Mothering

I had a friend on MySpace write a blog about her mother and it got me thinking about my own. As with any mother-daughter relationship, Mom and I have struggled more with our relationship since I've gotten older.

At first, I wanted to blame her. She didn't give me enough, she wasn't present enough. She didn't call often enough. She wasn't interested in the person I've become. She hated me for leaving Maine and for settling away from her.

Once I worked through the initial stages of anger (which took a long time), I got to place of pure hurt. I still believed all of the above, but I wan't angry about it. I blamed myself. I found ways that didn't exist that I must be at fault. I manufactured my own human failings to explain what I thought must have caused her dislike of me.

And now, I'm in a different place. Over the past year, I've come to realize one very important fact. My mother never failed me and she never failed as a person. She simply, like every other parent in this world, couldn't live up to the idealized standard that I had set for her. As it turns out, my mother is human. She is not a super human. She doesn't have mystical powers to fix what is broken with me, she can't read my mind, she can't be everything to me that I might need in any given moment. More than that, she has human feelings. Perhaps she did feel hurt and a bit betrayed when I moved to DC and made my life here. Afterall, I am her daughter and my life happens for the most part outside of her daily life. That would make me sad. And maybe even angry. But because she is my mother, I didn't allow her to have those feelings and I certainly didn't validate them.

It's funny, this relationship thing. I think, in all ways, I expected that my mother would never be any different than the person that I thought she was. The thing is, though, is that we are often not fully ourselves with our children. I know that I am not my entire person with Bailey. She sees the parts of me that she needs to see and the parts of me that I can allow myself to be when I am parenting her. For instance - Bailey is not a part of my love affair with Kelly and she never will be. And yet, that is a huge, huge part of what defines me as a person. And when Bailey is older, I may make decisions that come from that part of me. And Bailey will probably not understand those decisions. Why would she? It's a part of me she doesn't know.

I think I'm rambling, and making my point badly.

I guess, what it all comes down to is that growing up for me, in the context of my relationship with my mother, has been hard. It is difficult, no matter how much understanding I try to inject in my thinking, to accept that I am not the center of my mother. Perhaps that is selfish, but it is also honest. And, I think, natural. I think it's a good thing that I was so attached to the woman who birthed and raised me. I think these are good struggles, and if I could remove myself emotionally from them, I would probably be quite pleased with what I'm seeing.

But I can't remove myself. There is still the part of me that wants to be the first factor in my mother's life. Even though I would be very, very angry if I actually was. Does that make sense?

I see now that mothering an adult is a nearly impossible task. I understand, in some ways, why so many mothers and daughters who had great relationships grow apart. The women that I know who have untouched relationships with their mothers are women who really didn't ever change the dynamic. Their mothers still live for them.

And while that sounds nice, it wouldn't be what I wanted for myself or my mother. I get so jealous sometimes when I'm talking to my coworker. Her mom lives five minutes away from her and is their childcare provider. She is there at every major event, for every major milestone and the two are, essentially, best friends. That sounds nice. Except then, I think about myself when I am mothering an adult. When Bailey is all grown up and living her life, I am not going to live my life for her. That is going to be my time to re-fire my love affair with Kelly, to travel, to be the Mikki that exists outside of Bailey.

And when I am honest with myself, that is all my own mother has done. She morphed into a person. A full person with a life, with dreams, with hopes, with love and with daily functions that are completely outside of her children. As a woman, I am proud of her. As her daughter, I am lost without her.

I'm not sure where it goes from here or even that there is a destination to be found. My mother and I will forever be entwined in each other's lives in whatever ways we choose to put each other there. We have history and a story and what the future brings, I cannot say.

What I do know, and can say for perhaps the first time in my adult life, is that at it's very core my relationship with my mother cannot be defined as a friendship. Our relationship cannot be changed in a way that makes it easier for us, because to do that would mean that I would lose the most essential part of how I define myself. When it comes to my mother, I am a daughter. I choose that relationship and that definition because to do any less would be dishonorable and dishonest to the woman I call my mother. And to the love that I have for her.