I am my mother's daughter

I see so much of her in me. Whether it was just the genetic luck of the draw, or whether I learned my behaviors from her, I don't know. I do know that none of my seven siblings has these particular traits, and she raised them as well.

What are the traits? I dismiss my pain; my first level of defense is to ignore it; second is to take an aspirin (or Aleve, usually). And then to ignore it. I take on more than I can handle, and then proceed to get it done (this ability has disintegrated over time, much to my dismay). I set high standards for myself, and don't really grasp the notion that doing less than my best is sometimes acceptable. I also don't grasp the notion that sometimes my best is less than perfection. I attribute my failures to not having worked hard enough, or long enough.

By themselves, I don't know that these traits would necessarily even be that bad. The problem is, there are more, less pleasant traits.

I get frustrated with other people's "laziness," and since I am a workaholic, anything less seems like sloth. I am more inclined to intellectualize than to empathize. I tend to think critique is better than praise (as in, taking the time to analyze how something was done, and figure out how it could be done better, rather than just saying, "Oh, good job."). And, given my high expectations for myself, I suppose it makes sense that it's incredibly difficult for me to ask for, or to accept help (but, because I'm only human, when I get overwhelmed, I need help. So then I feel angry and resentful that people aren't helping me.)

Worse, I notice more and more often how not just I, but quite a few of the other parts as well, am really classist. How I could have picked up that level of classism while growing up as poor as we were, I don't know. Well, okay, logic says that internalized oppressions tend to be more intense anyhow. But for all my knowledge of how class works, and all my beliefs, overall, that classism is bad, I still have a visceral dislike of people who display the behaviors associated with a particular class bracket (it cuts across race and gender).

Some people can look at an abusive parent and say, "I would NEVER do that. I COULD never do that." I look at my mother, and think, "I can see how she did that. I can see the factors that would put me into the position where I might do the same things."

I'm not saying she did the right things. Heck, even when I was a teenager, I didn't say that. One time, she asked me whether I thought she was a good mother. I responded that I thought she was a good person but not necessarily a good mother. Obviously, this was not the right answer.

And, honestly, I can see almost as many good things in her parenting as bad.

I sometimes wonder whether my ability to see where her behavior came from means I wasn't "really" abused. But you know what? Just because I can explain what happened, and because I can see she was not evil or malicious, doesn't mean I didn't get hurt.

Why was she physically abusive? First, there was the fact that she believed physical discipline was an appropriate tool. Ironically, for all her vociferous support of it, when she was parenting with enough resources, she didn't tend to use physical discipline. But she could justify its use, because she did believe it was okay.

She was abusive because she got overwhelmed. She had taken on too much, and didn't have appropriate sources of support. She lashed out because she had no other outlets. And what's even worse was, I know she looked for support. When I was a kid, her apparent choices for a partner were either my abusive, alcoholic stepfather, or no one at all. When she went to her church for advice, or her family, they told her she should find a way to support him so he didn't "have to" drink. When she went to a therapist, after leaving him, the therapist's response to hearing her lay out her situation was, "I have no idea how you can handle all of that." And left it at that.

So she had no support. She was overwhelmed. And so she would reach her boiling point and, inevitably, one of us kids would push her over the edge. She didn't know how to take care of her own emotional needs. She didn't know how to step back, or insist on receiving support. But she knew how to erupt.

I can even see how my mother could be emotionally incestuous with each oldest child in turn. She was lonely, overwhelmed, had no one to turn to. And then, here is this person who can listen, offer support, stand in for a partner.

I'm not saying it was right. I'm saying I can empathize.

But, I am my mother's daughter, and not my mother. I did not have my first child when I was eighteen. I did not have eight children by the time I was thirty-eight (given that I'm almost 33, with no children as yet, I think I can say this with confidence).

Instead of having babies, I went to college. Instead of being married three times, I spent years in therapy working through my childhood. Instead of behaving as though what I experienced wasn't abuse, I have accepted that people I love, and who love me, could do horrible things at the same time. I have worked on healing, and I have taken time to learn new ways to live. I may not be perfect, but I am a work in progress.

So I'll close with this quotation from an old Nike ad:

You do not have to be
your mother unless she is
who you want to be. You do not have
to be your mother's mother, or your
mother's mother's mother, or even
your grandmother's mother on your
father's side. You may inherit their
chins or their hips or their eyes, but
you are not destined to become the
women who came before you, you are
not destined to live their lives. So if
you inherit something, inherit their
strength. If you inherit something,
inherit their resilience. Because the only
person you are destined to become is
the person you decide to be.