Day 0417

Inneresting. I was just told that while I can’t blame the insane (and not cute insane but batshit nasty insane) people in my life for their insanity — goodness only knows you can’t help the hand your parents and fate deal you — it is perfectly fine to expect them to take responsibility for their actions.
And if they can’t, for example, behave appropriately with a child, then I have every right to make sure that child doesn’t have to spend time around them.
It’s a bit refreshing after so many (many many) mental health pros telling me that unfathomable compassion is the only response to the Total and Utter Crazees out there.
So, the person in my son’s life who is nuts and who will always be part of his life can be considered a ‘condition’ that my son has to deal with. And I am allowed to take steps to make sure that condition doesn’t cause him more difficulty and suffering than it needs to as part of the reality of his life.
Somehow thinking about it this way takes away the constant edge of guilt I feel for not having been able to ‘fix’ the situation. That doesn’t mean I absolve myself 100% but it’s a nice start to lessening the weight I’ve felt for nine years.
What it doesn’t do however, is erase that bad case of ‘Wishful Thinking’ that travels around with me wherever I go. The bit of me that sees a pinhole of light while sitting in a black box and thinks ‘the sun is shining’ or who looks at someone who has hurt me and thinks ‘but at least they didn’t — me, and maybe one day they’ll change …’
Someone please hit me over the head with a Tom and Jerry mallet the next time those words enter my head. Please.

Day 0209

I learned a valuable lesson again yesterday.

The lessons seem to be coming fast and furious this year. And I soooo can’t wait for 2013 to be over. 2013: The year of loss and confusion

But I digress …

After I found out my kidlet had been bullied for a few months without me knowing I did the Parent Thing where I started kicking myself over and over again, using hindsight to prove to myself that I should have known.

It makes a weird kind of sense when you look back as a mum and can still recall the days when you knew your child’s every bowel movement, burp, fart and boo boo.

But now, as he moved away from me, we both need to start seeing things differently. There are some things a mum can only know if she’s told about them.

And so this is not so much a lesson in how I should have known, but in how I need to help him learn to talk about unpleasant things he doesn’t necessarily understand.

I want to liberate him from the weight of the mistaken belief that you can’t talk about something until you an explain it clearly; that the things you say out loud need a structure.

I still remember the day I realised my mum didn’t know everything that had ever happened to me just by dint of some amazing mother telepathy. It was utterly disillusioning. And I resented her for it. I resented her for not being there when she didn’t even know I needed her.

And that is a feeling I want to free my beautiful kid from ever having.