Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Flaws

I was reading someone's blog where she talked about how she can get along with rapists and murderers but has little tolerance for one of her neighbors and sometimes for her family. I can relate.

My mom's moving in across the street from us. There's a cul de sac that Ts into our street. She bought the house at the end of that cul de sac. Which is nice. Right? Right?

It should be. It is.

But the thing is, I've realized that my life has moved on. She's always my mom. I love her. But I moved away. From her.

That wasn't the whole reason I moved across the country. It wasn't even most of it. But it was there.

My mom is a super nice lady. Everyone likes her. She'd do anything for anyone. Except for sometimes me.

Years ago, I started having seizures. Which looking back isn't such a big deal now. At the time it was really scary. I had multiple seizures daily. Sometimes one right after another. I didn't lose consciousness or anything but it was upsetting. My arm or leg would be going all apeshit and while I wasn't unconscious, I wasn't conscious either. So I'd watch and lose it. I mean, you're supposed to be able to control your leg. And meds didn't help. They just added to the problem. And I was tired. Its really tiring to have seizures.

I was also very young. I was in college and lived in a community with little in the way of public transportation.

I remember my mom didn't help. All she did was tell the prayer chain about it and have people pray for me. I don't believe in god. At least I don't think I do. Whatever, that's another post. The point being, she didn't help. She didn't offer to take me to doctor's appointments, in fact, she got annoyed when I asked and asked me if I'd already asked my boyfriend at the time.

I'm not exactly angry about it now. But I can't say it doesn't affect how I feel about our relationship either. I'd always been there for my mom.

My mom has always fought with mood swings. The rages she would fly into when we were kids still scare me. And the depression she's prone to still arrises to this day. She avoids meds and doctors and help in general. And I was always there. I dropped everything all through my adolescense and early adulthood to help her. Whenever she needed.

She'd call up crying or not want to get up in the morning and I'd rush to the rescue. I'd crawl in with her and let her cry and tell her I loved her and that I'd let the dogs out and make coffee or whatever when she was ready to get up. And she'd get up.

And I always thought she'd do the same for me.

Not that she didn't do things for me. She did. She does.

She gets up early and bakes bread from scratch. She would never forget a birthday, anniversary, doctor's appointment, anything. She loves me.

But when I needed her help... well... she was reticent.

And I pulled away. And moved away.

And now she's following me. Which I think will be good eventually. I want to have kids. She loves being a grandmother and she's great at it. But, I have been living without her. Separate. Away. For 6 years. I've built a life that doesn't really include her.

So her moving here scares me in a way I didn't really expect. Now, she's not moving for another year but still. Every time I call her its all she can talk about. And I'm happy for her. But I'm scared for me.

I'm scared I'll be constantly snippy and annoyed. She is overly sentimental in a way that makes me nuts and always talks about god even though she knows I'm not really all about that. She can become incredibly focused on the negative and on getting help from others about it in a way that feels more like she's gossipping than it does that she's reaching out for help. And she gets depressed a lot. The rage seems to have passed with age. But the depression's still there.

And really what scares me more than anything lately, is that many of the things that annoy the shit out of me about my mom, could also be true about me. I want to have a family. And I want her around. But I need her to have her own life. And I'm terrified that if I bitch and moan and have all this negativity of her around me, I'll end up with the exact same relationship problems with my own kids.

Ah, I feel better. Thanks annonyblog.

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