Medication

My therapist felt I should talk to a doctor. My truama has run so deep for so long that it has become an integral part of who I am and how I feel. Therapy was bringing out what I lived though and it fucking hurt. All.the.time.

It was an ache in my chest that my whole body felt. Real crushing, physical pain.

I was prescribed an anti-depressant and an "emergency use" anxiety medication. 

I hate needing it. I hate that my mother hurt me so badly I need medication to even work through therapy. I hate that a loud noise or raised voice can send me right into fight or flight. A cabinet door or dropped plate are not going to hurt me...and yet they do.  I have been so anxious and depressed for so long that I don't even know what normal feels like. 

I have never not been hurt.

I went to the doctor for my kids. I want them to have the best part of me. I fight against my own pain every day to be the best me I can be for them. I hate my mother for being so horrible to me. I have no idea how to be a good mother. I only know what a bad mother does.

I study other moms. I read parenting books. I "like" parenting pages on FB in an effort to make sure I am not screwing up my kids. 

How wonderful it must be to have been raised by a loving mother. 

Night is the Worst

PTSD is having your subconscious mind always on high alert. No matter what is going on around you, your mind thinks you are still fighting to survive. No time is this more apparent than at night when your mind uses dreams to remind you that nothing is safe. Your most loved things lie dead in front of you. You freeze. Guns won't shoot. Legs won't run. Just when you finally get the gun loaded and aimed, what you are shooting at disappears leaving you to wonder when it will be back and if you will be ready for it this time.

No one has to hit you to wreck your head. Words work just fine.

All About Her

When I had my first child, my mother insisted on coming over to see me the day I got out of the hospital.  I was on two painkillers and had 15 stitches.  I was very sore and extremely tired.

I had barely gotten home and settled into bed with the baby when she came over, loudly banging as hard as she could on the door.  My husband had stepped outside to tend to our outdoor stove so she just stood there banging on the door as hard as she could to get my attention.

I let her in and she requested that I get the baby from his bed so she could hold him.  Then she asked me to get up again and get her camera out of her bag and take a few pictures of her with him.  I was in pain, obviously uncomfortable and upset at how insensitive she was being, but she didn't seem to notice.  Seeing her hold my new baby son did not make me feel at all happy.  Instead I felt an intense urge of protectiveness come over me.  I wanted to snatch him back from her, run to my room and lock the door.  

She had called asking if I needed anything from the store because she was coming to see me.  I did in fact need a specific type of sanitary pad and asked if she could get them.  She agreed.  When she gave them to me though, I discovered that she had purchased the cheapest brand she could find that were not at all what I said I needed!  My mother gave birth 5 times; of course she knew what I needed!

Even my first child was all about her and how she was a grandmother.
He wasn't even "my baby" to her.  She kept saying that he was "her grandchild" like she owned him.  

Sex has nothing to do with love

When I was around 11 I began asking questions about sex. I was curiousabout where   babies came from.  My mother did not want to answer my questions.  She seemed irrirtated with me, and gave me very vague answers.  One day she said to me, "You know sex has nothing to do with love. Even when you are married. Its just lust. Its just about wanting someone's body."

I carried this belief with me into my marriage. I cannot tell you how damaging it is.  Even though my heart knew my husband loved me, my mother's words had imbedded themselves in my belief system.  She made me think sex was dirty and anyone that wanted to do it was just in it for what they got out of it. I often felt unloved even when my husband loved me the most!

As I have worked theough things, I have realized this is how she felt about it.  It was her truth.  She was incapable of love so of course sex was never about love for her.  

That Lipstick Makes you look like a Slut

I remember once trying on a shade of my mother's lipstick.  It was called "Twig."  I put it on in front of the mirror one morning with my mother while we were getting ready for school.  She looked at me and her whole demeanor changed.  She snapped, "That's too dark for you.  It makes you look like a slut."  I was ashamed and wiped it off.

My mother soon decided that was her favorite color of lipstick, and even ordered several more just like it from AVON.  I never could understand what was wrong with me.  She said, "You don't want to go to school looking like a trollop."  Obviously as a teen girl I was trying to find out what DID look good on me.  I realize now that she was jealous.  That lipstick made me look older and quite attractive.

As I read more about Narcissistic mothers I am able to recall specific instances that I held onto and finally make some sense out of the fog I was kept in.  

Projecting Faults

I can remember when we were in process to adopt M, one of my brothers told me that my mother said I had no business adopting a child when I treated my own mother "this way." 

That stung me like a slap to the face.

Suddenly I was conflicted. What way? What did she mean?  What if she was right?  Would others agree with her? 

We were fundraising adoption fees at the time and I remember wondering if people would refuse to donate if they knew that I had a rocky relationship with my mother.   I questioned if I perhaps really had no business adopting a child? Was she right?  Was I a bad daughter like she said, destined to be a bad mother too?

I remembered her telling me many times when I was a teenager that she could not wait for me to have children so they could hurt me like I hurt her. "Just you wait, Erin. You will see how your children can hurt you like you have done over and over to me!"

I wanted children. I had two beautiful boys before we chose to adopt.  I chose to adopt because I felt so much sympathy for children without a mother to love them.  I loved my boys so much it hurt. I wanted to protect them from anything that woukd hurt them.  When they were babies, I kissed them each night with that silent promise, "I will keep you safe. I won't let anything hurt you."

I felt so devestated for children who had no one to protect them and love then.

My mother was the one who had no business having children. I do not know how she treated her mother, but given hiw she treats me, I can guess.  

The thing that has given me power over her hurtful words now is realizing that she she was talking about herself. She does not even know me or the woman I have grown to be.

The Green Prom Dress

I went to a small private Christian School.  There were only about 60 of us total in the High School and they did not do any kind of formal event except for graduation.  I had never been to any sort of prom or formal in my life, so when a neighboring Christian school invited our students to a prom, we were all bursting at the seams.

The first thing on a girl's mind when planning for a prom is the dress.  I was incredibly excited to daydream about what kind of gorgeous dress I could wear.  I had seen them at the mall, but since I had been homeschooled until 9th grade never had any reason to even try one on.  I rarely got excited over things, and even rarer did I show it; I was openly excited about this.

My elation soon faded.  As soon as I mentioned that I couldn't wait to get a prom dress, my mother told me that I should look at consignment stores first instead of "wasting all that money on a dress you will only wear once."  I grew up wearing hand me downs.  I almost never got anything new.  I had been so excited at the prospect of actually getting something that had only ever been mine.  I worked up the nerve later to tell her that I didn't want to look at thrift stores for my prom dress.  I really wanted her to go with me to the mall and choose a new one. She told me that she didn't have the money to spend on a new dress.  "That's just wasteful.  You can get one from a thrift store or not at all."  Notice she never said SHE would take me shopping at a thrift store either.  Just that my dress had to come from one.  I knew what that meant.  If it was up to my mother, I would wear some ill fitting hand me down while every other girl at both schools would be wearing a lovely new dress.  Suddenly, I was no longer excited about the prom.  

A few weeks later, I went shopping with Phillip, his mother and his sister, Rebecca who was also going to the prom.  We all started looking at prom dresses and Phillip's mother picked out a few she thought would look nice on me.  She looked at my eyes and said, "Green. We need a green dress."  And she pulled some off the rack.  I was shocked.  My mother had never once in my entire life matched anything to my eyes.  I wondered if my mother knew what color my eyes were.  I tried a few on and we all loved one.

Despite me saying that I shouldn't get a new one because mom didn't want me to, Phillip bought it.  It was $80.  When I came home with it, Mom was so angry about it. The next day she walked into the office at school where Phillip's mother worked and asked her in.the.office. why he bought it for me.  Phillip's mother said that it was his money and he could buy what he wanted with it.  Later my mother asked Phillip why he wasted so much money on a dress for me.  I was so embarrassed.  I was afraid that Phillip would "come to his senses" and realize what a fool he was for wasting $80 on a girl like me.  I obviously wasn't worth it.  He stood up to my mother so forcefully that I was a little afraid she would have one of her fits.  He told her that he wanted to buy it for me;  anyone could tell that there was a lot he did not say to her.  I felt like I had done something wrong.  Hadn't mom said not to get a new dress?  And I did.  Now she was angry at my boyfriend and his mother.  Now that I had brought the wrath of my mother onto them, they would probably hate me too.  It was all my fault.  Once again, instead of being excited about it I was sad.  

Mom continued to fume at me about the dress for weeks.  Every other day she had some snide comment about it. "I still can't believe he bought you that dress.  What if you guys break up?"  I would not say anything back to her.  I didn't dare argue.  In my head I had plenty of comebacks that I was mulling over, but I kept my mouth shut and tried not to let her see me react or I would be accused of "glaring" at her with "my evil eye."  I learned early on it served no purpose to stand up for myself.  Mom never lost an argument.  She was always right.

The day before Prom night, mom called me into her room and opened her dresser.  She took out a lovely green and white wrap that she told me she had worn with a formal dress once.  It was beautiful and matched my dress perfectly.  I was so surprised because she was being nice to me and sharing something of hers.  I actually felt like she liked me and was happy for me.  I told her how pretty it was, how nicely it went with my dress, and thanked her.  I felt so relieved that she seemed to be over how angry she had been.

On the day of the prom, the junior and senior girls went to get our hair done at a salon then we went back to school to get ready before driving to the prom.  My mother was there and I was so excited for her to see how pretty my hair was and how wonderful the wrap went with my dress.  I was standing there in my dress, wearing the wrap she gave me, with my hair done in an undo for the first time in my life wanting to know I looked beautiful and she ignored me.  Instead she focussed on another girl who's hair was also done up incredibly beautiful, and wearing the exact same style dress that I was.  She even pointed it out to me.  "Wow doesn't Emily's hair look so gorgeous!  Its like a work of art and that color dress just goes so well with her complexion!  She's beautiful!"

Mom... do you like my hair?  "It looks fine."

She went on about this girl and her hair and her dress until I left.  It didn't ruin my night, but it was a smack to the face.  I felt ugly.  Of course my hair looked terrible if my own mother couldn't bring herself to compliment it.  My dress must not have been the right color for my complexion.  I felt embarrassed.  I considered ditching my glasses for the night, but I couldn't see without them.  I guess I thought that maybe they made me look bad.  I just didn't know what was wrong with me.

Phillip told me I looked beautiful, but I couldn't believe it.  My mother's opinion counted and as a teenager, there was nothing I could do to not want her approval or to not feel crushed when I was not good enough to get it.

I was crowned queen at the prom that night, yet I simply could not shake the feeling of being unhappy.  I knew I should be happy.  I had a boyfriend.  I was crowned prom queen.  I had my hair done.  I had a beautiful dress.  Yet I felt like I did not deserve any of it.  I felt less than everyone else.  On the outside I smiled.  Inside, I was miserable and because I didn't know why, I beat myself up for being ungrateful and selfish, for not appreciating what I had.

It was 11pm when Phillip dropped me off at home after the prom that night.  My mother had locked the doors and turned off all the lights.  I had to get my brothers to let me into their room and sneak into my room to get ready for bed.  Even though we had agreed that I could stay out until 11pm, I was still left feeling like I had done something wrong.  My mother was routinely up until 12-1am on her computer.  Why had she locked the doors and turned all the lights off when she knew I was coming home?  As I took all of the bobby pins out of my hair, I felt sad.  What was so wrong with me that my mother wanted nothing to do with me.  What had I done?  I assumed she was still angry over the dress.  She routinely told me that I was so rebellious and ungrateful.  Of course she didn't like me.  I went to bed and thought about what I did most nights.  I recounted every event of the day in my head over and over telling myself what an idiot I was.

If only I had known then what I know now.