I appreciate your ability to empathize with me. I appreciate your candor with your experience. I have been pretty sad today. I noticed around noon today that my mother had opened her messages and had read my letter. It has been almost 10 hours and she has not responded. I am not surprised, really, but I am hurt. I think my mom cares about me, but I think her pride is more important to her than my feelings. But it's always been that way.

I have had to cancel my next two weeks of therapy due to finances. I could really use the opportunity to discuss this with my therapist. Before she went on vacation we had been discussing how my mom's probable abuse by her dad has always kept her from being able to fully acknowledge that he did the same to me. That she turned a blind eye because she couldn't deal with her own pain, much less mine.

I, too, have come a long way in how I deal with my mom. I have grown and matured over the past couple of years. I have allowed myself to recognize that she is who she is and I can't change her. I have made great strides in looking beyond her faults to see the good in her.  Unfortunately, this has included a feeling that I am selling my soul. That I am working much harder than her to make the relationship work. That I am "sucking" things up I shouldn't be, just to keep the peace.

After doing this for most of my life, it gets so very hard to continue the charade.  In therapy I have been working hard on my abuse issues with my gf.  I am trying so hard to believe that I am not a bad person, that I am lovable; that I am not dirty and that the abuse was not my fault. This parallels in many ways how I feel about my relationship with my mother. I really want to experience freedom from all this negative chatter in my head.

I do recognize the good in my mom. In my letter I told her that I missed her. That I missed hanging out with her, and that I need her in my life.  The whole dementia issue complicates this. I am in quite a quandary over how to procede because of this. It puts a whole new twist on things and how I deal with her going forward.

Like I said in a previous post, I just want to stand up for myself for once in my life. It is such a bad feeling to apologize for something when you are not in the wrong. Because of my abuse history, it is almost retraumatizing and sets me back in my recovery.

My diet and food plan has been all screwed up with my feelings over this. I have been out of work with my back and once the kids go to school, all I want to do is lay on the couch and sleep all day. This causes me to skip meals through dinner and messes with my blood sugars. But I have just wanted to block it all out by sleeping. I take responsibility for this- I realize no one is forcing me to skip meals. I guess it's just a lot of depression. I wish it were easier. I wish my father was not so disappointed in the way I am handling this.

Anyway, I guess I will take it day by day. It is very important that I remember I am not a bad person. Because I'm not.
Tracy