Is Redemption Possible?

I am not responsible for the distance my parents and I live apart. But I could be blamed for not bridging it more often. It would be lots easier if I could forget the decision made fifteen years ago, that I would NEVER fly out West alone again and suffer mom’s abuse (and dad’s tacit consent) without my husband present.

The last opportunity for face-to-face redemption came out of a need that was answered. My mom and dad came to visit in the fall of 2003, in the aftermath of my hospitalization. They spent a week helping me stay tied to reality. While I wanted mom to cheer me on, what I remember most was her silent suffering. Her honesty about feel inept. Her struggles to over-compensate.

There was so much she wanted to do, and somehow I could not let her. She did her best. She got me glasses I am afraid to wear. She took me shopping at Macy’s at a time that I could find nothing that suited me. My son was four at the time. She inadvertently drove him crazy to the point that he told her it was time for her to go home.

I kept the clothes through loyalty, though their style was not mine. I lost weight during the summer her brother W died. When I saw they would never fit again, I gave them away. Only one shirt remains in my closet from that time.

Out of gratitude I’ve stayed in touch and given her all the baubles of understanding and love that she can handle

But it all seems moot. The last words she flung at me by phone were formulated specially to tell me how my life was a lie. That I had given nothing to her and my dad. Nothing.

Likely one day soon, she will call and take the words back. Or try to. Normally I would forgive. But today I feel the stooge and it is time for me to exit this farce, this drama, which has no satisfying resolution.

I guess it is all because, for once I have decided to keep score. I started to do so once I realized she fit the much-maligned BPD diagnoses, and I really needed to decide if what I did for her was really helping.

Our lobby began, uncannily, with her suddenly going into my emotional closet and back to my college years , so she could do my sexual inventory. And do what exactly, reactivate shame? I side-stepped that, and eventually got my words right. “My mistakes are between me and God, mom.”

Next time, it was me who called to share news of the day: a late winter snowstorm enjoyed by her grandson. …. She had nothing to lose I guess, because she told me straight up, “I don’t care.”

It was some days later, she called for the release of apology, and told me she had been short because she had a toothache. I accepted the apology and moved on.

Later in spring my mom decided it was time for her to get honest with me again, about who I really am. “Your life hasn’t amounted to manure,” she said, using the vernacular. I did all I knew how to do. Having made the resolution not to fight any more with her forever, I got out a piece of paper. I became an interviewer, who needed to get my quote right. I read out loud to her as I wrote it down, hands shaking. Her answer contained another expletive, which I dutifully wrote down and read verbatim. What followed, thankfully was the click and a dial tone.

I know, I know, we are supposed to forgive and forget. But I made the choice this time not to excuse her. When she called back days later to make peace, I told her gently what that does to our relationship, and told her about the pattern I had observed. I told her I believed she could change and I would support that. She heard me, because I put her on speakerphone, and that made me sound different enough for her to pay attention.

Well, they say that when one party in a relationship changes, often the party that does not want change will flail and fight.

Each conversation since then, I’ve spoken the truth. That the hurting needs to stop. I get honest, and she gets even.

Not able to face that she hurts me and it is a pattern she needs to change, she wants to leave me holding the bag of garbage taken from her closet, telling me it is mine. All mine.

It all came painfully clear this Monday. I was stunned when I heard her voice, sounding like a cat that had swallowed a baby sparrow . “I raised you right and you turned out wrong.”

Maybe she was joking? This was so absurd it didn’t warrant a rebuttal. I did what I do now, when I am speechless. I repeated her words and she AGREED with them! I was so confused at the total inappropriateness of her trial balloon, that I could only be grateful when she hung up.

I was left with these thoughts: What the F? After all my faith and hard work?