Yo Momma – Part I

Well, it’s almost Mother’s Day. What does that mean to you? I will make sure here is where I enter that this is not a warm and fuzzy feel good story about mothers. Mine especially is who I’m writing about but some of you may relate to this.

Mothers Day is the celebration of mothers. Grandma, Nanna, Auntie, Big Momma whomever she is…the day is about her. Celebrating her awesomeness, greatness and sheer magnificent being.

Sigh.

How about though, the mothers that don’t deserve to be celebrated. The mothers that didn’t get it right. The mother that told you your father died like it was your fault. The mother that failed to hug you after your father died. The mother who was emotionally unavailable after your father died and left you to figure out life and death on your own at the tender age of 11. The mother that because of her own issues with her mother, never figured out how to love you and never expressed it to you. Love is what it does was her famous line. We ate, had our utilities on, clothes and needs met so she was good in her line of reasoning on what love what. Bullshit is what I call that. I mean sure the basic needs is what all people are required to have as a child. That does not negate you from saying to the children that you gave birth to that you love them. I didn’t ask to be here and certainly didn’t ask to be mistreated in the process of that not asking to be here. Therapy, don’t go if you don’t really want to unearth the shit that has you held captive because let me tell you, I am learning all the things that I probably wish I didn’t know. I have been depressed since 11, believing it was due to my father’s death. Nope, it was the aftermath of that tragic event that the further tragedies were born. My mother!!!

Now don’t get me wrong, I love her, hell I even like her a little but whew did I get the short end of the stick when it came to bonding. I get it, they were young when he died, 32. So, sure I get she may have been dealing with the weight of that, however, there are two children that may be suffering as well. As I mentioned before, in a previous blog not one damned person asked the kids how they were, Not the MOMMA, NOT THE AUNTIES, NOT NOTBODY asked. Yes I said NOT NOTBODY!! How did we get missed, or deemed not worthy of the ask? I don’t fucking know but I know this, I have suffered gravely for most of my life because of this lack of. Again, don’t get me wrong, folks may have “loved me” but the only one that mattered was the lady in the house. The one charged with raising us and taking care of us. Sorry but it was an epic fail. We survived, but survival just means you got the bare minimum of life’s basic requirements.

In this case the bare minimum of love. No hugs, no positive affirmations, no words of encouragement but we ate. Please don’t hit me with well, our parents did the best they could, or well you know kids don’t come with a manual or handbook. Kiss my grits! I understand in my case that my mother had her own issues with her own mother (God rest her soul) which is where this issue all started presumably, essentially that is not my problem. I would have thought and still do that if you didn’t have a great relationship with your mother, if you had children you would work to make that the opposite situation for your children. Again, I thought very very wrong. Sigh.

I would rather have had a small meal and a big hug if I had to equate it to what I was supposed to be happy about. Then to be told to stop focusing on who was not here (my dad) and be grateful for those that are here. Now you telling me how to grieve. For real. How dare you! You never helped me grieve when it was necessary now as an adult you want to pipe in with your two cents on how I should handle things. The audacity.

Yes, so as I prepare to go and spend time with the lady that has caused me grief in some form or fashion for a great part of my life I do so with the knowledge that I guess she did the best she could. It wasn’t enough for what I needed yet I survived. It was a minimum survival where love was concerned. I didn’t have a road map, a guide or even a damn compass on which to guide me. Not from her, where I spent a great deal of time trying to be seen by her, trying to obtain her approval and to no avail. I was a lost little girl. I had love that got me through thank God for Aunt Bea, Grandma Bessie and my strong circle of friends who were too just trying to figure it out, but that still was not the prize. The prize that I never won, lived and died inside my mother. A prize that now realized is one that will never be.

I have offset that loss by being the best mother I can to my girls. I love them, they hear me say it and they should have seen it in action. I know that to be true. Life has been hard for me.

Love has been lost for years…and to whom do I owe, as the kids would say

Yo Momma.