The Mother of All Meltdowns
, which she helped contribute to.Ultimately the story was to bring awareness to siblings of children with special needs. It brings to light how siblings can be affected too, but in telling this tale the anonymous guest shares her story and how she herself is a Glass Child. And as I read her story, it resonated with me, because I certainly fit into that category as well, but never knew there was a definition for it.
I'm very aware that there is no such thing as normal. I have never expected for real life to resemble the movie Pleasantville. Yet, I've always known that my family is, well, different. I have a collection of four parents - 3 living, 1 not - 2 biological and 2 step (though they're just mom and dad to me). This parental mix and match game has produced a total of 8 younger siblings. My dad and my step-mom had two, I have a step-sister from my step-dad, and my mom and my step-dad had 5. Yes, I know, it's a lot to keep up with! Trust me, I have trouble too.
For as long as I can remember, my mom has called me mom. She will be the first one to admit that I raised her. It's our family curse that one girl gives birth to another baby girl at nineteen. I'm the girl in my wave and my mother was the girl in her's. We grew up together, much the same way that Lena and I have. However, I have never felt that Lena has helped raise me. My Gramma insists that I was already 30 years old when I was born, even to this day.
This weekend produced yet another episode of me raising my mother. Friday she started sending me frantic text messages about needing my help because her and my dad (step-dad) were broke and hungry. Having 7 children under her care necessitated her being a stay at home mom and my dad worked to support our family. A couple years ago, my dad made the decision to pursue going on 100% disability instead of just partial, because his back just couldn't take the hard labor anymore and he was getting chronic migraines that lasted for days. While this has put them in the financial position of bringing in more income than James and I combined each month thanks to his time in the military and awesome benefits at work, somehow, every two weeks I get a phone call asking for a small loan to get them through to their next check. I'm not entirely sure where the hell it goes, but it doesn't last more than a few days when it arrives. My sisters reached their breaking points a long time ago with the constant phone calls for small loans here and there. I don't blame them, but it leaves me with the sole responsibility of bailing our parents out time and time again. Even knowing that a lot of their struggle is primarily self-inflicted, I still can't manage to tell my sobbing hysterical mother no when she calls to ask for help.
Friday was just another page in the never ending book of caring for my parents. It doesn't surprise me, it doesn't piss me off, I'm just numb to it after living in this endless cycle. It's all very wash, rinse, repeat, over here when it comes to bailing them out. But that's the role I've been given to play. I'm the good child, the mother, the caretaker, the savior, the shoulder to cry on.
Believe it or not, despite the constant strife they have with money, they're in a good place in their lives comparatively speaking. I remember times that were a whole lot worse than driving 50 minutes to take my mom to the grocery store. I think that's where the major difference comes in between me and my siblings, they were too little to remember a lot of the shit we went through. They don't remember my dad when he was unemployed and hopped up on cocaine. They don't remember my mom going out 4 or 5 nights a week to get wasted with her friend because she couldn't handle the stress of 4 kids in diapers and my dad falling asleep in a puddle of his own drool. What they do remember is me making their lunches for school in the morning. What they do remember is us running around outside all the time because any moment my parents were home was a moment that I didn't have to feed one of the twins or change a diaper. They remember that I'm their other mother and that they can turn to me any time mom starts getting a little crazy.
They all have their own memories of growing up dysfunctional with a bipolar mother who refuses to take her meds on a consistent basis. But they weren't old enough for real memories to form until a while after my mother's nervous breakdown and two year hiatus to San Francisco. At the time that she officially snapped, we'd lost the house we were living in and I chose to live with my dad and my other mom. I'm pretty sure my moving out with the straw that broke the per-verbally camel's back. In the blink of an eye, her rock, her co-parent, her friend, was gone.
Looking back, my mother believes with her whole heart that fate needed to put her through that for my benefit. At the time I made the choice to leave, no one knew that my dad was sick and that he was only going to have 4 more years with us. No one knew what a gift my family falling apart was giving me. I was just relieved to get away from all the drama and the opportunity to be a kid instead of a parent at 14 years old. Don't get me wrong though, I was eaten alive by the guilt of leaving my younger siblings, my babies, with two completely unstable people while I got to go off and live in happy well adjusted household with two parents that actually liked each other. Especially now, I'm more grateful than ever that I got to spend the last years my dad had living with him. I think it's those years that I spent with them that helped keep me sane and provided me with the examples I desperately need to raise Lena.
I'm pretty sure that this paints my mom as a monster and I want to assure you, she's not. I love her dearly and she's taught me a lot of good lessons in my life and has played a major role in helping me with Lena over the past decade. However, it took her a long time to get here. It took me a long time to forgive her for looking through me and depending on me to pick up the pieces where she fell short. One of my sisters has a venomous hatred for some of the things she's done and has a really hard time just accepting our mom for who she is. I'm hoping, that with age, will come forgiveness for her. I suppose time will tell.
I do love my mom and honestly, despite everything, I wouldn't trade her for the world. I've learned to take the good with the bad, I've learned that I can't change her into someone I want her to be, I've learned that sometimes it's just out of her control. I've also learned what it means to love someone more than yourself. I've learned that you can be all sorts of crazy and that you have to put that aside when you become a mom, because nothing, nothing is more important than giving your all to your child. I've learned that some people just have more all to give as well. I'm bound and determined that my daughter will not end up a Glass Child the same way I did.
I'm grateful for the close bond that I have with my siblings because it's filled my life with love and purpose and I couldn't ask for a better bunch to raise my daughter around. I can see a little piece of all of them in her and a little piece of me in all of them. They're my fate, Lena is my fate, and my mother, well she is too. It's just the hand I was dealt and I will continue to play the game until there is no longer a game to play. If I learned one thing in my life it's that it's too damn short to hold grudges and you have to love the family you're given unconditionally because you never know when they won't be there anymore.
Yes, I'm my mother's mother and this is one Glass Child who intends to parent the hell out of her for as long as I'm able.
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