Milestones

• November
• 18

6:00 am Mental Illness, Parenting Teens, Survivors of Abuse, The Friday Files

The Friday Files continue …

Mr 17 graduated from high school yesterday. We started the day with one of our family traditions for special occasions (birthdays, Christmas, etc) – all 4 of us on our bed, sipping our coffee and sharing a box of chocolates.

We also presented our graduate with a new watch to mark the occasion. 

The ceremony was very moving, especially when the graduates presented a flower to the people who had been instrumental in helping them to make it this far (usually their parents).

It’s a huge milestone, and a joyous occasion. Lawrence and I are just SO PROUD, as you can probably see from the photos!

I can’t help comparing it to some of the milestones in MY life. Due to my mother’s psychiatric illnesses, they were rarely happy events.

My 16^th birthday – my Dad took me out to a fancy restaurant which was lovely and made me feel like a princess. What was not so lovely was enduring my mother’s rants and raves before and after the event. She hated my Dad, hated that I looked like him, hated that we had anything to do with him. Her bitterness poisoned my relationship with him.

My Senior Formal – Mum had a major explosion only a day or two before my formal, and would have nothing to do with it.  I was absolutely miserable on what should have been one of the happiest nights of my life. It’s hard to enjoy something like this when you are torn up inside and full of fear.

My College Graduation – By this stage I had left home and Mum and I hadn’t spoken since. Dad and I had only just started rebuilding our relationship from scratch, something that was only possible now that Mum wasn’t constantly in my ear. So it seemed very strange to have my Dad and his partner as my family for such a special occasion.

My 21^st birthday – I had been out of home for about a year and Mum and I had only recently begun speaking again, so our relationship was strained. It was a very low key occasion.

My Wedding – When it came time to send out the invitations, I asked both my Mum and her current husband, and Dad and his partner. All my life I had been forced to “choose” between them (Mum usually won out, as she was the parent I lived with and I wasn’t game to go against her wishes), but I was sick of it.  It was MY wedding, and I was the one paying for it, so the time had come. I invited both, and told them both that THEY had to sort it out. Of course, my Mum got offended and refused to come to the wedding.

In hindsight I think I’m glad, because heaven only knows what trouble she would have caused, or the scene she may have made f she’d actually turned up. When the Big Day dawned I couldn’t help but wonder if she would put in an appearance.  I just couldn’t fathom a parent staying away from such a momentous occasion. I still can’t! But sure enough, she didn’t come. After that intial thought early in the morning, I was too busy, happy and excited to give the matter another thought and it wasn’t until during our honeymoon that my new husband and I discussed her boycott. Although there was some lingering sadness, overall I was relieved.

It wasn’t until after the honeymoon that I heard about what Mum did to my brother. At 16, he was the only one still living at home at that stage. We’d asked him to be a groomsman and Mum told him that if he went to “that” wedding, that he needn’t bother coming home!  Little brother had a lot more guts than I would have at that age, and not only came to the wedding but never once let on the turmoil he went through to be there.  He ended up staying with my sister and her husband that weekend. It took a lot of courage for my brother to do that and keep it to himself, not wanting to spoil our day.

When we resumed contact, Mum told me that she spent my wedding day in bed, crying her eyes out. It was clear that she didn’t take any responsibility for the situation – that she didn’t realise that she’d brought it on herself, because it was HER choice. She blamed ME. But, I held my tongue, thinking “anything for peace”. I desperately wanted to make our relationship work …

The Birth of My Children – When I was 6 months pregnant with our son Mum got in a mood and picked a fight on the phone, before hanging up on me (long story … I’ll save it for another post). So when our boy was born (AND on my Dad’s birthday no less – she would NEVER forgive me for that!) I was in a quandary. Should I let her know? And if so, how? I ended up sending her a birth announcement once I’d come home from hospital, just like we sent to all our relatives and friends. In return, we received the plainest, cheapest “new baby” card with no message inside, just signed “Mum & (her partner)”.

By the time our daughter came along 2 ½ years later I didn’t even send a card.

I have often wondered HOW she could live with herself, knowing that she’d missed out on the special occasions in her daughter’s life. She never came to my wedding. She never saw my beautiful children – her grandchildren!

I think the answer is, she didn’t accept the blame. She blamed everybody else (typical of a borderline). THAT’S how she could live with herself.

I just can’t imagine being like that with my children. No matter what they do, I will always love them and be there for them. I guess that proves just how sick my Mum really was …