Mercy
I’m an over-thinker and and over-sharer. So I thought, why not use Mother’s Day as an opportunity to over-share with everyone what my journey has been like raising my teenagers? No, I am not going to whine about how my teens are turds because we all have that story. What I will share is the freaking heartache that I have felt in discovering that my own strained relationship with my mom is 90% my fault and this whole time I blamed her 100%. Being wrong sucks! Asking for forgiveness is hard! No one wants to be more right than me. This is a self discovery that I have accepted months ago. So at Thanksgiving, I wrote my mom a note asking for forgiveness and mercy. In the note I told her that I always thought I would grow up and be a better mom than her. Yup - I said that. Some of you read my blog about my mother that I wrote for Mother’s Day years ago (Title: Flaws). I guess that post was the first step in realizing that I thought I was so much better than her. But the problem is that instead of leaning in, I held my ground and thought if I just ignored it enough that I would some how be better than my mom. The tighter I held onto wanting to be better than my mom, the worse I got. I’m here to tell you that as vain as it sounds, she raised my brother and I and we are great people. In the end, she wasn’t a horrible mother. I have had many incidents within the last three years to point the finger to me; I am no better at being a mom than my mom was at raising me. My mom left her family in the Philippines, came to the US, went thru the process of being an American citizen, worked her ass off as a nurse and still managed to raise my brother and I as nice, decent American-loving people. I am raising rude, entitled, self-centered kids. Of course I will get push back on that statement - friends will say, “You’re being hard on yourself, Barb. All teenagers are like that.” But fuck that. I say, “Nope!” Because not all teenagers are like mine. And one of the biggest problems that faces America these days is the dismantling of families. The convenience of all members doing their own shit and forgetting about family values. How can we have family values if I’m too busy on social media, too busy trying to get my aspirations out there in the universe, while their father is busy running a football team? The journey of raising teenagers is to figure this out. What are our values? What do I want my family to hold onto? To understand that means I had to learn that it all boils down to time and timing. For years I had packed my days/weeks/months/years with activity after activity to be “that mom” who does it all. When in reality - I ain’t doing shit. Nowadays, I feel better. I feel like I sort of have a handle on what I’m meant to be doing. However, the one “demon” I’m dealing with is my mom. My problem is letting go of the need to receive mercy and forgiveness from my mom. I have been pushing her away for decades. DECADES! If we wait around for Bella to discover that I was a pretty good mom when she turns 54, I will be 92. And BTW, that day may never come for her. For practical purposes, I have to start with the one that has less time on the clock. My mom. But it’s so much harder than it sounds. No matter how much I try to explain things - feelings - my mom does not get it. She lets me talk and she listens. She has never once responded, replied or referred to anything I’ve written or said to her. It’s like trying to get water from a stone.
Speaking of doing their own shit, did I tell you that my daughter has decided to watch every single episode of Sex in the City? (Cringe, yikes and wtf all at once). So in the spirit of Sarah Jessica Parker’s character, Carrie let me ask…Is the attempt to get forgiveness from my mom something I need or is the idea of being forgiven a hope that my own daughter will turn the corner sooner?
Pinches,
Barb
