All I can afford to give.

The past few days have felt a bit like I’ve been walking around in a dream. Possibly like a reoccurring nightmare. I know that it has a lot to do with thinking about the past, facing disappointment and falling into old habits in dealing with the things life has to throw at me. I hate feeling like I’m walking around in a minefield. An old familiar mine field, watching each step I carefully take. I like being able to skip around freely, but I suppose that’s a fairytale way of living. Despite the fact that I am a girl, I don’t want to live in a Disneyland princess reality. I want the good and bad life has to offer. It’s what defines me.

Much of my despondent attitude has to do with my mother, I’m sure of it. Visiting Oklahoma last week brought back some of the issues I thought I had buried there, but being around my mom brings those issues up to the forefront. Since my father passed away last year, in feels like my mother isn’t here anymore either, or rather that she doesn’t want to be here since he’s gone. My biggest issue with my mom is that she doesn’t really like to be around me. This isn’t something I’m saying because I want to feel bad; this is a direct quote from her mouth. She’s told me that I remind her of my father so much, partly because I look like him, but more so at the fact that I’m their “lovechild”; the product of my parents wanting to create a bond that would hold them together for all eternity. This has proven to be in my favor and a factor that works against my entire being.

When I visited home last week, it didn’t take my mother five minutes to lay into me with verbal assaults. I thought I had grown used to the stings of her phrases, but they bit me in new ways. Maybe it’s because I’ve been gone for so long I've grown accustomed to the drama free lifestyle my brothers and I have created in our happy, humble abode. These days it seems as if it irks my mother to even look at me in the eyes, in the face, when I’m talking to her. The way her eyes quickly dart away when I’m trying to hold a civil conversation with her, or any conversation for that matter, couldn’t make me feel anymore unwelcome in her life than if I was a sales circular that showed up in her mailbox; annoying and useless. It shouldn’t be any surprise that this affects me, entirely.

At the very least this gets my mind reeling about my own life. In one sense, I want to be a good daughter. I want to keep trying to get through to her to help her get through the grief of losing my father. In another sense, I feel like I’m going to waste my own life trying to make hers better. With both my parents, this has been my life story. I guess that’s due to the fact that they chose to bring me into this world under those circumstances; to make their life and love better. In the end, my father chose alcoholism over everything else. The idea of bringing a life into this world to try and fix theirs, failed. The woe-is-me part of myself wants to say that I should think that I’m a failure, but I don’t feel that way. I feel like I was brought upon this earth to do something bigger than what they had intended for me. Nevertheless, I want to help my mom, but what do I do if my attempts aren't working? I don't want to give up on her, she's my mom.

There's more to this, but at the present moment, this is all I can afford to give.