Retrospective

It's not your fault. You can't control the way your mom responds to you - or doesn't respond. You feel ashamed of her and how different she is from the other moms. It's natural to want a mom who loves you unconditionally, no matter what you look like, no matter how well you do in school. You yearn for acceptance, you ache for empathy mingled with reassurance. You crave love, and you wish your happy, childlike trust wasn't met with such disgust. You were made for the love you wish for. It's not your fault that you don't receive it.

When your mom expresses rage, it's not your fault. You don't deserve such anger. You're a child. You don't know how to externalize your feelings in an adult way. How could you know? You're young and inexperienced. It's the responsibility of your primary caretaker to teach you how to handle your emotions, and she can't. She's scared and hurting too and can only see you as an extension of herself.

It's OK to feel hate toward your mom. You feel squashed by her and put down, not nurtured or understood. She never tells you it's going to be all right, but that's not because all's going to end badly. She can't think beyond her own circumstances to extend comfort to you, a frightened child. She is caged by her own emotions and has only projection and laceration as her tools. She knows how to cut down, and she knows what she feels. She doesn't feel what you feel or celebrate your individuality on a consistent basis. She's on-again, off-again.

You can bury the idea of her as an ideal parent. She's not. She can't be. She's crazy, and she's a crazy-maker, asserting that her ideas are the only good ones, while manipulatively telling you that you think hers aren't good enough. She twists things to fit in her worldview, and she misuses her skewed perspective of God to shame you into thinking that she's right. She'll tell you the story about the children who mocked Elisha and were eaten by bears. She'll make you feel bad by reminding you that she should have a millstone hung around her neck for causing a little one - you - to stumble. It's all about her.

It's not about you, and it's not your fault. It's her fault. She is to blame. Let yourself be free from the guilt of cultivating thinking patterns and coping mechanisms that stem from her dysfunctional ways. You can't help it; you're just trying to survive as any young human does.

It's not your fault.