Approaching the 3-year anniversary of my mother’s leaving, I find myself caught up in another wave of a complex kind of heartache. A heartache that has kept me from writing even though she begged me not to stop. Grieving her has never been simple. The process has been packed with a messiness I never thought would tangle and tighten knots inside of me. I expected sadness when she left, an ache because of her absence. What I didn’t realize would show up was the avalanche of guilt that squeezed itself into my heart causing chaos in my mind. It showed up in relentless tides of “what-if’s” and all the “why didn’t I see’s?”
Our relationship has always been controversial for not only her and I, but for those close to us. There were elements of love, pain, anger and regret. As a child, I was captivated by innocent adoration for my mother, but as I grew older, I was overwhelmed with emotions I couldn’t fully recognize. What I do know is that our story was shaped and molded by pain; a home shadowed and darkened by my father’s sins. For years, my mother and I misunderstood each other. We spoke in sharp tones and let unspoken resentment fester in the spaces between us until there was no way to break through the walls between us. But, there were moments when she shook off her defenses allowing her wisdom, gentleness and love to cover me like a warm blanket on a cold night. Those moments were fleeting, buried beneath layers of misunderstandings, both of us too stubborn or too wounded to reach across the divide.
Growing up, I couldn’t understand why she stayed. I would shout at her about why she endured the cruelty and violence. I would berate her for not leaving and hate her for letting him hurt her. My 15-year-old mind felt like she had chosen to remain in a life that hurt all of us. I wanted her to be bigger than that. I wanted her to stand up and take us away from the chaos. Instead, all I could see was fear; silent, pervasive and unyielding fear in her eyes. What I didn’t know then was what fear could do to someone. I didn’t see how it paralyzed her and trapped her in a cycle she didn’t know how to break out of. I didn’t know that there was no-one she could turn to and that help was just not available to her. Blinded by my anger, I saw only her silence and mistook it for weakness.
My ignorance ushered me into an era of seeing her as someone I had to challenge. I wanted to anger her and shake her. I saw her as someone whose choices I questioned and whose actions I judged harshly. I didn’t see her struggles, her sacrifices, the quiet battles she fought, or the tears that soaked her pillow at night. I was angry as I focused only on her imperfections, and the thousands of ways I felt she had fallen short. Now I realize how my quiet rage had blinded me to her fear of leaving, the dread of the unknown and more than anything, the pressures that told her to endure for the sake of her family. I hated what I perceived as her failure to shield us from the storms. Resentment fueled my words and deeply hurt her. Guilt fueled her silence.
19 Months before she left, I began looking at her through the eyes of a 50-something year-old woman with my own fears, regrets and failures behind me. There was no grand reconciliation. There were no fireworks or a joyous reunion. We walked slowly and carefully, almost afraid of the other. It was just a series of small, deliberate steps that were taken together when my father died. We talked. We listened. We saw.
I started asking questions instead of just assuming the answers. She shared pieces of herself I had never known or seen before. They were there. I just didn’t want to see them. The distance between us steadily lessened. She wasn’t just someone with her own fears, limitations and traumas. She was a woman; complex, flawed and endlessly resilient. She stayed because there was no way out. She endured because she thought it was the only way to survive. I heard her talk about the dreams she had set aside for me, the fears she carried alone and the love that had always been there even if it didn’t look the way I wanted it to.
Those moments were a succession of gifts, a second chance to build something beautiful out of the wreckage of our past. There just wasn’t enough time and when her angel came for her, I was left with a lifetime of regrets, words I left unsaid, wounds left unhealed, and love sometimes left unexpressed. Could 15-year-old me have been more compassionate? I should have seen the fear behind her silence and her love behind her endurance. Why didn’t I try to coexist in love and in pain and realize that sometimes, survival looks like surrender?
Today, I am proud of her and can finally see the countless ways she showed her love, even when I didn’t recognize it. The finality of death leaves no room for do-overs, no matter how hard we ask for one. She told me to lay down the weapons I’ve used against my own soul, and let go of these burdens, invisible yet heavy. She said that it would stick to me like an anchor tethered to the present and the future, dragging behind me while making it hard for me to move forward. Doing that is a radical act for me. That would mean I would have to forgive myself my flaws, my defensiveness and my battle cries. It serves no-one, least of all me, but punishing myself sometimes makes me feel like it’s the only way to say ‘sorry.’ Holding onto my failures won’t erase the past. Forgiving myself won’t erase my role in my mother’s pain, but perhaps, it’ll free me from the anguish I feel when I replay our yesterdays. Perhaps, I can then grieve her better.
With love,
Ali
ALICE VL 
You must be logged in to post a comment.