Thank you to notalone and Three Roses for the kind words you offered, I'm sorry I couldn't get back at you folks earlier.
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So. Journal.
I'm having a lot of feelings today. It's May 1st, which means it's the 19th anniversary of my mother's death, she passed when I was 13.
I've made five attempts at writing this and I still feel like I'm always going into way too much detail, so the super short version:
*** CN Emotional abuse mention, physical abuse mention TW mention of non-graphic suicidal thoughts ***
She was emotionally abusive towards me and my father until she died. She was physically abusive towards me until I was almost 6. Her behaviour is/was a very, very large source of trauma for me.
She was also not okay herself, had struggles with depression and anxiety as well as having Lupus that was only properly diagnosed a year before her death.
I've had 4 family members die before I lost her too. Dealing with grief was... not done with grace or care in my family which only makes it harder. I only learned how to process grief last year, when my father in law passed away, at 31.
Being the only child, I was golden child and scapegoat all in one, sometimes the shift just took a minute. Scapegoat meant that my needs got ignored, I got ignored until I barely talked, I'd get punishments that would be lifted the moment I was back at golden child then reinstated when I did something she didn't like.
And I know if she hadn't passed away, I would not have made it until I would have been old enough to get away.
And that's the thought I struggle the hardest with, knowing that it had to be her or me. And the fact that, being the selfish human being that I am, I am glad it was her. I mean, logically I understand, no one wants to die, but emotionally, that's a whole different ball game.
So, I struggle today. I struggle hard. I want to write down everything that happened but that'd be 13 years of stuff. Some of which I'd just rather not remember.
But today, I mourn. I mourn the mother I had and I mourn the mother I didn't have. I mourn the mother I would have deserved.
And I struggle because I find myself censoring my words even now, even here. I'll stop here now because I've got this feeling that if I don't, I'll either write the novel that is the entire story of my life with her or delete this post again.
*** End TW and CN ***
I'm exhausted from just the general state of the world and all of this is just... a lot at the moment. But I think I'll be okay. And I think I'd like to start sharing more of my story here soon, just letting that bit out felt... freeing. Not necessary good, but freeing.