Finally Choosing Me

For a long time, I had a very clear understanding of the problems between my oldest daughter and me.

I was the mother trying to help.

She was being childish.

I was being reasonable.

She was overreacting.

I had sacrificed.

She didn’t appreciate it.

And because I could make a pretty convincing argument for my side, I didn’t spend nearly enough time wondering what the story looked like from hers.

That’s difficult to admit.

Because I wasn’t just wrong about everything.

But I wasn’t nearly as right as I thought I was either.

Sometimes “Helping” Was Me Taking Over

The car is probably one of the easiest examples.

My daughter didn’t ask me to co-sign for a vehicle.

I offered.

She was driving a car that was still in my name, and I wanted her to have something in her own name so she could start building credit.

My intentions were good.

There was a plan for us to split the payment 50/50.

But then I chose the vehicle.

I had reasons.

I knew what we could afford.

I wanted something reliable.

I thought I knew what made the most sense.

What I didn’t do particularly well was listen to what she wanted.

I thought I was helping her become independent while also trying to control what that independence looked like.

That’s a little ironic when I look at it now.

Here. Let me help you become an independent adult.

Now please do it my way.

The payment arrangement didn’t work out the way we’d planned either.

I ended up making the payments while she drove the vehicle for about five years.

There were other times I stepped in financially too.

And over time, I became resentful.

I felt like I was always fixing something.

Always paying for something.

Always being expected to solve the next problem.

I told myself I was being taken advantage of.

Sometimes, maybe I was.

But that’s not the whole truth.

I helped create the pattern I eventually resented.

I Thought the Problem Was Money

This may be the part I regret more.

There were numerous arguments between us over the years.

And I usually entered those arguments with one very important piece of information already established:

I was right.

Very efficient.

No need to waste valuable time considering other possibilities.

If she was upset, I thought she was being childish.

If she was angry, I became defensive.

If she brought up something I’d done, I could explain exactly why I’d done it.

And sometimes my explanation may have been completely reasonable.

But an explanation isn’t the same thing as listening.

Looking back, I can see times when she was reaching out to me for something that had absolutely nothing to do with money.

She wanted me to hear her.

She wanted me to see that she was hurting.

She wanted her feelings to matter even if I didn’t agree with her interpretation of what had happened.

And sometimes I missed it.

I was so accustomed to solving problems that I didn’t recognize when the problem wasn’t mine to solve.

She didn’t always need Mom to fix it.

Sometimes she needed Mom to see her.

And there were times I didn’t.

That hurts to admit.

But I Was Angry That She Couldn’t See Me

At the same time, I had my own hurt.

I was dealing with things she didn’t understand.

I had my own losses, fears, financial stress, responsibilities, and emotions.

And there were times I was angry because it felt like none of that mattered.

I wanted her to understand what I was going through.

There was just one fairly significant flaw in that expectation.

I wasn’t telling her.

I had spent years trying to protect my children from the ugly parts of my life.

I didn’t want them worrying about me.

I didn’t want them carrying my problems.

I was Mom.

I was supposed to handle it.

So I kept things to myself.

Then I became hurt when she couldn’t see the things I was deliberately hiding from her.

That’s not fair either.

I couldn’t expect her to understand a story I wasn’t letting her read.

We Were Both Looking Through Our Own Hurt

I think that’s what I understand differently now.

She had her version of our relationship.

I had mine.

And when we argued, neither one of us was really entering the conversation alone.

We brought every previous argument with us.

Every disappointment.

Every time she felt unheard.

Every time I felt unappreciated.

Every old wound that hadn’t quite healed.

So we weren’t always arguing about whatever had just happened.

Sometimes we were arguing about years.

And when you’re both trying desperately to make the other person understand your pain, it’s incredibly easy to stop listening to theirs.

Neither of us could see very far past our own feelings and needs.

That doesn’t mean everything either of us did was okay.

It doesn’t mean there weren’t real hurts.

It means I’ve stopped believing that healing requires determining once and for all which one of us was the bad guy.

Then Everything Came Out

Eventually, there was one final argument.

And I unloaded.

Not just about what we were arguing about.

Everything.

Everything I had been carrying.

Everything I hadn’t told her.

Everything I thought she should have understood even though I had spent years making sure she couldn’t see it.

It was less of a conversation and more of a trauma dump.

Years of hurt came pouring out at once.

And somewhere in that conversation, I said something that has stayed with me:

“I may always be the villain in your story.”

At the time, there was hurt behind those words.

Probably defensiveness too.

But I’ve thought about them differently since.

Maybe there are parts of her story where I am the villain.

Maybe there are memories where I hurt her even though hurting her wasn’t my intention.

Maybe there are decisions I can explain perfectly that still caused pain.

I don’t get to edit her memories simply because my intentions were good.

Just like she doesn’t get to decide what my experiences felt like to me.

Maybe the question was never:

Which one of us was right?

Maybe the better question was:

How do we move forward without continuing to hurt each other with the faults of our past?

I Can’t Change the Mother I Was

There are things I wish I’d handled differently.

I wish I had listened more.

I wish I’d asked more questions before assuming I knew the answer.

I wish I’d recognized that providing financially wasn’t the same thing as being emotionally available.

I wish I’d let my children see enough of my struggles to understand that Mom was a human being too.

And I wish I’d understood sooner that admitting I hurt someone doesn’t require me to declare myself a terrible mother.

It just requires me to admit that I am capable of hurting people I love.

That’s uncomfortable.

It’s also true.

I can’t go backward and become the mother I wish I’d been in every one of those moments.

She can’t go backward either.

Neither of us can rewrite what happened.

But maybe we don’t have to.

Because I don’t want the rest of our relationship to be spent putting the past on trial.

I don’t want every new disagreement to become evidence in an old case.

And I don’t want either of us to have to win before we’re allowed to heal.

Maybe I will always be the villain in some chapters of her story.

Maybe she’ll be the source of hurt in some of mine.

But neither of us has to remain the person we were in those chapters.

I spent a lot of years trying to prove that I was right.

These days, I’m much more interested in something else.

How do we love each other from here?