If she won't change, I will.

Some things never change. You’d think when something never changes you’d get used to the way it is.  Why doesn’t it work that way?  I got a phone call from my mom tonight and I can’t shake the disappointment it left behind. I hadn’t heard from her in a while and was beginning to wonder if she was okay.  She even missed my birthday.  While I can consider the crappy excuse for a mom that she’s been over the years; she’s always remembered my birthday.

As soon as she started talking I regretted picking up the phone in the first place.  She was high. You know, high on the drugs she swears she gave up years ago. She had no idea that I was even saying words.  Not once did she have an appropriate response to anything I said to her. Not once did she even say anything that mattered. She just rambled on and on like some crazy fanatic. 

I hung up the phone grateful to no longer try to make small talk with someone who couldn’t make any sense.  It kills me that she thinks I don’t notice when she’s high. I hate that she thinks she pulls it off so well.  I hate that she thinks I’m so dumb and naive not to know the difference.  Does she really think she’s so unaffected by her own actions? 

I guess the hardest part for me is that she used to do a lot of drugs. A lot of very hard drugs.  Those drugs and her choices were what got us kids taken away from her and put into foster care for the majority of our lives.  It was such a crappy experience and she was to blame.  Years go by and I try with everything I’ve got to build a relationship with this woman because she’s my mom.  I give her the benefit of the doubt even when I know better. For a long time, I fooled myself into accepting her little flaws as part of who she is.  In my mind, the fact that she still does drugs is as commonly viewed as my name and the fact I like coffee.  

As I sat with the phone pressed to my ear listening to her talk about dry boogers and nasal moisturizing saline solutions, I was watching my little girl run around.  Then my sweet little two year old did something that shook me from my hiding place.  She asked if she could talk on the phone to Grandma.  In that very brief moment I was hit with the weight of the world.  I had to tell her no. Luckily she just scampered off without another thought.  There was no way I was going to let her talk on the phone right then. I had no idea what words would come pouring out of my mother’s mouth.  I realized that rightfully, I didn’t posses the ability to trust my own mom.

I can handle my mother and all that comes with her. I think I have done a pretty fine job of subduing the battle between my emotions and my sense.  I’ve pretty well burried the scars she’s left and the hurt she’s made.  Tonight I realized thats wrong. Tonight I realized and can see for the first time how much effort it took to build whatever fake view of her I have. Somehow I have forced myself to accept these issues and I shouldn’t have. Never would I tolerate somebody coming into my home stoned. Is Grandma really an exception to that?  

Never do I want my children to feel the need to justify moral issues.  I’m terrified by the thought of them growing up into adults who do so.  I wouldn’t be able to blame them as I am currently a prime example of ‘poor judgement justification’. 

That ends now.  I am going to let myself be shocked when she calls drunk. I’m going to allow myself to feel the sadness and disappointment of her higher than a kite monologues.  I will let myself feel these things because it will keep me raw and aware enough to protect my children.