Happy Belated Birthday, Mom.

Mom, you would have been 79 years old if you were still alive.  Happy birthday, Mom.  The very best gift I could offer you is my forgiveness.  I wasn't the perfect daughter.  There was only one perfect human but that is saved for another day.  Today I offer my gift of forgiveness.

Mom, I forgive you for a lot of transgressions.  I am certain that through my remaining days there will be more things that pop up into my mind, both positive and negative memories.  I ask your forgiveness for falling short of the daughter you wanted.

I forgive you that you forced me to grow up and take responsibility for Matt for much of our young lives.  Even after you married Bud, I was still a primary parenting figure to Matt. That hurt him and it burdened me more than any 8 to 18 year old deserves.  I feel that the beginning was out of necessity because you were trying to keep us afloat with Dick not in the picture in any way.  After that, though is where the hurt is most profound.  You used me.  You neglected your duty as a parent to me and to Matt when you dropped us in Moulton so that you and Bud could live in Houston.  You tried to justify it that you were keeping us our of trouble after what Rick had done and been through.  I wasn't Rick, neither was Matt.  We were all in different developmental stages and dealing with a major shift when you married Bud.

I forgive you of all of the jabs about my weight and appearance.  I was doing my best to fill a hole that you created in me when you didn't fulfill your duties.  It started early and with increased pressure of adolescence, living in a rickety unreliable farmhouse in pretty harsh conditions, it got worse.  I forgive you of the jabs about recommending to the show, "What Not to Wear", telling me how to dress as an adult. So many instances, that I just can't count.  The strange thing was, you forgot that when you started to make more money that I needed to stop looking like I was wearing hand-me-downs.  You had forgotten the importance of positive body and self-confidence that you needed to foster and instill in me as your daughter.  I think this is what made me a "hard-ass", I always felt I was on my own.

I forgive you for the ugly things you have said about my home through the years, even my sons' artwork as children.   Nothing was ever good enough so you lived a life that wasn't full.  You tried to force that on to me.  You tried over and over to push me where to live and how to live and after forcing me to be independent, I wouldn't have it.  It bothered you that you were losing control of me.  I forgive you because, you shouldn't have controlled me ever.  I am sorry I gave that power to you, I cared too much.  

I forgive your shallowness about appearances.  You were insecure in who you were at the time and historically because of your own issues with your parents so you put on a mantle of everything beautiful and perfect.  Life isn't perfect and it is beautiful in the imperfections.  

I forgive you for failing to ever put me first.  I think you made a really good attempt with our wedding but for the rest of my life, it was all about you, you, you.  I pray that God is using my experiences to be a better parent and one day grandparent, to see and capture the beauty in togetherness.

I forgive you for treating me so differently than my brothers, holding me to a higher standard morally and behaviorally.  You seemed to have a real hands-off approach to my education through the years, I forgive you for that, too.  When I needed a car, you bought a sports car for yourself. I wasn't expecting something super nice, just something that would actually be mine.  I think Grandma and Grandpa gave Rick a car, Matt bought a car.  I didn't buy a car but I put my self through college paying for well over 1/2 of it, working while in high school and college and not accruing any debt in doing so.  I resented the way you would say, "Bud's put three through college right now." It was a lie.  You knew he wasn't paying for mine but you wanted to give laud and praise to him.  I resented that I was expected to be tough and work outside and do housework when on the farm but my brothers just had to work outside.  I forgive you for that and for all the little ways that Matt, my junior by only 18 months was coddled even through high school when I wasn't cherished.  You took advantage of my good nature and I forgive you.

Lastly, I forgive you for the role you played in your own death.  I think your borderline personality disorder grew and grew from late 1976 onward.  You would travel from doctor to doctor until you could get the medications you wanted to drug you and numb you from the pain you were feeling.  You were addicted to surgery and the need to be the center of everyones world.  Even the plaque on your desk stated, "Everyone is entitled to my opinion." You lacked humility, you didn't know how to ask forgiveness.  You certainly didn't know how to give it. Your drug addiction, your BPD, your insecurities make me overly cautious because I don't want my husband or children to have the relationship you had with me.  I forgive you for that conditioning. 

I think from heaven you are crying tears for me, hopefully looking out for me and helping me heal these gaping wounds.  I just think you didn't know.  

I forgive you Mom.

The Weight(y) Issue(s)

Recently, I met a woman with a very body positive vibe.  It was early June, I had orchestrated a neighborhood scavenger hunt, and she showed up in workout wear with no "over" clothes like I would have worn.  She was a pear shaped woman, likely 15 years younger than I and was absolutely loving being in her skin.

I wish I could say the same. 

Sure, I have my positive moments.  Usually it's when I look in the mirror after taking a shower and I have hair and makeup on.  There are other moments, too, when I actually feel good about how I look.  But this woman, there was no ambiguity about her self image.

Because of my aforementioned battle with sugar, my eating to fill a hole, and struggling with understanding that I don't have to keep up with anyone, I have issues.  When I was in high school, I don't recall every feeling "fat" or even larger than I was supposed to. I do remember eating WAY too much junk food.  Some of it directly tied to our living with a stranger.  In college I put on the "freshman fifteen" like most of my female classmates.  I struggled with it, trying to exercise it off but realistically speaking, I could not stick with an exercise regime to save my life. 

The only summer of my college career that I went back home, my mother decided it was time for me to lose weight.  We were living in Moulton and there was actually a Weight Watchers group somewhere nearby.  So I counted everything and felt deprived:  deprived of sugar, and carbohydrates, and attention that I actually wanted.  My Mom thought she would be my coach, watching everything I did and ate, encouraging me to walk on dusty roads in the heat of summer.  Once or twice she went with me and then she started to feel bad.  I was supposed to "run home" and tell my dad who would come pick her up.  This was likely July, middle of the day, on gravel roads.  I don't run.  I have never been a runner but Mom made out like she would die soon if I didn't so I tried, in the sun, on a gravel road that was an  uphill trek to get home.  I think I ran, then walked, then ran some more.  Mom didn't die that summer but I thought I might. 

Every once in a while, she would pat the back of my legs ----- the ones my brothers called "thunder thighs" ----- and say, "you don't need to eat that."  By the end of summer I was down to an acceptable weight according to Weight Watchers.  When I was driven back to college and I went grocery shopping.  I distinctly remember being near the Albertson's dairy department when we were walking.  Mom stopped and I went ahead.  "What are you doing?" I asked. "I am just looking at how beautiful you are now that you have lost weight."  Sigh.

Obviously I didn't stick with it.  Who was I doing this for anyway?  This isn't the kind of attention I wanted or needed.  It's pretty hilarious that I look back on my college pictures and say, "Wow, look how skinny I was!"  After the summer after my junior year, one of my residents (I was an RA) came to me to confess that she had an eating disorder.  It was why she was always wearing sweaters.  That blew me away; her family didn't pay attention to her.  

After I graduated my mom informed me that my grandfather was giving me liposuction surgery. 

What?  

Rick and Carolyn had been given washer and dryer after they were married from my Grandpa.  Matt was given a trip to Europe.  What did I get?  Liposuction that I didn't even know I needed.  Mom was in control of Grandpa's money and she wanted everything to be fair.  In my mind did washer + dryer = trip to Europe = Liposuction and 6 weeks of recovery seem fair? It still doesn't.  LIPOSUCTION HAD NEVER EVEN CROSSED MY MIND and now Mom had me thinking Grandpa thought I was too fat.  

Let me be crystal clear about a few things.  My mother's mother was over 5'10" tall and not a small woman at all.  My father was a large man.  Even in his early days when he was courting my mom, he was not a scrawny guy.  His own mother was a portly woman and his father died of a heart attack.  My sons are both above average at 6'1"; they got that from me and my side of the genetics.  One of the two is ectomorph and the other is an endomorph (I think) and honestly, I don't care so long as they are happy, healthy, and morally upright.  

I still eat too much and too fast but now I know why.  I can usually stop myself or at least slow down.  Fullness is a rarity for me.  It is truly better if I do intermittent fasting and wait to start eating around noon.  Nowadays, I feel like open the mouth, open the flood gates.  If I kept a food log, it might help but honestly I don't want to.  I still remember writing everything down for WW. Enough.

No, may I have a serving of unconditional attention please?  Let's serve it with a side of forgiveness.