my father's daughter

Throughout my life, people have marveled at how much I am like my mother.   Sheez, do they get it wrong!   Mom & I are way more different than we are alike.  In truth, I very much take after my father.

Like Mom, doing things for others - being of use - is central to my life.  Our our why  & how were light years apart.  

Mom was all about doing what others wanted; she never grasped that wants & needs can be worlds apart.  Doing what others want requires only action, not thought.  Determining need requires thought & discernment & core judgment.  As I experienced Mom, including the stories she'd tell about her years with Gran, those were qualities she couldn't - from her late teens - afford to develop & apply. 

Just consider the different ways we responded to challenging realities around being present for our mother.

Mother's father died when she was 19.  Gran, Aunt Betty & Mom moved in with Gran's father.  After he died, Mom became the person that Gran - and the rest of the family - tagged as her primary support.  The role was exclusively hers until Gran's death in 1955.  

Being there for Gran was no walk in the park.  From everything I've heard over the years, Gran was spectacularly self absorbed.  It was all about her.  It could not have been easy for Mom, even before she fell in love with Dad.  Afterward, it was far worse, as Gran made no bones about being deeply jealous of him.  

Gran did hurtful, incredibly damaging things without any apparent sense of the impact it had on others.  She was startled by any negative blow-back.  Frankly, she rarely had to deal with negative consequences to her breath-taking self-absorption;  Mom's way of handling the gruesome reality of her life was to make her mother's actions okay.  That was just the way Gran was, there was no changing her;  why bother getting bothered when the problem would still be there tomorrow & the next day & the next?  So Mom put on a smiling face & did what she had to do to get by. 

All of which ultimately resulted her being institutionalized for a nervous breakdown (after or before Gran's death?), complete with shock treatments.  

All that being so, I never heard Mom speak flat-out ill of Gran.  She told horrific stories about things her mother did, but without censure.  She never openly criticized Gran - she also never ever told a single happy story about her mother, either.

Mom survived having to be there for Gran by making it okay for her mother to be the gorgon she appears to have been.  She made life "work" by telling herself that because there were reasons for her mother's behavior, the behavior was bearable, even when it wasn't.  

Mom survived by not seeing what was right in front of her, not feeling what was all around her, not expecting that she had any right to a whole life.

That was NOT how I survived having similar responsibility for Mom.  

Where Mom survived by keeping her eyes shielded from inconvenient truths, I acknowledged them.  Where Mom kept her feelings in, I gave mine free rein to be what they were.  I wasn't able to change anything, but I wasn't about to pretend things were anything other than what they were.

I am my father's daughter, which explains a lot of things.  Like how I appreciated some of the very traits that alienated my brothers.  Or why I rub Kerry the wrong way (Dad had the same effect).  Or why he never felt protective toward me, as he did toward Mim (he knew I could stand on my own two feet).  He was straightforward & direct, which didn't always sit well with other people.  He took me at my word, which meant a lot to me.  

The way I survived being Mom's one constant support - in spite of heartbreaking challenges - was by letting things be the way they were, without embellishment or editorializing.  Not always - there were areas where I was every bit as blind as Mom, or maybe just incredibly stupid - but enough to not go off the deep end.

Dad & I were not close.  Not once did he ever side with me in any disagreement involving Mim.  He protected her;  he empowered me.  

Mom gave Mim the ability to not see what hurts;  Dad gave me the sight to see even the toughest reality.  

I am my father's daughter, and damn proud of it!