To My Darling Sons,
It hurts knowing how I burden you daily with my deep seeded angst from having come from the family, which I do. And yet, I cannot unhook from it enough to do otherwise. I fled here/them half my life ago committed to not returning to this and them. I rarely spoke of my mother and never of my sister because I wanted to spare you the knowledge of the dysfunction from which you come. But since our relocation to this side of the country and proximity to them, you have not been spared. You recognized at the onset they were not safe and I am not proud to have bribed and begged you to hug and be physically close to them-hoping pathetically, that if they could fully feeeeel the magic of you…maybe it would soften them. And that was, in a way, using you. I never threatened, shamed, or guilted you for not wanting to touch and be touched to but I did encourage something I very much disagree with, unwanted touching. It is never acceptable or necessary. EVER.
I was sad and angry in ways that defy articulation, for most of my life, and had been raised to judge that, rather than to examine and heal from it. With your father’s sisters in and out of his and each other’s lives for years at a time, I did not want you to add anyone to your world who might re-enforce the idea that people will love you and leave you when you displease them. It is why I waited more than a year to share you with Sweet Greg. I know beyond doubt, that he will only love you and me, and he will do so unconditionally. With him, I am 100% certain. He is safe, wholesome, kind, benevolent beyond words, abnormally so.
While I cannot give you a happier mother and I cannot provide you a different family experience, I hope you will always remember the relationships and loving people I intentionally brought into our lives. I have surrounded you with only deeply trusted others, who would do anything for you and for us as a family. I am so sorry I cannot heal fast enough to spare you my depression and anxiety of more than 40 years. I am sorry I have leaked on to you the depth of my pain, along with the frequently spoken commitment to make certain I tell you again and again that IT IS NOT YOU. It is me, my brokenness–and it is THEM. You did not cause or imagine it and you can not fix it, no matter how wonderful you are.
Over exposure to people who don’t mind hurting you will break a person. Please continue believing your gut. You know what feels good, right, kind, and true. Your bodies and your spirits know. Because of life-long debilitating sadness, I have had to learn many things late in life about how to care for myself so I can live a better life and share with you a better way than the one in which I was raised. To do this, I must have space from those who not only make me sad, but then judge and persecute me for my grieving process. I am sorry for the loss of your
innocence and the conflict you must face each time THEY choose to gather as if it is normal and loving. I know it hurts you to participate in the divisive and unwholesome arrangement. Sadly, your only choices afterwards, are: to keep it from me –which would separate us and weaken our bond or to share it and helplessly witness my reaction of pain. I have to believe the lessons here are valuable to each of us, at least to those of us open to learning(each of you and me) I love you so much. If I could change one thing, it would be my inability to stop myself from suffering, not because I can’t take it but because it costs you when mommy is too tangled up in despair to make room for joy. How can I lead you into joyful lives when I, myself, cannot model one for you?
I am a work in progress. I love you. I will make better mistakes today than yesterday. Tons of them. I will always be willing to change and do better, and never blame you for who I am or how I handle myself. I am sorry that your families create this conflict and confusion for you. I am powerless to change that. I will never give up on changing the things I can.
I treasure how much we laugh together, how much of me you do get to know, our countless and always funny inside jokes, as well as our talks through things that are more difficult than funny. I hope I don’t ruin that with my despair—since apparently that is how I forfeitted my family of origin.
I do believe that you know whom you can count on and go to with your most precious tender thoughts and fears. You know who OUR people are. They are the ones who support us as a family and would do nothing to further divide us. Wholesome benevolent love is much greater than blood. So sad that your grandmother and two aunts have positioned them selves as walls and not bridges for our little family. It is all that they know and the best they can do. It is very hurtful and I wished I could protect you from it. Because they are entrenched in a culture where there are the excluders and the excluded. I wish to be neither, just as I wish for you to choose neither. I understand why your dad works to remain in the good graces of the collective. I feel bad for him too. Of them all, he seems the only one with hope to rise above.
I love you. I will continue, for all of my days changing the things I can and trying to accept the unacceptable and the unchangeable.
Love you,
Mommy
