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“Why couldn’t you protect me, Mum?” I’d asked, hiding the tremble in my voice. “From him and everything else.”
“I did! I made sure no one could criticize you.”
“No, you became the bully. You enabled another bully and let him drive me into the ground until it almost broke me. Maybe your intentions were good to begin with, but you let your own trauma blind you and you punished me for it.” My voice breaks over the next words. “Why aren’t you proud of me?”
I wasn’t sure what I was searching for – acknowledgment maybe, or closure. Answers, definitely.
“Of course, I am!”
“Then why can’t you tell me?”
Silence met me on the other line.
“I shouldn’t have to beg you for a kind word. You have no problem listing all of my flaws – do you really find it so difficult to find one redeeming quality in me?”
“Oh, darling,” she says. “No.”
“I make myself throw up, Mum. After almost every meal since I was fifteen.”
The therapist helped me prepare for this conversation, but it’s Tristan who gave me the strength to do it. Prior to our relationship falling apart, he’s the one who was steadfastly by my side, my greatest champion and slayer of every self-doubt I ever had. I doubt I’d have found the strength to take these steps to heal myself without him.
I certainly wouldn’t have known that I deserved a million times better.
“I’m so sorry,” she chokes out, silently crying now. “I never wanted that for you, I just didn’t want you to get hurt.”
“You were so busy worrying about how the world might hurt me that you never realizedyouwere the one hurting me,” I say. “Things have changed, Mum, and I will no longer accept the way you speak to me, the ways in which you belittle me. So, you have a choice. Either you understand what I’m saying and change or you don’t and, like dad, we go our separate ways. Think about it and let me know your decision.”
“I don’t need to think about it honey, of course I’ll change. I– I don’t know if it’ll be perfect overnight, but I’ll try.”
The relief of her words had been crushing. A big part of me had truly believed I’d lose both parents that day.
I’m not naive enough to think things will magically get better, but I can settle and be happy with intentions changing.
And so far, progress has been slow but evident.
I know Tristan would be thrilled to hear it, to know Iamtaking care of myself and even more than he could hope for, but I don’t tell him. There’s no use pulling him closer when I’m trying to push him away.
“That’s great,” he says. “It’s pretty dark out so I can’t see much, but you look really good.”
My heart squeezes again, happy to have him compliment me.
“Maybe that’s because we haven’t spoken in a while,” I jab, wanting my own petty revenge for how he’s hurt me.
He winces, but doesn’t let it deter him.
“Nope, that can’t be it. You’ve always been stunning,” he says, easily. “On the other hand, our separation is definitely why I look like shit these days.”
It’s hard to make out his facial expressions from so far away, but even I can see how tired he looks. It can’t be easy to work long hours, drive to another country, and sleep in his car for weeks on end.
Then again, no one asked him to do that.
Even though I have about a million things I want to tell him, I stay silent. He’s the one who wanted to speak to me,hecan do the talking.
He looks up at me like I’m the only good thing in his life, his eyes lined with sadness but shining on me.
“How much longer am I going to be in the doghouse, baby?”
“Forever.”
