Posted on by She Never Sleeps

The Human Condition (pt. 112)

I sipped my bourbon. I was tired, I didn’t want to be out. In fact, I wanted to be home, in bed, surrounded by my cats, drifting into a comfortably uncomfortable sleep. I wanted my worn-in sweats, with the loosened waistband, saggy bottom, pilled fabric throughout, softened through multiple washes…  I lapped the Bulleit lightly wishing I was already under the fat knit blankets in my bedroom, falling away into unconsciousness.

Instead, here I was, listening to a man drone on about the artistic condition.

The Artistic Condition, the grueling self-doubt, the striving to be at least an equal to their peers in that specific field, the 24/7 struggle to be recognized – noticed, the sleepless 2 a.m. tossing and turning anxiety ridden nights, the booze and the drugs and the men and the women and some more of the booze with a side of drugs… just to take the edge off.

And I fiddled with my drink, swishing the amber liquid lazily out of semi-boredom and resignation. Why was I here? Because while I wanted the cozy comfy security of my bed, I didn’t want to go to the home in which it was inhabited. Problems were at Home. Fights were at Home. Anger and 7 years of built up Frustration were at Home. Things I was not overly eager to deal with. Yet, these all seemed like better options compared to the incessant droning of the gentleman seated to my left.

Finally, I said, “So, Human. You’re bitching about being Human.” He doubled back and looked as though he was going to argue the point. But I excused myself before we could go down that (I could only assume) long and winding road.

A short tumbler with a couple swallows left of liquor remained on the polished bar top. A man kept an eye on it, waiting for its owner to return. And I walked out into the night, head full, heart empty.

 

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4/5/18 Maternal Guilt, In Short

Motherhood was never a driving goal of mine. Even as all my high school friends were off being impregnated by future absentee fathers, my only aspiration was to get out of my shitty poverty stricken neighborhood and maybe one day see the world.

Of course, youth + stupidity squashed those hopes fairly quick.

I wasn’t meant for motherhood. I knew it right away, although I couldn’t accept the bald truth of it. This is not to say that I did not love my first son – I have never loved any living human as much as I have my first child. Just looking at him every day broke my heart in different ways in which I had no idea how to handle. The overwhelming pain I felt in thinking that I wasn’t good enough to be the mother to this amazing tiny ball of perfection still lingers, 21 years later. Only in hindsight and more self-introspection that I care to admit, have I realized how much the absence of my own parents  affected my demeanor towards my son.  Of course, anyone on the outside looking in would say I’ve done a great job. How wonderful that he and I have such an amicable relationship.

They do not know that I walked away from him when he was 6 months old. That I thought he’d have a better life without me in it. They do not know that when he was a year old, I willingly handed over physical custody to his father and never legally fought for him because I was too scared that I would lose. The courts would see I wasn’t the right kind of “mom material” and I’d be deprived of any real communication or time spent with him. They do not know how much I drank (so much) while he was gone just to black out my guilt of not being the cookie cutter mold of what a “Good Mother” was supposed to be, that my status of Weekend Mom not only belittled my character in the eyes of others, but in my own as well.

But I loved him, albeit from a safe distance. In solitude, the ache of his absence would send me into fits of uncontrollable weeping. A handful of poems I wrote remain as a reminder of those times, but not one more than that because any attempt to  encapsulate my feelings about my life without his presence in it would spiral me further into a depression in which I was not keen to visit. Throughout the years, I never questioned that I still wasn’t worthy and constant arguments with his father (the “good” parent) didn’t help. The weight of my fears and doubts tempered any desire or attempt for the closeness I longed to have with my son.

However, as each year passed, as he grew into a young man and his childhood days receded as an ebbing tide, I accepted that imperfections and all, I was His Mother. I would like to say it was an overnight transformation in which I woke up and Voila, All Makes Sense and is Well and Good!, but that is not how life or personal growth works. I still wrestle with my guilty days, especially as I am now raising my two youngest in such a different manner. I find while I am spending time with them, running errands, singing songs, sewing up injured teddies – I am also ruing all of which I’ve missed from my first child’s formative years. However, I am also aware that even as just a weekend/summer mom, I tried the best I knew how to build a bond between the both of us. And as long as I am alive, there will always be room for improvement in that relationship.

We joke, we laugh, we text, we message.  We do have a better relationship than most. He has assured me time and again that he harbors no ill will towards me, that he never thought I was a “bad mom”. He has made it clear that I’ve always been Good Enough (and it makes him sad to know I felt any other way), which I still mostly struggle to believe. It is not something in which I’ve completely come to terms with, though little by little it sets in. He has grown into a man whom I am proud to call Son and I hope that one day I am the woman who he is proud to call Mom.