My Mother's Daughter - Apples and Trees

My mother is a tricky woman with a tricky disorder.  Bi-polar is an insidious affliction, and even in my middle years, I find that it is the gift that keeps on giving.  Amidst the myriad of my mother's eccentricities, there is an undeniable spirit of resilience—a fierce fighter in a world that demanded conformity. She battled against my father's sometimes patriarchal and controlling demeanor, which he often masked as "wisdom" and "discernment" but was, in reality, tyranny cloaked in the guise of love. Her fight extended beyond the confines of our home; it was a rebellion against the demands of motherhood, the expectations of societal norms, and the constraints of civility.  It is this last part that concerns me, for it so closely mirrors my own rebellion. 

Amidst her skirmishes with external forces, she also waged a war within herself—a torrid triangulation between identities, a constant struggle to find balance between service to others and service to self. The cycle of self-sabotage, self-pity, and self-righteousness became her relentless companions, fueling the fires of her defiance. She was a woman caught in the throes of her own passions and interests, never quite finding equilibrium.

In her struggle for autonomy and self-realization, she seemed trapped in a perpetual state of unrest, unable to fully blossom into the woman she was felt she was destined to be. The overwhelming weight of her circumstance, the relentless demands of life, left her grappling with day-to-day existence. It was a cautionary tale, a reminder etched into my mind as I recount her evoloving story and devolving state of being.

The futility of fighting against one's own existence is a wearisome battle. It inevitably led to a descent into the depths of depression. During times when the pendulum swung uncontrollably between extremes or when chaos seemed to reign supreme, my mother seemed to try to gain equilibrium through her children.  Not in healthy engagement, but vicariously and with pernicious parasitism.  

I recently visited my mother hoping to connect and re-introduce her to my son after creating a strong boundary between the two because of broken promises, an affront to his innocence. 

The trip was a drain on everything I have come to understand and value as a “resource”.  She was combative, strange and determined to devour my son and I with her erratic behavior and eruptive emotions. It amazes me, a person’s will to survive despite not needing to, and not fully knowing how.  It is as if she roams aimlessly, haphazardly, manically - until finding a suitable host, and to her; “suitable” usually means those that are innocent and meek, compassionate and trusting.  The echoes of this visit lingers in my memory, as a testament to the unyielding and vicious spirit of my mother’s warring soul amidst the tumultuous sea of existence. 

“Warring” does not mean “warrior”, as warrior denotes a level of bravery and sacrifice; which I have come to realize that my mother is either devoid of, or chooses not to tap into.  I feel that my interactions these days with her are draining as she criticizes aspects of myself and my parenting that she is not authorized to do, given her inability to embody anything nearing an “ideal” parent (or person for that matter).  I see her now as she truly is, vain, shallow, cowardly and selfish. 

What is my responsibility to someone so devoid of object constancy and relatable perspective?  I want to teach my son how to care for elders, ancestors and the ill afflicted; but I fear that what I am teaching him in reality, is how to sit stoically in front of a firing squad of incessant ineptitude and abuse.  What will be let of him can be seen in me. A well of righteous indignation and bitterness. A lonliness that seeks no solace. Chronic, throbbing and unyielding.

My own rational mind asks that I detach from this dark entity and send it back to the nether regions from which it came; even as I too, know the brink of despair that comes with the dissonance of conflicting selves, inner and outer.  Wouldn't I be condemning myself to the same fate?  Would she just be keeping my seat warm until I could join her in that fiery inferno of hell, or am I content to live it out now in my daily interactions with her; in hopes that my devotion to her as “mother” will send me to the light?  

There is a part of me that will always be an emo child misunderstood because those who were appointed to understand and care for me, did not bother.  Could I, in this lifetime, shed my relentless resentments for her and instead, ascend past my own attitude and self-sabatoging likeness to her and allow myself to thrive in all the ways that she could not. Perhaps, in this way, I honor her. #nofilter