Sometimes I just don't know what to do....

I love most of the members of my family, I truly do, but sometimes I just don't know what to do about them. My mother and I have never gotten along. Although I'm not sure why, I have my suspicions. She treated me like I was less than dirt while I was growing up, and to this day she does not want to talk about my childhood, or even admit that she could possibly have had something to do with the way I am now and all the animosity that I have towards her. She has told me more than once, and not in anger or spite, that she wishes she had never had me. She has said nothing of the kind to my two brothers mind you. Just me. How can a parent say that to their child? The human being that you gave life to, you have no problem telling her that you never should have had her. And she doesn't even want to begin to believe, or even contemplate, that she has something to do with the fact that my self-esteem is in the toilet, has been for years, and I feel like I'm a failure at everything I do. I've tried therapy, counseling, medications, everything that you can think of to try to change the way I feel about her and about life and things in general, but all of that can only do so much. If my mother cannot believe or contemplate that she is as least a participant in this whole messy situation, then how in the world can things get better, and who else in the world can help me?

That being said, I feel a little history is in order. My mother, from my very first memory, always treated me like I was lower than my two brothers, like she was ashamed to have given birth to a girl. Every time that it came to getting new school supplies and new clothes for school, my older and my younger brother both received completely new school supplies and a completely new wardrobe. Me? I was stuck using the leftover school supplies from last year, and wearing clothes that were too small for me, or threadbare, or stained, because she refused to by me anything new unless I absolutely had to have it. And even then, it became a huge fight between my mother and my dad, as to the importance of getting me new clothes. Now I started developing at a very early age. I got my first period the night before 1st grade started. (I know it seems like it's not possible, but I swear it is. I should know, because I was there.) Now my mother had never explained anything to me about developing and periods because she thought that I was going to be a "late bloomer" like she was, seeing as she didn't get her first period until she was almost out of high school. When I went to the bathroom before going to bed, I saw blood on my panties and freaked out. So I called my mom to come upstairs and help me. What does she do? She sends MY DAD up to talk to me, because my mother was "too tired" to deal with a scared child. Gee, thanks mom. I get to talk to my dad about feminine issues at 8 YEARS OLD. What the hell was wrong with you? What the hell is still wrong with you? If I wouldn't have lived with my mother for 15 years of my life, and witnessed all the things that she did wrong, and all the things she didn't do, that a mother is supposed to do for her children, I wouldn't believe it. But I was there, and unfortunately she still does shit to me, even though I'm an adult now, with a daughter of my own.

This is going to be one long blog post, considering I have tried and tried to skip over events in an effort to just hit the big parts and focus in on the big events, but I can't. Everything my mother did, no matter how small, is tied into everything else. So, on from first grade and my first period. These memories may not be in the correct order, because I have repressed a lot of things that happened while I was growing up, so if this jumps around, deal with it or don't read it. Simple as that. I don't mean to sound like a bitch, but this is my blog, not yours.

My next memory is of my older brother taking me out into the yard between the two big bushes that were at the corner of the driveway in New Berlin, that was on the right side of the two parking spots that were between the garage and the yard. My older brother took me out there and forced me to have sex with him. Now at the time, I was so damn scared of my older brother and what he would do to me if I told anyone, so I didn't do or say anything. My mother caught him doing it to me one time, he was in his bedroom, and yet my mother blamed everything on me. She said it was MY fault that my older brother did what he did, that it was MY fault that he did it more than once. She never sat him down and told him that was he was doing to me was wrong, that he could have gotten me pregnant. She never told my dad about what happened and Dad didn't know until much later that anything was going on. My mother never let my dad be a "parent", because my mother was raised to believe that the mother took care of the kids and the home, and the father worked and that was all he did. A few times, my older brother decided to bring my younger brother into it, and it was both of them against me. I still didn't say anything, because my mother babied my younger brother; to her, he could do no wrong. So I knew from a young age that I didn't mean anything to her, and that if I had a problem, she wasn't the one to go to for help. It finally stopped when I was about 10, when my dad was home from work one day and saw my older brother taking me out to the bushes. My dad felt so bad about it, I could tell, because he hadn't been told about it previously and even worse, my mother knew about it and didn't do anything about it beforehand. But all that was done was my dad and my mother talked (yelled) to my brother and told him not to do it again. That's all. No report was ever made, no charges were ever filed, because my mother did not want "her good family name" to be drug through the mud with the investigation and statements and everything. So once again, my older brother does something wrong, and nothing is done. But I was the one that was the victim.

After that incident, my brothers and I never got along. They teased me, saying that when I walked into the room, I made the radio skip, because I was fat. I was a size 10 until I got pregnant. But to my brothers, I was "fat". Because my brothers teased me a lot, about anything that they could think of, and nothing was done about it, my self-esteem went down the drain and my mother and I started fighting. A lot. We got into fights about everything from the way I dressed to the way I "complained" about my brothers teasing. I would go to her when I couldn't take the teasing anymore, and tell her what they had said. She told me to "grow up" and "grow a thick skin" and "stop being a baby, people will tease you all your life". She never once told them to stop teasing me, or told my dad about what they were doing, or told me to ignore what they were saying, that what they were saying was untrue. No, she never once did anything to make me feel like I was wanted, like I had a mother instead of just a woman that I lived with. And my brothers made sure that they didn't do anything while my dad was home, because they knew that my dad would raise hell. My mother didn't do anything because she "didn't have time for (my) whining". So my mother and I started fighting. I told her she was a bitch, that she didn't care about me, and that as soon as I was old enough, I was going to run away from her and my miserable life there to go somewhere else and finally be happy. We got into knock down, drag out fights. And of course, my brothers always made it seem like it was my fault that my mother hated me, that we fought all the time and got into fist fights. There were many times when I knocked her to the ground and just had so much rage, not anger, actual rage, that I wanted to kill her. That's how much my mother affected me, and I was only 10. So in 10 years, my mother proved to me that I was there only because she had a legal obligation to take care of me. She did the bare minimum of what was required of her, and even then, she got that only marginally right.

From age 10 to age 15, that time of my childhood was mostly just me and my mother fighting and my brothers teasing me. My mother did not allow my dad to have anything to do with me and my brothers, other than taking us out on the boat and cutting the grass and taking care of the pool. Those are pretty much the only things that I remember my dad being able to do while my parents were married. So all the fighting and hitting and yelling was pretty much the only thing that I can remember from age 10 to 15. When I was 15, my mother started leaving me alone, pretty much ignoring me, unless there was something that needed to be done that my brothers refused to do, like cleaning the bathroom. Then, on Valentine's Day, 2001, I came home from school to my mother sitting at the kitchen table, which she never did, even if we were eating dinner. I said hi and went to go upstairs to do homework, which I always did after school. My mother told me not to do my homework, that I should instead start "packing (my) shit, because you're moving in with your father". My mother was in the kitchen to make sure that she didn't miss the phone call from my dad, because he was at work and she had left him a message to call her. My parents separated when I was 11 and the divorce was final shortly before I turned 13. So anyway, I went upstairs and started packing, not even arguing with her, because I had been begging her since my parents separated if I could go live with my dad. I hated my mother so much at this point that I honestly would not have cared if she died. So, after about two hours of packing and not hearing the phone ring, I went downstairs to see if he had called and I just didn't hear the phone, and if he hadn't called, if I could call him. Yes, I had to ask to use the phone. I was in a hurry to leave. I couldn't stand it there anymore. Well, my mother was on the phone with my dad, and I clearly heard her say "You take the fucking bitch, I don't want her anymore!" Then she hung up the phone. My mother turned around and saw me standing there and without apologizing for what she said or anything, she told me that I wouldn't be going with my dad that night, because he was with "his little slut", which was what my mother called his girlfriend, for Valentine's Day, and couldn't drive from Jefferson to New Berlin, because he had been drinking. So it would be the next day that he would be there. So I went upstairs for the night, because my mother told me that she wasn't going to feed me anymore, because I was "no longer her responsibility". I stayed home from school the next day, waiting for my dad to come get me. When he got there, there were no words spoken between him and my mother, other than "I'm here and we are going to take as much of her things as we can". My mother responded with "Make sure you don't take anything that doesn't belong to her, or was ordered to be yours in the divorce". That was it. She didn't say good-bye or anything. She went and hid in her home office at the back of the house and that was it. My dad and I loaded up his pick-up truck with as much as the two of us could get downstairs and into the truck. I had to leave my piano, which my mother later burned in the fire pit in the yard, and the majority of my clothes. I didn't care about the clothes, because I needed new clothes that actually fit, so I left them there. Dad said we would go shopping that weekend and get me clothes that fit. So we loaded up and left. We went to my old high school, New Berlin West, so I could say good bye to my cheer-leading squad and my friends and clear out my locker. Then it was on to Waukesha and getting registered at my new high school, Waukesha South, and get all my things into my dad's apartment. I was nervous about starting a new school in the middle of my freshman year, but I was happy to finally be away from my mother.

So then my "new life" started, being free to be me and not having to worry about being told I was stupid or fat or anything else of that variety. I started a new school, made new friends, was able to actually have them over to the apartment, something that I was never allowed to do while living with my mother, and I was actually able to have my first boyfriend. I came out of the protective shell that I had built up while living at my mother's. Sure, there were transitional issues, going from a home that had no rules whatsoever, to my dad's that had rules and consequences if you broke those rules. Because of all the issues I had developed from what happened with my mother, I was very rebellious. I had a lot of negative energy that I used to take out on my mother, but now my dad was the only person around to take things out on. That led to my dad calling the cops on my one night because I ran away to a friend's house and refused to come home. Then when the cops took me home, I wouldn't calm down and stop yelling and cussing and trying to leave. So I spent one night in Juvenile Detention. That taught me that I never wanted to be in jail or detention or anything like it ever again. After that, my dad started me in counseling.

The counseling seemed to work a lot. I stopped trying to take things that my mother did to me out on my dad, I stopped the lying and sneaking around, and I started doing better in school. Then, the March after I turned 16, I found out I was pregnant. That brought a whole new shit-storm to my life. My the fact that I was pregnant, no that wasn't the bad part. The bad part was the fact that my guidance counselor at school found out I was pregnant and called my mother to "confer with her about how to handle this". Now, when my father enrolled me in Waukesha South, my dad made sure that the office personnel and everyone involved knew not to contact my mother regarding anything to do with me, because there was something in the divorce papers that stated that if my mother kicked any of the three kids out of the house or they moved out on their own, before the age of 19, my mother gave up all legal rights as to their schooling, health care, etc. So when my mother kicked me out, which to this day she denies that she ever kicked me out. She says I left of my own accord. Whatever. Anyway, after my school counselor decided to go against that and call my mother, I had to spend three hours at school with my mother, talking to her and "trying to figure out what we are going to do". My mother wanted me to get an abortion, telling me "if you don't get an abortion, I want nothing to do with you or that bastard child". Needless to say, I was not going to get an abortion. The really bad part of all this was that my counselor decided to call my mother the same day that my parents had court to change the child support order, because from the time my mother kicked me out until they went to court, my dad was still paying my mother for three children living in my mother's home, when there were only two. So then, when my mother left to go to the court date, I quickly called my dad and gave him the heads-up on what my mother knew and what was probably going to be brought up in court that day.

During court, my mother stood up and wanted the judge to order a paternity test for my dad, because my mother believed that my dad was the father of the child that I was pregnant with. That's how sick my mother is. She has been diagnosed as bi-polar, for which she does not take any medication, because she says she's not sick, and "only sick people take medication". I believe that she is schizophrenic as well, because of how she acts and what she says. Anyway, the judge did not grant the order for the paternity test, and my mother was ordered to pay back all the child support that my dad had paid her for me living with her, while I was actually living with my dad. After that, I was thankfully separated from my mother. I did not have to have anything to do with her, unless it was my choice. The judge was not going to force me to spend time with my mother, when we so obviously did not get along. So I was finally free of my mother's grasp. Or so I thought.

My pregnancy was pretty uneventful, although I did have a bout of stomach flu where I couldn't keep anything down for a day. I called my doctor and he told me that as long as I could eat something the following morning, I should be fine. I was about four or five months pregnant at the time. Anyway, I was able to eat some soup the next day, and keep it down, along with some white soda, so I thought I was fine. My dad and I decided to go to the mall, because there was a Saturday sale and he needed something, I forget what. But I was standing at the counter with whatever it was that my dad wanted to get, waiting for the salesperson, while my dad went to look at some speakers for his truck that were on the clearance rack. In the whole 30 seconds that it would take my dad to turn to look at the rack and the box of speakers, realize that the speakers would work for his truck, and turn back around to come over by the counter, I passed out. Right at the counter, I passed out. No one was close-by, although there was an off-duty Brookfield paramedic that had just walked in the store. He saw me go down, and according to my dad, he called the store security and the ambulance and supported my head while we waited for them to get there. The paramedic did not see if I had hit my head when I went down, so he wouldn't let me get up for fear that I had a concussion. And the fact that I was pregnant. I was considered "high risk" because I was 16 while I was pregnant, so they wanted to make sure I was going to be ok. They loaded me up and took me to the emergency room at St. Joesph's Hospital, which was where I gave birth to my daughter in November 2002. After that, there wasn't anything physical that happened while I was pregnant. But my mother came back into the picture.

A few months before I gave birth, my mother decided that she was "sorry" for "what she had done", but had never fully explained to me what it was that she had done, that she was now apologizing for. Whether I truly believed that my mother had changed, or if it was just the hormones from being pregnant, I don't know, but I allowed my mother call and come to see me a few times. At the time, I don't know if it was an act, or if she was serious. I know now that at the time, she was back on her medication and wanted to make things right between us. She said she "didn't mean" what she had said about the abortion, and that she wanted to be the grandma to my daughter. Well, it turns out that my mother hadn't changed at all. It was all an act. Everything was fine, until I gave birth and my mother was there and she told me, when there was no one in the room, that she was going to set up an adoption for the baby, because she "didn't think that I could handle it", being a mother at 17. Well, I tried to tell my dad and my daughter's father and anyone else that would listen that I didn't want my mother around me, didn't want her around my baby. My daughter's father, Mike, didn't believe me. But then again, he's always been a "momma's boy", always doing what his mom wants him to do, not what's right for our daughter. But that's a whole other story.

Anyway, after my daughter was born, my mother decided, off and on, that she didn't want to be around my daughter, and then a few weeks or months later, she would decide that she did want to be around her. There were many times, as my daughter got older and could talk, that she would ask about "Grandma Rita" and when she (my daughter) was going to see her again. My mother would call and set up a time and a place to meet, because my mother was coming from Saukville, over an hour away from my dad's house in Waukesha. Then, when the day came to meet, my mother would call like 15 minutes before we were supposed to be there, and tell me that she had to cancel, but wouldn't give me a reason. So then I was stuck having to tell my little sweet daughter, who wears her emotions on her face, that we weren't going to be seeing Grandma Rita that day, that she (Grandma Rita) had to cancel, but that we would see her another day. I can't count all the times that I had to tell my daughter that, and then try to calm her down and wipe her tears. I know that that's what mother's are supposed to do for their child, but aren't they also supposed to try to keep them from harm? That's what I've tried to do, yet people are trying to paint me as a bad mother. But that's for another post as well.

Now I haven't actually talked to my mother in almost a year. I have exchanged a few e-mails, mostly because she had to stick her nose where it didn't belong and make up lies, but again, that's for another post. But since I have stopped talking to her, I have been happier. I have realized that there is nothing that I can do to change her. I can only change myself, which I have started, slowly, ever so slowly, to do. But now, for those that read this that know me, you will probably understand a lot more about me. And please don't ask about these things unless you are a very good friend of mine, because I don't talk about these things easily. But there you go. That's the miserable childhood that contributed to me being so screwed up. In case any of you were wondering.