hi dad.

for the first time in over a decade, mom has kept in contact with me for more than 24 hours. she and I had a 30 minute phone call on sunday. since then, we have texted every day. we will have another phone call on sunday.

she has been sober for six months. she is in a long term program. she works at their front desk. she has admitted to me the choices she made after your death were wrong. she said she has a lot of making up to do. she said things that prove(s) to me she is sober and actually in treatment. she has been self-reflective & respectful of my limitations thus far. we have both cried at our lost time.

i know to keep my distance and not to get my hopes up. i have been burned way too many times in the past. i told her this on the phone. she understood and accepted it. i shared with her pieces of my life. she was in awe of me and this life i have built entirely without her. she is proud of me. i do not know how to feel about that.

dad, she has pieces for my puzzle. Like i told you last time we talked:

“the other parts of me? oh god, i have so many questions! you and her were so intertwined, always finding your way back to one another. she has in depth knowledge about the man i want the most- you. also, a daughter would be lying if she did not want anything to do with her mommy. she is someone i have so desired a relationship from, and that hurts me to admit it.” (day 4820)

every human deserves a second chance. sober mom deserves a chance. i am trying to balance fairness to her while protecting myself.

i have so much hate for addict mom.

for the last few therapy sessions, we have focused on her. there is pure, unrefined animosity seeded deep, deep within my soul. it burns. it is so ugly. i recently (shared on day 4825) found some old writings from my teenage years. i did not share this specific one, but i found a letter i wrote to mom at 15. it was so full of hate: deep and primal. i wrote things like:

• Hoping and dreaming that I will have a mom I never had, that she will be back from the abyss. When I realized that you aren’t going to make it happen, I was torn. It felt like I was kicked and kicked and kicked and I don’t know why I was kicked. my insides torn out, but I didn’t die. I had to watch myself bleed out, my entails six feet away from me. I was still breathing, but it got harder and harder. The pain was unbearable. I went blind with rage because I knew I shouldn’t have trusted you.
• I was kicked again and again and ripped my healed scars right open and was on the floor again, barely breathing. I don’t blame you for Dad’s death. I don’t blame you for my problems. But I blame you for what you could have controlled.
• MY MOM WASN’T THERE ANYMORE. MY MOM DIDN’T WANT ME. I HAD TO FIGHT OFF THE DEMONS MYSELF. I thought of dying in the 3rd grade. (caps and italics included)
• You don’t control me. I will not be you. I control my future and even though all those past experiences hurt, they are past. They cannot hurt me now. I am away from all that. I will never be in those experiences again.

dad, when it comes to addict mom, i become someone i do not know. does sober mom deserve a chance? the sane progressive thinking person within me reaffirms my knowledge that drug addiction is, in fact, a disease. my primal response is lots of crying. i want to fight AND flight at the same time. my hands grow hot and heavy. my legs quiver. i want to scream an ancestral war cry.

dad, i so desire to hear your thoughts when it comes to mom. i imagine you had a vast understanding of who she is as a person. you and her are cosmic soul partners. tied to one another, for whatever reason. am i here to break that chain with mom? am i to free her of the universal responsibility? am i just assuming my usual caretaker role with her by suggesting that? 

fuck. a hug from you would solve all of this.

therapy is slowly repairing the damages done by addict mom. we are finding parts that were lost, restoring balance. i am gaining so much self awareness. my therapist is literally a saint who is doing god’s work, or a witch doing magic, whatever you wanna call it. 😉

it is a long road ahead for me.

for mom and i.

xoxo,

your daughter