That last one was just explaining things...so here's the first official post. I'll start out with something nice. I want to write about my mom. Not the one that gave birth to me, but the one who took me in at 17 when everyone told her not to. I've always called myself the luckiest unlucky person in the world, and she is my proof.
I was living in a horrible residential treatment place. Everything in my file told of me being angry, a runaway, a troublemaker, filled with attitude...essentially, not worth working with. And that is what the staff believed. That is how I was treated. But somehow my mom saw through that. She took me in and she fought for me and she helped me succeed.
Now she's proving that to me all over again. Last wednesday night I called her in a panic. More than panic. I was sobbing. I'd been drinking. I was hallucinating. I had no idea what was going on around me. But I couldn't put any of it into words. She told me to come home. I told her I couldn't, I was too drunk to start the car much less drive it. She said she'd come get me. I realized I had no idea where I was.
She helped me figure out where I was close to and drove for over an hour and a half in the middle of the night to come get me. She took the next two days off work to stay with me while I detoxed. What she didn't know at the time was that the panic, the hallucinations, all started before the drinking. The fact that i'd drank enough to kill the average human was merely a symptom.
I begged her not to take me to the hospital. The hospital for me was as bad as the treatment place she rescued me from. She agreed not to take me if I'd be open with her and tell her about what was going on.
We went home. To her house. I cried, and cried, and cried. Then I got sick. Then I cried some more. The usual detox. But she stayed with me. She comforted me despite everything I said. No matter the number of times I begged her to leave me alone. She stayed. She told me I needed to let her in. She wanted to know what was going on.
I tried to speak but the words weren't there. In my head I started so many different ways. But nothing came out.
"Mom." I finally said. This got her attention. I didn't usually call her mom unless other ppl were around.
I lost my breath again but managed to tell her "Mom. The poem." The poem was something I wrote her for mothers day. Well, I journaled it but it made me think of her so I sent it to her. I forgot until after it was sent that it had mention of my abuse. I'd never talked to her about my abuse. She'd called me to ask about it (after the usual thanks and that she loved it). I wasn't able to answer her questions then.
"You were right," I told her. Not surprisingly she had a copy of the poem nearby. She keeps everything. "About what?" she asked, likely knowing what was coming.
I lost my breath. I struggled for air. She stayed there with me. Close enough for comfort but not so close to be scary. Most she was quiet. A few times she'd remind me she was there, help me to breathe.
"They." I finally stammered. The words were there in my mind but not on my tongue.
"They." I accomplished again.
"It's ok, you can say it. I'm here now," she encouraged softly.
"They. Hit. Me." Finally. A strange victory. Such a small bit of information. But for the first time in my life, I had spoken out loud a small part of what had been done to me. I had been trained well, since I was very small, never to speak of what they had done. I had written it. Somehow in my mind that was the loophole. But it had never been spoken. And there it was, out, floating away from me to somebody new. Such a small bit, and yet it was like time stood still. The silence that followed was endless. I curled as small as I could and hid under the blanket I was wrapped in.
I'm not sure what I expected. Was I waiting for a lightning bolt to drop from the sky and strike me dead? Maybe. Knowing the way my life works I wouldn't completely discount it. I was immediately transported back into their world. The threats. They'd kill me if I told.
I felt a hand on my shoulder. A small, soft touch.
"I'm sorry they did that to you," I heard my mom saying. I sat, still. She repeated. "I'm sorry they did that to you. You didn't deserve that."
I sat frozen between the two worlds. The scary truth I thought I knew in my head. The new truth I wanted to believe just outside my blanketed hiding place. I poked my head out from under the blanket. I slowly, fearfully, looked up at her face, waiting, perhaps, for the monster to come out. I saw her eyes. They were filled with the same kindness and concern I saw when she comforted my crying baby sister. There was the same love I'd seen her show my brothers, even when they'd caused trouble. But this time it was for me. A bit of my secret was out and the world continued. She was still there. Still with her hand on my shoulder.
"Can I hug you?" She asked. I could only nod. I moved a bit towards her and she wrapped her arms around me and held me. The tears began to flow again. She let me go but stayed close, still touching. It was a strange feeling but maybe a good one. I wasn't sure yet.
A bit more time passed in silence. I was grateful mom didn't feel the need to ask anymore questions just yet. My body was still shaking. Visibly I would guess.
"Mom?" I asked to break the silence.
"Yes?"
"There's more." More words were coming now, I'm not sure from where.
"Would you like to tell me?"
"They did more. Other. More." The words were still proving difficult to grasp.
"You're safe here. You can say it. No one can hurt you here."
"They lied, mom."
"Who lied?"
"Them. Why I ran away." I'd run away from my biological parents at 13 years old, which is how I ended up in foster care. According to my bio parents, it was the last in a series of terrible things I'd done to them and they couldn't handle me anymore. I'd always let people assume that was the case, it was easier than the truth.
"Why did you run away?"
"They...bad...they...bad things mom...bad....mom, he raped me." The first full sentence I'd been able to utter. The first thing that came out clearly, though barely a whisper. I wanted her to know. I needed her to know, though I wasn't quite sure why.
I looked up at her. She was crying. And not just a few tears. She was sobbing. She's a tough woman. I'd never seen her cry like that before.
"Mom?" I'd quickly grown to really like calling her mom. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Why are you crying."
"You're my baby." She said through her tears. "You're my baby and I hate that they hurt you. I love you, and I hate that they did that to you."
I lay still, having now snuggled myself in right next to her. I quietly listened to her crying, her breaths, felt her body moving next to mine. I closed my eyes. Strange things were happening inside of me. She knew another level of my secret. And yet she'd called me her baby. No one had called me their baby before. She knew about my dirtiness and yet she wanted to love me? I was scared, but comforted, I think, too. I felt important. And probably loved. I wasn't, and am not, sure exactly what love is supposed to feel like. But maybe that was the start of it.
Since then I've told her more. Still in small, breathless whispers, but more has come out. She hasn't cried like that again, but each time she's held me and stayed with me. She didn't know when she brought me home what was going to be coming out of me. She had no suspicion of SA. But yet when it came out she stayed calm and strong. She didn't break her promise and take me to the hospital or send me anywhere else. She insisted that I come get her for every nightmare, every flashback, so she can keep me safe. She says I need to let her help me, to mother me.
In many ways the breakdown has continued. She says that because no one mothered me when I was very young, a part of me didn't develop. That part of me still needs to be mothered like a very small child. And no matter how many times I wake her up in the middle of the night, or spend hours attempting without success to go to sleep, she's stayed with me.
I owe her gratitude that I find myself entirely unable to express. I don't understand how I could've ended up so lucky as to find her. It feels strange to call myself lucky in the midst of this pain I am experiencing, but I truly don't know where I would be now without her. She has rearranged everything in her life right now to be here for me and with me, though it has been many years since I have been any legal responsibility of hers. She could've very easily said she was busy, or any number of other things. She could've easily left me at the hospital and chosen not to deal with this. But yet she stays. She thanks me for the honor of entrusting her with my secrets.
I can't understand that right now. I can't thank her the way i'd like. So I continue to take a deep breath and let her hold and comfort me. A part of me still tries to fight, but even then she stays. I guess that's what makes my mom so special. She stays.
(Ok that turned out a whole heck of a lot longer than I meant for my first post to be! But what can I say, like to write! :)
