Perfectionist Rehab

My mother surrendered her rights to me when I was four years old. It was the middle of winter, and I was terrified. I had no idea what to expect, and I was forced to leave the only home I’d ever known. A stranger came into my mother’s apartment to collect me, and I had to let her.

I had spent my early years desperate for my mother’s approval. I was convinced that if I were good enough, I would earn her love. It was engrained in me from the start that things only got as bad as they did because I was incorrigible. Difficult. Stubborn.

I imagine it’s easy to assume that I would hate my mother. I’ve certainly been accused of hating her on more than one occasion.

I don’t hate my mother.

I’m not sure when I started to forgive her. Perhaps there was never a single instance, but over time the weight of my emotions became too heavy to carry.

I let a lot of things go.

This is not to say that I commend her actions. There are moments when I look at my own small children and experience impatience and frustration. Sometimes I’m filled with rage because I would never inflict pain on them, but such consideration was never paid on my behalf.

I was heavily caffeinated this morning, and my mind was racing. I found myself fixating on my childhood, as I often do on Mother’s Day. It’s possible, and even probable, that my own mother chose to give me up because that was the easier option. Maybe she was even relieved to no longer have me live with her.

Maybe it was the worst day of her life.

One of the most painful lessons I’ve learned in my life is that abuse isn’t the absence of love. Love can fuel abuse, because the attacker may feel that they are doing right by their victim. Putting them in their place. Rectifying bad behavior. Discipline. In my foster mother’s case, it was clear that she loved me. The only way she could have projected all her self-loathing onto me was if she truly saw me as her daughter. It’s not particularly comforting.

I came to the realization some time ago that it may have been the worst day of my birth mother’s life when I was taken. It may have meant that she failed. She may have had to heal from the loss.

It may have been a sacrifice.

I come from a long line of abuse. My mother, my grandmother, and my great-grandmother all suffered severe physical, sexual, and emotional abuse. They took out their frustrations on their children, deprived them of nourishment, and participated in psychological torture for at least three generations before someone came along with the courage to do something different. I always thought I was the cycle-breaker in my family.

I was wrong.

My mother saved me.

She gave me a chance. She let me go so that I had a real shot in the world. I owe everything I have to her because she made a simple decision.

My mother decided that I deserved better.

I sincerely hope that reincarnation is real, and not for the reason you may think. I have no twisted desires that my mother would become an abhorrent insect or other creepy-crawly. I want reincarnation to be real, and I want to have a choice in how I come back.

I would ask to be my mother’s mother.

I would soothe her cries. I would hold her while she slept. I would regulate her emotions, and I never would expect her to regulate my own. She would always have delicious food in her belly, warm and clean blankets to snuggle with, a beloved stuffed bunny, and rosemary-scented pigtails. She would be free to giggle and play and dance. She would be loved so thoroughly she never would question her worth. She’d always have the support she needed, so that she never had to lash out on anyone. She would be safe, and she would know it.

She would have a childhood.

When I was a child, I prayed that I would die in my sleep. I genuinely believed that my death would fix the pain my mother was experiencing. I believed it was my fault that she was suffering. I had too many needs. I was too boisterous. I was in the way. I was pathetic.

Now I know that the reason I felt those things was because my mother felt them first.

I inherited those feelings from my mother. I don’t know how many generations it goes back, but I know I’m at least the fourth daughter who felt this way.

I throw everything I have into my own parenting, and there are still moments when I’m hypercritical of my behavior. Every day I try to do better, and I pray that it’s enough. I genuinely detest that mistakes are inevitable, because I’ve been taught that the things my own mother did were mistakes. I have firsthand experience as to how damaging a momentary lapse in judgment can be.

I suppress my emotions at times. I hold onto my emotions sometimes. I let things go sometimes. I breathe deeply through discomfort other times. I do all of the creature-caring tasks – I exercise, drink water, sleep as much as two tiny people allow, and try to do something for myself every day. I’m trying to be better than I was yesterday.

Maybe the only reason why I have that luxury is because the woman I’m supposed to hate gave it to me.

Maybe she isn’t just some selfish jerk.

She’s a traumatized woman who lost control of her temper. Maybe she didn’t have the resources to get help. Maybe she believed her actions were justified because they were all she’d ever known.

She had a moment of lucidity and she realized that what she did was wrong.

My mother saved me, even though that meant she’d never see me again.

Our culture compares motherhood to sacrifice, and glorifies the dissolution of a woman’s ego to serve her family.

My mother sacrificed a life with me so that I could receive something she could not provide.

If that’s not love, I don’t know what is.