting her to do the right thing. Then it will not hurt me so much when she does the things she does. He was right, I try to stop expecting her to act morally, but it is sooo hard to not feel betrayed when your mom constantly exhibits such immoral and immature behavior.
This is just one incident. Just the beginning. I moved away from her, but she only got worse. More examples will follow. Thanks for listening. I feel better now.
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