The Perfect Example

There is so much I have learned about life from my mother, but not how most might think. Yes, my mother had SOME positive influences, but mostly, my mother taught me some of the harder things in life that most parents try to shield their children from. One of the best things about life that my mother taught me, that was positive, was how to never to rely on a man to be the provider of the family. My mother married my dad when they were younger, so her highest level of education had been a high school diploma. She never could have imagined that by her early 30’s she would be a widow with 2 young children trying to survive on just a high school diploma. I was 6 when my father died from cancer, and for that first year, my mother really struggled trying to provide for my brother and me. Eventually, she had to send me and my brother to stay with our aunt and uncle during the week, and she used that time to go back to school. That is about as far as the positives go when it comes to my mother. But everything else she has taught me, as negative as the experiences were, has made me the person I am today. Someone that is the opposite of her. After my father died, I had a very rough life, thanks in large part to my mother. At the age of 6 years old, I had to grow up rather quickly due to my mother having a severe mental illness. She was diagnosed with Multiple Personality Disorder/Dissociative Identity Disorder (MPD/DID) less than a year after my father’s death. Her alters were suicidal and she “lost time” for majority of the day. My mom could barely handle just showing up for work and school. Everything else, I had to step up and take care of. By the time I was 7, I was in charge of doing all the cooking for me, my older brother and my mother, writing and mailing checks to pay all the bills including the mortgage, all the laundry and cleaning of the house, and I also had to check the house everyday before leaving for school to make sure I remembered to lock all of my mother’s medications (or any medications for that fact) and remove any and all sharp objects which she could use to try to kill herself with. After school, I always had to come straight home and get the house ready for me to be on suicide watch for her. My mother worked extremely hard in therapy to get better, and she did for a while. But her progress, while it helped with her mental illness, her true colors started to show through, and she was not a good person. I think I would much rather prefer having a severely mentally ill parent than what my mother was. I finally got enough courage to tell someone (my aunt), that my mother’s step-father had been molesting me from the NIGHT my father died, up until I was about 12 or 13. When my aunt helped me tell my mother, I got blamed and called a “little slut”. That was my first lesson I will never forget. Can’t trust anybody, not even family. Someone who was supposed to protect me, blamed me. Then she tried to say I was making it up, yet, he had done the same thing to her which is why she had the mental illness. She failed to protect me then and she failed to protect me from my older brothers physical abuse. Then her personalities got out of control again. Just as I was about to go into Jr. High, and starting to make a lot of new friends, and I couldn’t even do normal kid stuff, like sleepovers, or even have friends over after school. Not because she didn’t allow me to, but because I was too embarrassed because I never knew if I would come home to find my mother, a grown adult, sitting on the floor playing with cars because her 5-year-old alter was in control at the time. Just before my freshman year, my mother taught me the biggest lesson of all-that I was nothing to her. After years and years of emergency room visits for broken bones and other injuries as a result of my brother’s abuse, he had finally hurt me so bad that the hospital no longer believed my mother’s lies about how I got hurt. My brother had gotten upset because he thought I was eating his favorite snacks (which I absolutely hated) so he took a metal bat and cracked me in the face with it, breaking my jaw. I had to get metal plates on both sides of my lower jaw, and had it wired shut. The hospital staff knew it was no accident, so they wanted to talk to me alone. I couldn’t speak, but I could write, and I didn’t hesitate to write my brother’s name when they asked who hurt me. The hospital called the police and got them involved and my mother begged and pleaded with them not to arrest my brother. She asked if they would at least release him to her custody so he wouldn’t go to juvenile hall. The police informed her that due to the emergency protection order for my safety, my brother and I absolutely could not live under the same roof. My mother looked at me and told me not to worry, she will pack all my things and my aunt can pick me up after the surgery, I was not her problem anymore. That was the best thing my mother has ever done for me, letting me go live with my aunt and uncle. My aunt is the one who has been there for me, who taught me right from wrong after so many years of “this is wrong but….” Justifications my mother taught me. But more importantly, my aunt taught me how to work through all the trauma my mother caused me, and still see the good in everything instead of closing myself off and not trust anyone, or anything else that could hold me back from my full potential. My aunt taught me that although there are bad things in life, that does not excuse anyone from doing the same thing to others that had happened to them. My mother never did finish college, but she did get a good job working at a church as a secretary. She worked there for quite a while, almost long enough to earn a pension, but she even messed that up. 6 months before she would have had enough time working there to receive a pension, she got caught stealing money. When they confronted her about it, she admitted she had been stealing thousands of dollars every month for the past 8-10 years (basically the entire time she had been employed there). I do not regret the experiences I went through with my mother, nor would I change anything if I could, because in her sick and twisted ways, she taught me exactly who I DIDN’T want to become. My biggest fear is having any sort of resemblance to my mother in any way, but it is that fear that proves I will never be anything like her, according to my aunt. My mother is content with her evil and twisted ways, regardless of who is hurt by her, and I could never be like that to anyone. I know the pain she can cause and it sucked when I went through it, so why cause someone else that sort of pain? I could never do that. So regardless of how horrible my mother truly is, I am so thankful for teaching me about the many evils in this world (and how to overcome no matter what), and for teaching me exactly who I don’t want to be. Everything good in my life, is because of what my aunt has instilled in me. If I end up even half as great as my aunt is, I could honestly be satisfied with all I have been able to accomplish in my life.