my ****ING mother

At a time when I was depressed beyond belief, at the lowest low of my life, so desperate for someplace to lay down my head and take a time out from life for a little while that I actually lived with my mother for several years as an adult (from the guide to dysfunctional families: "Home is where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.")

At a time where I was so depressed, so beyond hope that I actually cried in front of my own mother, I finally fucking realized why I'd never cried in front of her before: She doesn't give a shit.

It took me until my 40-somethingth year of life to discover that, all these years that she wanted to be my best buddy, my mother had honestly never given a rat's ass about my health or well-being.

When I look back, I see in retrospect that the slightly detached feeling I've always had comes from having two parents who really never cared about whether I was ok, whether I was happy, whether I needed anything from them.

Two parents who saw me only as a burden, unless, in the case of my mom, I was meeting some of her needs. In which case I was the good one. And if I wasn't 'being good'? Then of course I was bad. What else? No such thing as simply 'being a child', and recognizing that kids do weird-ass annoying shit. It's part of being a kid. How could any parent not know this?

Yeah, they were young. Yeah, they weren't ready to have a kid.

Never marry out of guilt. BAD idea.

Am I being cruel? I don't know. I no longer (if I ever did) believe in 'turn the other cheek' - far as I'm concerned, that just gets you two black eyes...

And what the fuck? Why do I have to be nice to people who were so mean to me? Who mocked me, teased me, made fun of me, hassled and harassed and poked and prodded me until I felt like I had no choice but to curl up in a little fetal ball and hook my brain into books and disappear down the rabbit hole of reading for the rest of my life?

Continuing with my story, and making no more fucking excuses for my lame-ass parents:

I really fucking don't even want to talk/write about this. Again it's embarrassing, as if I should be ashamed to be talking about my mother like this.

That's what I was taught: It doesn't matter what people say or do to you - your feelings are insignificant and of no consequence.

And then I started to get pissed. REALLY fucking pissed. Like, so pissed that I started throwing things. But of course being the GOOD girl, I couldn't really throw something valuable that I'd feel ashamed for later.

So instead I threw grapefruits. I chose slightly rotten ones, full of juice, and they smashed, nicely, all over the kitchen floor, with lots of messy, sticky splatters everywhere that I left for mom to clean up. A couple of times I even imagined that it was her HEAD that was splattering...not in any gruesome, gory way, but sort of in the abstract, like a cartoon. I'm not really into blood and guts.

Growing up, if I ever had a problem, who did I turn to? Nobody. My dad would make fun of me, or lecture me, which was even worse - not only did he not have any clue whatsoever about what I was talking about, but he'd make me feel guilty for bringing it up, as if it was some sort of crime to not be able to figure something out all by myself even though I was only a child.

And this: I was never allowed to say anything mean back to my mother because she was so sensitive. She had been wounded so badly as a child that she had to be protected at all costs from the terrible children, her own fucking children, for fuck's sake.

So if I was mad about something, it didn't matter what the reason was, I had to suck it up. Because god forbid that I should make my parents uncomfortable in any way.

My job was to need nothing, to be as inconspicuous as possible; silent, a ghost. Invisible.

Which is exactly what I became, and I fight this feeling every day of my life: The feeling that I have no right to exist, to take up space on this planet. That I must constantly be earning my keep in some way, that it's never ok for me to just relax and enjoy life.

This feels random and meandering and I'm afraid it doesn't make any sense at all.

But I have GOT to drain this wound. Let this fucking PAIN out so the fucking abscess can heal and can maybe have some small fucking chance at getting on with my life before it's too late and there's no time left.

And that's another thing: I've been getting that shunning thing lately that men, especially young, white American men, do to middle-aged single women (I've been told that I'm "very obviously single" - what the fuck, is there some kind of sign tattooed on my forehead that everyone can see but me? Lots of kids and other women seem to assume I'm a mom. Maybe I'm just a fucking chameleon. Or, maybe people see what they want to see.)

These rude-ass kids look - or even sometimes walk - right THROUGH me, as if I don't exist. I've taken to walking like a football player who'll bash right into the sons-of-bitches if they don't give me some fucking space. The idea that I've already put up with so much crap - pain, depression, endless disappointment - and now THIS on top of it? Reminds me of half a dozen years before my grandfather died, I took a boyfriend I had at the time over to visit him. The bf asked gp something about how life was treating him, and Grandpa replied, "I'm just trying to get through it."

Jeez, with that attitude running in the family veins, no wonder I'm frickin' depressed!