Mother's Day: Bah Humbug

So I once worked on a blog called Grace and Motherhood. I still love that blog. It is about Natalia, kind of like my version of a baby book. I got derailed with it because of life. I injured my knee which led to a whole new one. That led to a LONG, painful recovery and me having to quit floor nursing all together. This turned into going back to school for my nurse practitioner-ness, which sucked 2 years out of my life (think Princess Bride). So I have a new knee and a new career. Now I'm 2 years into that (almost) and feel like life is back on track again. Okay, now we are all caught up, let me introduce you to this new blog and it's purpose. 

I know Mother's Day isn't until May 12th, but I don't want to dull any part of that day for all you terrific moms. Y'all are doing fabulous and I see how much you love your babies. It makes my heart swell. Mothering isn't for the weak. Okay, story time......

During the whole knee recovery thing I finally met my mother. I mean, really met my mother. 

I was raised by my mother and I knew she had mental health issues, but I could never quite figure her out. It was her typical odd behavior when I was at my lowest point in my knee recovery when I finally had enough and decided to step away from our relationship. Honestly, she didn't even notice.

 I was in counseling at the time and doing research on my own to diagnose her. I diagnose everybody. (I'm diagnosing you right now!) When there is something I can't figure out I obsessively research it. I came across narcissistic personality disorder (NPD). Now this isn't just snapping endless selfies or cutting to the front of lines. This is much, much extra. Think of it as a person trapped in a two year old mentality. They are starved for attention - any kind of attention. They feed on it. They need to be adored, feared, lifted up. But this is an adult. An adult who can manipulate children, manipulate relationships, and keep the relationship off balance. All the pieces of our past came together and I finally saw my mom for the first time. 

The hardest part was the death of "fictitious mom". This was the template of a mom I wanted Artemis (obviously not my mom's real name) to fit into. For years I cried and longed for "mom", but all I had was Artemis. One could not be the other. Artemis does not know how to be a mother, nor does she have the capacity to love. Now that makes most people very uncomfortable. It is so taboo

to say a mother does not love her child. I get it. I can 100% tell you Artemis does not love her children. I'm talking about actual love. People will say "Well, she did the best she could". To that I say: It doesn't qualify as love. Jeffrey Dahmer also did the best he could. It still was not love. No, she never ate any body parts, no severed heads.




So here's to all of us who think mother's day stinks. Maybe I should look on the bright side that I'm a mother and it can be MY day.

That just seems dumb. I really like being a mom and Natalia tells me all the time I'm doing a good job and she appreciates me. She is that kind of kid and I can't believe God gave me such a gift. That's why her middle name is Grace: a gift I never deserved, but God gave her to me anyway. A special day seems gratuitous. Really, mother's day reminds me of the mom I still want. The one I wanted Artemis to be. The one I hoped she would turn into if I just explained enough how she was hurting me, how she could stop hurting me, and how she could make things right. The problem with NPD is not only are they empathy deficient, but they also do not believe they are the problem. It's stupid to fix something you don't believe is broken. It is 100% beneath a narcissist. Artemis believes all the blame belongs to me for causing drama. I should just ignore it like everyone else in the family. This is why I had to let go of my mom and Artemis three years ago.

Going "no contact" with family has rules. This was carefully thought out for a year before I went to this level. I had tried having what Jeremy calls a "Hallmark" relationship, where we talked mostly around holidays. I wasn't strong enough to resist her boundary infringement and would get sucked into the drama every time. The no contact was not punitive, it was protective. I see Artemis as a dangerous person. Not physically, but mentally and emotionally to me and my whole family. If she was not a relative I wouldn't have let her near my family. That is what helped settle my decision. I wrote her a letter and read it to her over the phone since she lives on the other side of the country. She quietly listened, said "okay", and that was the end of it. She never attempted to contact me again. The rules were no contact with Natalia as well (because of sociopathic tendencies) which didn't change much for Natalia since she had only seen Artemis when she was a baby. 

I love Artemis. I love her so much it breaks my heart she lives in a place where her life is in constant chaos and cannot be helped. The no contact thing doesn't mean I haven't forgiven her. I forgive her so much better in this situation. The one thing I want more than anything is a mom. Fictitious mom. I see how much I love Natalia and how easy it is to be her mom and it's frustrating Artemis couldn't do that. It's easy to go snuggle Natalia, to check myself when she calls me out when I'm rude, to wake up and make her breakfast so she and I can snuggle on the mommy chair before school. (Obviously a Master's Degree doesn't guarantee no more run-on sentences.) Artemis did evil things, but she is not evil. She's just a human. A very broken human. 

This blog will be about my life growing up. It's not all doom and gloom. Most of it's funny. Some of it is tragic. All of it is my perspective. The names will be changed except for Lacowville residents. I want anyone who has had less than a cookie-cutter family to be able to read these posts and be like "Hell yeah! I remember having the electricity turned off because my parents bounced a bunch of checks!" "Yeah, I remember my weirdo step-dad who just met us walk around in his underwear and dentures!" You know, the normal childhood stuff. Everybody's welcome. Dentures and all.