Evenings when the weather was rainy, or cold, or boiling hot, I would look out my window and hope and pray that she decided to stay in the mission, or at a shelter, or that a good person had an extra bed for her, or that she had maybe gotten money for a motel.
She would call but I often couldn't answer. I could not take the chance that she would be raging and drunk, or full of the latest drama she had largely brought on herself. Or maybe it was also that it was just so damned painful to hear from her. I knew that I was no match for the pain she was in nor for her desire to escape it. Nothing would stop her, not even her love for me. And that hurt more than I can put into words, even though it shouldn't. That should bring me relief, somehow, that it wasn't personal. It's just that it felt so personal.
Maybe I will always wrestle with that, as well as whether there was more that I could have done. Feeling so powerless, actually being so damned powerless, was also very painful.
My faith was also hugely affected. Terribly affected. For years I struggled with this question: how could You? God, how could you let her never, ever get out of pain? I prayed, I got and stayed sober, I begged, I helped, I stopped enabling...so why? I would hear someone say that they prayed and their brother got sober, so prayer really works. I would seeth with grief and rage, quietly daring God to explain that, to ask Him whether He wanted me to understand that prayer for others works but not for me and my mom. Why was her whole life so damned tragic?
I still don't fully have the answers to that. But I do trust God. He Has just been way too good to way too many people, myself included, for me not to. So, He definitely must've had His reasons. I think now that maybe it was actually more merciful to mom and that she was of better use to God just as she was, to leave when she did, the way that she did. The Hospice Counselor explained that when Mom actually died, she had a very peaceful expression. The counselor said that she had seen countless people die, and that no amount of drugs or medicines could keep a horrible look off of their faces if they were not at peace, so she knew that Mom was.
I know that her story has definitely inspired me to do all that I can to stay sober, and that many of my fellow alcoholics have not been able to do so. I also have realized, being forty two now myself, that although she was fairly young when she died - fifty three - that forty two and fifty three is a long time. I have already had a good life. She lived a very long time, had a long marriage, two kids, jobs, friends, and interests like singing for a whole lifetime before things got really, really bad.
There are those who believe that my mom was mentally ill, perhaps bipolar or some such other problem. But I don't think that's the case. I think she quite simply had alcoholism, and also PTSD from past abuse. Then I think person after person let her down, and she also did not turn to some places that she could have. I see Mom as a champion for women's rights in that she did whatever it took to stand up for herself. She was willing to lose support from people she cared about. Perhaps she was somewhat misguided, because certainly there is no bigger way to say "fuck you" to society than to quit living by its rules, but the ones she broke may have hurt her more than anyone. Still, she did it, which was enormously brave and I am so very proud of her for not going back on her truth about the abuse. I can only assume that at some point the lack of support was too much and so she got together with hurtful people and also back with her sister. Certainly much of her rebellion was aimed at continuing to blot out her pain with alcohol. Certainly that part hurt others, and ultimately I will call it wrong. Yet I have enormous sympathy for it. I know what that terror feels like, when someone has hurt you and you want the people you love to believe you, to protect you, to support you, and they don't. So you find something to help with that feeling. You deny it's a problem so that you can keep your defense. I understand that. I understand so much about her still today. She continues to inspire me still today. My whole life is one of bravery largely due to her.
I wouldn't even have said anything about my own abuse if it hadn't been for Mom. She taught me to speak out, to speak up. She believed me, and she thought I should be heard. She was my advocate.
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