Motherless Child

I had an angry, volatile, drunken women telling me what to do for most of my life.  This woman was the same person who brought me into this world.  Who repeatedly told me I was bad, had ugly hair, could not be or speak like my Argentinian father.  Demanded that she had to live with me because I was her youngest daughter and it was my responsibility.

I am in fear that her spirit is haunting my new home, my new life that I have created.  I have created, in spite of her and her upbringing and her beliefs of what she thought I was, I have love and joy and happiness everyday.  I know what loves is.  How it feels to receive it and how it feels to give it.

I moved out at 18.  But I did not detach from her until my 30’s.  Until after the death of my father, a failed marriage and finding the right fit of help from a therapist and 12 step meetings. I was able to give up the hope that she would miraculously become my image of a loving person who was happy that I was in her life.  Was proud of my independence and supported my hopes and dreams.

She was a narcissist in the worst way.  The sad point about that is that my being an extension of herself, the loathing that she exhibited in herself was transferred to me because she loathed herself in the same manner.  She couldn’t help but be brutal to me because she was brutal to herself as well.  That is all she knew.

I loved her.  I hated her.  I don’t miss her.  I don’t ever remember gaining comfort from her.  But for years when she was alive I wanted acceptance from her.  I wanted her approval.  And the day I heard that she had died, I felt orphaned – although I had not seen her in years and maybe had spoken to her on the phone once a year.  But she still haunts me.