Dear Fat Girl,
Step away from the buffet table for a minute, because we need to talk.
You and I have always been at odds with each other. I would join the gym, and you would eat a piece of birthday cake at an office birthday party. We had a rivalry, but we still liked each other.
You used to occasionally indulge. You never drank regular soda or ate candy bars. Lately, that has changed. You have become a glutton, and quite frankly, you disgust me. (more…)
My child,
I have so much to say so please bear with me. It’s strange how life can twist and turn and your life-long fantasy of how things should be just drifts away with the next breeze that blows by.
I wanted the perfect life for you. I wanted to be able to give you everything and anything you wanted. To say that I have always wanted you would be an understatement. I have longed for a child and was blessed to find out that you were going to grace my life in a short nine months.
Your father and I were together since I was 15 years old. Everyone warned me that, although he might be fun to date, he would never provide me with security and was not “marriage material”. I didn’t listen. I wanted to believe he would change and that my presence in his life would make him want to be a better man.
We married and my life became clear. My life would consist of never having a home of my own and working long hours just to support my husband, who would not even attempt to leave the house or his video games. We lived with my mother and I adjusted to his ways. He was an adult who never grew up. (more…)
Dear Mom,
You forwarded me an email today that said we should treasure the people in our life who matter and let go of those who don’t. I understood the intention behind it and what you were trying to say. But I deleted it without sending it back to you.
I’m sure you think it was just because I hate email forwards. You’d be wrong. Oh, I do hate them, but generally I forward the sappy ones to the people I care about. Not this time.
I deleted it because I am certain that you have no idea who I am. I deleted it because you fail to see the things that are important to me and respond to them. I deleted it because of the way you have treated my husband for these last 15 years. No one says you have to love him or even like him, but treating him with respect seems like something you could do for me. (more…)
I know that, for as long as I’ve known you, you’ve worried about how good of a mother you would be.
I just want to tell you, again, that looking back at the last seven months, I couldn’t be more confident that you are (and will be) an awesome mother.
I’ve watched, again and again, as you put Gracie before your own comfort, desires, and needs, and always in a loving, nurturing way.
Not out of obligation or responsibility, but out of love.
I think that the examples and experiences that you’ve had, have given you the opportunity to either be the mother you feared you would be, or to learn from them and become with mother you wish you’d had.
You have done the latter, and I can’t tell you how much I respect and admire you for that. You’ve always been someone I’ve looked up to, and this is one more example of why. (more…)
Dear Mama,
It’s Mother’s Day and everyone I know is sending flowers and candy to their real mothers to celebrate. But you and I know that I can’t do that. My mother said she just couldn’t handle one more baby. She cried in your arms and you begged her to stay; to wait, to think; to stop the drugs and the life that sucked her very breath away. But she was too young, too foolish, and too lost in herself. So you said yes, and took me and showed me the love my own mother could not give. I never knew or understood the pain you felt that first night when you bundled me up, took me home, and held me as I cried long into the night.
You were there when I took my first step and lost my first tooth. You held my hand on the first day of school as I skipped to class in my new shoes. I said you were my mother and no one asked why you were so much older than all the other moms were. You made cupcakes for birthdays and took me to piano lessons. I never questioned your love, support, or kindness. You simply smiled and called me “sweet daughter” and that was enough for me.
I never knew you were anything but my mother until the day I saw my birth certificate when I applied for my drivers’ permit. The day, the place, the time…all of these were right, but the names shown as mother and father were strangers to me. Who were these people? My heart broke when I realized you were not my mother at all, but someone else, someone with no connection to me. Who were you and why was I here? (more…)
