Mother’s Day was great. I didn’t just avoid or stuff it; I completely forgot it was Mother’s Day! Mother’s Day was the epitome of obligation in my family, to show how much I loved her. The other 364 days of the year I was reminded that I owed her to succeed, I owed her to live life so she could live it through me, the life she never had, and I owed her to look after her. I owed her and I owed her big! So much so, that my mother insisted upon a headstone on her gravesite so that we could remember her and visit her long after her death. Remember the guilt… the obligation to remember.
Guess what? I FORGOT! Last year I stayed in bed all day and cried because I knew ‘I should’ go to the gravesite on Mother’s Day but I did not want to; I felt guilty that I didn’t want to and I felt guilty that I didn’t go. Through my healing, I have now given myself permission: I don’t ‘have to’ do anything and because of this freedom, I forgot it was Mother’s Day, without guilt or shame.
Don’t misunderstand me, I am still allowing her to rule me from the grave; maybe just not as much as I learn to love differently. She taught me to distrust with example after example of how it is ‘stupid’ to trust; she taught me not to share information about myself because then someone would ‘have something’ on me and, in return, I was to gather information about them in case I needed to use it against them in the future. She taught me that to show feelings is not only ‘bad’, but ‘shameful’. If I cannot tell people the details of my life, other than my achievements, of course, then how could I possibly expose the weakness of feelings?! I thought I couldn’t and then, I trained myself, I wouldn’t. This protected my heart from ‘love’ and intimacy, allowing me to merely ‘get’ through life, instead of living it. Allowing me to feel unloveable because I chose not to share love; to isolate myself from love, like she did; and she taught me so very well.
Thanks, mom! Happy Mother’s Day! I remembered… And, I’m sharing anyway, although I am feeling a little guilty about being so honest. And, I love her dearly.
