Do You Love Me, Mom?

An open letter to my mother

Sunday, May 12, 2024

Dear Mom,

There’s no one in the world I love more than you.

You’re my rock. My breakfast buddy. My confidant.

No one has taught me more than you have.

You are more gracious to me than I deserve, love me wholeheartedly, and support me through every high and low. I would not be who or where I am today without you.

But do you know what I am most thankful for about you?

The way you’ve healed.

The Mother I Grew Up With

Sometimes, when I look at you, I hardly recognize the woman who raised me.

The mother of my childhood was as radiant as a rainbow and as angry as lightning. I remember her furrowed eyebrows and flashing eyes as much as her smile or her laughter.

I remember her raised voice, her rigid posture, her hands on her hips. I lived in fear of her criticism, trembled at her rebuke, and couldn’t understand why she never seemed to empathize with my pain or anxiety.

When I was a preteen, she told me I was getting too heavy for my age. She insisted that I needed to lose weight and exercise more for the sake of my health because I was—

Well, she never explicitly used the word “fat.”

“Overweight” was the clinically correct term. But there was enough shame in it to make me feel fat and ugly down to the marrow of my bones.

But then, when I was a teenager and I told my mother how much I hated my body, she said that my self-hatred was sinful. She told me to get down on my knees and beg God for forgiveness.

The mother of my childhood took me to church every Sunday from the day I was born.

We believed in God because it was the right thing to do, but I never felt particularly at ease around the God of my childhood.

The God I grew up with was much like my mother: awe-inspiring, but emotionally distant. Breathtaking, but quick to anger. A great, powerful force that would punish me for messing up.

I was taught that God loved me, but I wasn’t so sure He liked me very much. He seemed very hard to please . . . just like my parents.

But, according to the mother of my adolescence, doubting God was sinful.

During the chaos of my parents’ divorce, when I confessed that I was wrestling with doubts about my faith, the mother of my adolescence quickly rebuked me and told me I needed to repent of my doubt.

That’s how life was in our home: black and white, wrong and right, truth and lies.

The mother I grew up with was a paradox, a firestorm, a roar of thunder—mesmerizing in her energy, terrifying in her electricity.

I loved her, but I feared her. And I often wondered, “Do you love me, Mom?”

Because some days, I genuinely did not know.

The Mother I Know Now

The mother of my adulthood bears hardly any resemblance to the mother of my childhood, except in photos.

After twenty-seven years of motherhood, you’ve barely aged a day, Mum. But you’ve softened by decades.

I can’t remember the last time you raised your voice, except in laughter. Your loud, echoing laugh embarrasses me in public sometimes. (You’re just so extraverted and energetic! Some days this little introvert just can’t keep up with you.)

You embarrass me all the time, honestly, especially with the dramatic, over-the-top way you react when people mistake us for sisters (or, better still, twins). Sometimes I dread going out with you because I know people will gasp or drop their jaws at our uncanny resemblance.

But you know what?

Mistaken identities, aside, I am so proud to be your daughter. Why?

Because man, Mom, healing looks good on you.

My Mother’s Daughter

Mom, thank you for doing what no one else in our family had the courage or humility to do: owning your mistakes, apologizing for the harm you caused me, and making amends for the past.

I loved you as a child. I feared you as a teenager. I resented you as a young adult. And now, I love you to the depths of my soul.

You, brave woman, are my warrior.

I don’t know how you found the courage to leave your abusive husband of seventeen years, but I thank God every day that you did. I don’t know how you survived that hellish divorce or stood your ground against a remorseless pathological liar, but I can’t thank you enough for never backing down.

You chose freedom when everyone in your small, fightin’ fundamentalist community believed that divorce was a sin.

You chose to break the chains of multi-generational trauma even when it cost you everything.

Knowing what I do now about the world you grew up in, it is no wonder to me that you believed the things you did. I understand why you always spoke so negatively about other women’s bodies, why your theology was so rigid, and why so much anger coursed through your veins.

That’s what happens when you grow up with an angry father, a verbally abusive mother, and a legalistic church.

I see now that you were merely mirroring what was reflected onto you.

But you didn’t remain stuck in that, Mom. You shattered the illusion and found the truth. And for that, I owe you the world.

Her Children Arise and Call Her Blessed

What would I do without you, Mom?

Thanks to you, I’m not tangled up in an abusive relationship.

I can identify a narcissist within a few, short interactions, and I recognize covert verbal abuse in all its subtleties.

Most importantly, I know how to walk away from people who don’t respect me.

Because of the battles you fought, I’m living in freedom: free from trauma, codependency, and all the stupid mistakes our family’s been making for generations.

Mama, I hope you’ve forgiven yourself because I have, wholeheartedly.

(Don’t you dare apologize to me anymore! You’ve offered me more apologies in the last year than I can count. Believe me when I say I’ve forgiven you!)

I owe you my life, Mom.

Without you, I would not be the writer, the daughter, or the friend I am today.

I don’t have to wonder if you love me anymore, Mom. I feel it in the gentleness of your embrace every time I hug you. I hear it in the softness of your voice when you speak to me. I see it in the tender way you look at me. I experience it in the patient way you listen to me every time I turn to you for wisdom and comfort.

Remember that time a few months ago when I dropped the oatmeal jar and spilled organic oats all over the floor? Much to my surprise, I was more upset about the mess than you were! While I berated myself for my carelessness, you felt bad because you knew I felt bad.

That may seem like an insignificant incident, but after the harsh rebukes I endured growing up, your gentle reassurance meant the world to me.

The eyes that once blazed with fury now sparkle with joy. The lips that once reprimanded me now console me. The woman who once frightened me is now my most trusted confidant.

In my adulthood, you are the mother I always needed: an inspiring example of God’s healing love.

“A woman of valour who can find? She is worth far more than rubies.” (Proverbs 31:10)

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