Mother Love Not Required

We face one another picking apart our chicken cutlet parmesans. While my mother complains about the thieving coked-up whores in her diner, I assemble piles of mozzarella cheese -- eyes transfixed on the clock. I keep time; will it to pass by. It's 1996 and my mother and I sit through one of our semi-annual lunches, which consist of filler talk with minor variations. We dine in Long Island cafés rife with stale breadbaskets and tepid beef. Today, while my mother prattles on, it never occurs to her to ask about me, about my life, rather she talks about herself, how my stepfather and me ruined her life, how she's desperate to escape. Sometimes I think we do this, the lunches, simply to see how long we can endure one another. Whether she can break me.

Giggling, my mother reveals that she's leaving us for another man, one she met in a bar -- he's taking her to Disneyland! Disneyland! -- and could I not call her for six months, make that a year, because she's concerned that I would inevitably wreck her happiness. You always do. In the same breath, my mother tells me, Oh, the sex. You wouldn't believe. I start to shake because my mother is leaving us for a man and mouse ears. I look up at my mother, watch her scrape her teeth with her fork, slurp the last dregs of her piña colada, and I writhe. I hate her. I hate you.

Nine months later, on the eve of my college graduation, my mother calls me, hysterical. The man who bought her mouse ears tried to strangle her. She's been fired, living on white bread, and can still see the marks his hands left on her neck.

Could we take her back? Could life be the way it was?

I pause, wondering if it's possible to drown standing up. I want to be the dutiful daughter, the one who loves beyond repair. But I think about the way it was: the woman who never allowed me trespass to my real father, a mother who stole my childhood from me. I remember the years of neglect, rage and abuse, her decade-long cocaine addiction, the fear of angering her and the terror of wondering whether she would get even in my sleep, and the countless times she told me I wasn't worth her labor. I wasn't worth anything at all.

I told my mother that she made it impossible for me to love her. Her response was a cold fuck you.

A decade later at a party in a bar that resembles a cavern, someone asks me about the book I've written. I give broad strokes, don't bother with the details, but I say that it's a book about my relationship with my abusive, drug addict mother, and how love is not unconditional. That having a family for the sake of having one, no matter how painful the familial binds, is not the healthiest decision. That day in the spring of 1997, my mother asked me to make a choice -- between her and my mental health -- and the decision suddenly became so easy. I chose me.

After I say all of this, the person replies, "How could you not love your mother? How could you not want to find her? She is your mother, after all." I close my eyes; it's as if I had been miming the whole time for this was not the first time someone has asked me this question and it won't be the last.

We live in a culture where parents routinely disinherit their children from marrying out of their faith, social standing, race and sexual orientation. When a friend from my high school came out, her parents changed all the locks, banned her from their home and excluded her from family gatherings; they haven't spoken in eight years. And while this is all heartbreaking, the stuff movies are made from, it's a practice routinely accepted. In response, we shake our heads and lament about the unfortunate situation. However how unfortunate, parents aren't shamed by their decision to disown their children, and it is typically up to the child to reconcile the family.

In our culture where mothers are sacrosanct, it is the ultimate taboo to sever ties with the woman who bore and raised you (save the rare cases of celebrity parents and enablers because while they are real people, they don't seem very real to us like our friends and neighbors), so while I understand how someone would question my decision to end my relationship with my mother, it doesn't make it any less frustrating and difficult to answer. In the 10 years since my mother and I have parted ways, while I long for the idea of a mother -- a mentor, a role model, a learned woman who serves as my career and life guide, a best friend, a blanket that offers comfort -- my mother was none of these things, and I have developed my own familial construct: a life inhabited by strong, supportive, loving people who couldn't imagine their lives without me in it (and vice versa).

But perhaps I should have answered with these questions instead: Why does love need to be unconditional? Why is a family member granted an unlimited supply of get-out-of-jail-free cards while friends and partners endure our fissures, breakups and divorces? Why is their only one definition of family?

What I should have said is this: What is your decision won't necessarily be mine.

Comments

[Potomacker]

I dread having to tell anybody about my mother today. I've become quite accustomed to the standard responses. "I'm certain that she did the best that she could." "You must be exaggerating." "What did you do to make her do/say/incinerate that?"
Her death only boosted her impunity and she was never held to account for her actions and she never had to answer the many questions that we could only ask as adults. Nobody in my family will ever connect my sisters' out of control lives with their upbringing by her.
It's especially impossible for me as man to answer questions about her without catching grief for honesty. I get responses that accuse me of being both misogynist and unfilial. If I feel less than loving towards her, it's a fault in myself. Women, especially mothers, are the biggest culprits in this silencing. For them, I suspect that any perceived attack is an attack on all motherhood, and a potential opening for criticism of them. I'm unclear whether this is simply a method of protecting their privileged status as mothers (it is however open season on fathers), or an expression of their own anxiety as to their effectiveness as good mothers.
We have had no qualms about stripping fatherhood of any assumptions of goodness. Perhaps we have gone much too far in this direction. We still have a long way to go to remove the presumptions of motherhood away from the truths of reality though.

[jeskiley]

"Although sometimes I wonder if we both had an opportunity to live our lives again knowing what we know now, would we make the same decisions?"

The freedom comes in knowing that we can't have chosen differently. We can only choose in each present moment, starting now. You can imagine you'd be a different person if your mother had been different, but that's truly a fantasy. When you finally accept the gifts that have come to you from this experience, you won't want to change a single bit of it.

Good luck with your book!

[felsull]

jeskiley-you raise an incredibly terrific point. Although sometimes I wonder if we both had an opportunity to live our lives again knowing what we know now, would we make the same decisions?

Part of me wonders what would of became of our relationship if my mother would have acquiesced to therapy or rehab (it being so odd and foreign in the culture and society in which I grew up in - only "crazies" went to therapy. You dealt with your family and issues behind closed doors). If therapy weren't so taboo and she would have known how her addiction affected me as both a daughter and the woman I subsequently have become, would she have made the choice to heal herself? To take responsibility for her actions? To heal our relationship.

I ask these questions a lot, especially since I have to deal with my book (my own little birth) coming out into the world. But it's comforting to know that your relationship with your child is so utterly critical. Your parent is your first love, your first hurt, and that relationship is paramount.

[felsull]

accountability- I've given the idea of having children a great deal of thought & this is still a grey area for me. For years I shunned the idea because of what I had went through and the fear that I would be ill-equipped to be a good mother. The idea of even equating the words mother and Felicia sounds strange to me, even now as I type this. However, there is something wonderful and healing about creating your own family, setting a new standard, and perhaps learning from the mistakes in our past which will enable us to be even better parents...

I've got some time, but it's still something I've been pondering.

Cheers, Felicia

[jeskiley]

Absolutely, take your time. Setting a new standard is the most rewarding part of the process. Of course, we still fail and make mistakes, but that is healing and humbling as well. I always keep in mind that our parents didn't have access to the research in child development or the connections to community that are available to us today. Some of the worst parents may have made different choices if the resources had been available to them like they are to us. I don't envy the bubble they lived in, though it was part of what birthed the next generation, filled with so much more support and broader options.

[misterworms]

Best wishes to you. I am also looking forward to that next phase of my life after choosing my mental health over a poisonous relationship with my mother.

[felsull]

Thank you, all - for sharing your comments and stories! I really appreciate your comments. It astounds me how we give so much of ourselves to people who don"t always deserve it. I"m never complacent with all the loved ones in my life - I always make an effort to be the very best friend, partner, etc, that I can be, and I would never take someone"s love for granted. I hope that my blog post conveyed that - that we should never feel this overwhelming sense of obligation to reconcile or repair a damaged relationship with someone who may not even deserve it, even if it"s our blood relation. Sometimes it is healthiest to sever that relationship¦but that"s just my own two cents...

I'm glad I've discovered this now before I enter the next phase of my life - marriage, children, etc. I'm hopeful that all of this will make me a better wife and mother....Here's hoping.

Cheers, Felicia

[OtayPanky]

You got dealt a mother with a severe personality disorder.

Lucky you.

[Yourtalkingtoyourself]

Wow. I feel sorry for everyone who responded. Sounds like not even one happy person replied, what a world of saddness for so many. Of course, we are just hearing one side of the story, aren't we now..

[eaglecapri]

Wow! How insensitive. The people who replied are in pain because they suffered in their childhood under the hands and tutelage of their mother and you comment how not one happy person replied. Why would they? Why would anyone want to 'rub it in someone's face' what a wonderful mother they have? I do and the ONLY reason I'm replying to this article because I could not pass up such a ridiculously, absurd comment made by you. On top of that, to remind them there are many people out there who don't live in a world of sadness? How is that helpful? And, all you have to say is 'we're just hearing one side of the story, aren't we now...' It makes me think that you may have the answers to share with this audience. On second thought, never mind. I'm sure no one wants to hear excuses. Maybe, those mothers who caused the pain should start with an 'I'm sorry.' And it is as if you think everyone is fabricating their abuse. Maybe that's part of the problem with the other side of the story....

We're all, as adults, are responsible for our own actions. And apparently these women decided that abuse was no longer an option. Good for them. Now it's up to the person who caused the abuse to accept accountability and sew what has been rendered. Everyone has to have their own path of enlightment. How about sending positive energy to both parties and hope each party are able to reunite in a healthy mother-daughter (or whatever type) relationship! Jeez. Have a heart, yourtalkingtoyourself.

By the way, did you mean for your screen ID to be youretalkingtoyourself, because yourtalkingtoyourself is grammatically incorrect. I'm just sayin'.....

[accountability]

Oh this struck home with me too.
Thanks so much.
I applaud your courage, your choice.

I was never able to "abandon" my mother. I quote abandon because that is how it felt when I contemplated it. I met people who did and I was fascinated with the ability.
I suspect I always hoped she would fill the hole by being a mom. Living with a narcissist is difficult enough, when it is your mother it is devastating. The damage done may never heal, and the path taken towards healing is painful and exhausting. And somehow the bruise or scar is always there anyway.

Marnie1 said this:
People who have careing parents have no clue what a barren and lonely desert unwanted, unloved, abused children live in.
That void is never filled, it lasts for a life time.

Yes, this resonated deeply. I am 58 years old, unmarried, childless. My Mom passed away a few years ago. I believe I was good to her, though I often will think of something I said and feel badly. I'll mouth an I'm sorry to her... thinking she didn't have the capacity, it wasn't her fault etc. She taught me well.

Yes indeed, these mothers cause real destruction in the lives of their children and others. What is terribly sad is that they cannot see that their actions and words have done any harm, they cannot admit any culpability, and if by chance they do catch a glimpse because you have attempted over and over again to have a real relationship, and have confronted them, they might say, well, yeah I did that, but they will never say they are sorry, they will never ask for forgiveness in any way that will make an impact, will help the broken heart.

[accountability]

I thought of this as well which I think is part of the effects of this toxic mothering.

As I get older I have less and less friends. I think in part it is because many of my female friendships have been very strong, at least to me... and these relationships are doppelgangers or stand ins for that original poisonous relationship. Not just because of my own neurosis, but because the person actually does have some of those same traits as the bad mother.
When you say enough, or question why, or utter a syllable of what might be construed as criticism, or try to have a conversation, or just stop taking crap without answering it with some of your own... these kind of people cannot stand it.

Just recently I came to the stunning (to me) realization that there is a difference between friendliness and friendship. Friendship can withstand arguments, fights, misunderstandings and will do what it takes to repair a problem. Friendliness doesn't really risk any of that, even after years of knowing another. Friendship requires love, generosity, kindness and empathy as nourishment for survival. Friendliness involves a cup of coffee, a movie, emails now and then, forwarded jokes and maybe an occasional bitch session over lunch or dinner. There is no great loss if it fades away. It is not really noticed. The loss of friendship is devastating. It is as if once again someone is cruelly saying you are worthless and no matter how much you know rationally it isn't true, emotionally your heart is ripped out of you for awhile.

Why would it take so long to figure this out?
Because when one is hungry for love and acceptance any friendliness is mistaken for friendship. To operate under the assumption that those you are friendly with are actually your friends is a mirror of the wishful thinking about an unloving/hateful narcissistic mother.

[dapaul]

Great essay, Sullivan. More power to you. People don't understand that the ability to procreate doesn't not necessarily indicate an ability to nurture. Motherhood does not always include love. And yes, the fact that it is accepted that parents can cut off a child for perceived misbehavior while the converse is considered shocking is one of society's failures.

[TonyOrlando]

.
Felicia,

The fact that you wrote this; means you are still bothered. I suggest you try again to communicat with your mother. One day, you will not feel the need to write this story. It is common to over-compensate when you are trying to cope with a ongoing situation; especially when you were not taught how to properly cope. Most of us do not get this training either. So, you wing it. And you are doing good by lisening to your heart / instincts; telling you to still speak out. Investing this energy into your own family is a form of denial, over-compensation. Which also suggestes you are not finished here.

I will keep my fingers crossed for you. That you may trip them up, just for a moment; a moment of clarity.

You deserve this. Thank you for sharing, for being real with us.
You are already ahead of the game; great start.

[jeskiley]

Sounds like another one bit by the guilt bug.

[NHGranite]

Why can't you "divorce" your mother? That's what I did and our relationship changed for the better for me. I never did understand the lack of love, craved it and thought I was too terrible a person to have children myself. But there is a tie that is hard to break; it is the longing for a loving parent that never breaks.

When my mother was dying, and told my brothers that she loved them, she was only able to tell me that I was so good to her. Even at the end there was no resolution. Funny, I was the grade A student, finished college, have a stable 35 year marriage, a good job and a nice home but was never good enough. My brothers have had serial marriages, one is in jail for assault, neither finished school, neither would see her at the end - makes you wonder what love really is. But I am happy I was there to love and take care of her at the end; it was good for me.

[jeskiley]

Beyond the visible interactions we have with people, we are also bound by energetic ties. To permanently cut a tie not only frees you, but frees the other person from your energy dance. This is why it's unfathomable to most people to cut off one of your roots. It comes down to faith that your tree can still find nourishment, one root less. To release your mother is a gift to her, an order to her spirit that your energy is no longer available to sustain the demon inside her. You gave her permission and forgiveness, to land closer to her own center. Good for you!

Whether your mother will ever heal, God only knows. But I'd imagine you received some of your best strengths and talents from having to deal with the ultimate betrayal. You learned to mother yourself, and to hold the archetype of Mother accountable to its highest purpose. Once healed, that kind of vision is priceless!

[TonyOrlando]

People who do not face thier situations put their problems onto the next generation. So, it does hurt to hear outloud what just happened to you. But, this is the best therapy. Talk about till you are ready. Chances are, you had been talking already, but to your family. They do not want to talk about how they misbehaved.This was a bad choice for me. I should have talked about it to a friend. Because all they did was gang up on me, and treat me like dirt. Like they had no compassion. No guilt. But, in actuallity;, that is exactly what they are filled with, guilt.

Told my father just days after he did this; that I forgave him. His reply, "what are you talking about". See, him covering his tracks, see his guilt.

I call my mother every month. She acts like she did nothing wrong. Even when she says really creul things today that has nothing to do with the past event.

If you stop pretending along side with your family, you will feel alone. You will also see through alot of other things in your life; enlightened. You just got a new tool set for your efforts of trying to deal with a horiable situation. a lesson in reality.

The real question is this. How are you going to, at the same time; live in both thier reality, and what
really is ?

I see this also works with our political situation today. In fact, my situation gave me the ability to challenge what I was hearing concerning Iraq, katrina, etc..

[Marnie1]

Believe me I understand, and my family was not as extreme an example as yours.
I have never married because I realized in my early teen that I had no clue what a successful marriage was.
I was determined to never have children as long as my parents lived becasue I could not live with the idea that they would do to my children what they had done to me and my brother.
I stuck by them till they died. There was no remorse or resolution, between each other, or anyone in their dysfunctional extended families.

People who have careing parents have no clue what a barren and lonely desert unwanted, unloved, abused children live in.
That void is never filled, it lasts for a life time.

My best to you and others, may you find real love and support in you life.