Dear Mom,
hanna,
i love you so very much. i have been really sick, and i'm afraid. even mom's get scared sometimes. please pray for me. i love your pictures. you are such a beautiful girl. i'm proud of you.
mom
Mom,
I know you've been really sick. Everyone knows that you're sick except for you.
We're not, of course, talking about the same kind of sickness.
Who knows...maybe this time there really is a tumor, maybe this time you'll die. or maybe this time they'll give you the right prescription so you can fuck yourself over even more.
You and your perpetual sickness. Get sick to get sick to get sick.
You try and try and try to find all of these fatal, physical dissabilities and diseases and disasters to blame it on, and lord knows you don't have to fake the mental ones.
You make your sickness so much worse than it has to be.
I used to allow you to make my sickness so much worse than it had to be.
But not anymore. I'm so worried about you and, no, I no longer have any expectations of you...high or low.
I have hope. Hope's all I've got to give you. And I've got love. Love from a distance.
I'm too little to do anything dramatic for you right now. Even daughters get scared. Even Daughters get scared. Even daughters get scared.
I've always known that you've been scared. Scared of not getting your way. Scared of yourself. Scared of what you might say or do or remember or feel or touch or hear or see or care about.
You, you, you.
Unfortunately, I can't say that I am selfless. In fact, I think I've taken on a lot of your selfish habits. I fight with those everyday.
I said fight with them, and not give into them. Do you hear that? Do you hear that?
I will not allow myself to fall into your pattern of self destruction. I started to, and I'm fighting like hell to not become what I hate/love the most.
I'm swinging my fists and kicking my legs and flailing my arms against the grain, and everyday I kick a little harder. Everyday I move a little farther. Thank you for that.
Thank you for showing me what can happen. If I would have stayed on the path that I have come accross so many times in the last 4 years or so, If I would have let myself become what felt the easiest, I would be left with no real home, no self respect, no respect from my family, nothing that I love and need. No one that I love and need.
You push Grace and I so far away. SO FAR AWAY and then expect us to fall down at your size 6 1/2 feet (yes i still remember) and tell you that we love you and we need you. You expect us to save you.
I'm sorry, but Im just not ready to be a mother yet, and I think your adolecense is long gone. So let it go and let us have ours.
Please, don't think that I don't care. If I didn't care, you wouldn't affect me. You just wouldn't.
If you're wondering, yes I still remember the good times. I remember when you'd sing me to sleep and play with my hair. And I remember when you read me Judy Blume books in Third grade. I remember the smell of your First perfume, blended in with the smell of Lubiderm lotion and ciggarettes. I remember swimming with you and Grace and laughing a lot.
Things are never all bad, and I know that.
I wouldn't have the strength to write these words if i didn't. I wouldn't see that just because some really really fucked up things have happened to us, doesn't mean I can't love myself, love my life. It doesn't mean that I can't function.
I never quite understood how you could feel such a world of hate towards yourself, yet have so much pity on yourself.
And I probably never will.
This was all ignited by hearing that you might have brain cancer. Thinking about the possibility of you dying. Thinking of what my life would be like without you.
and the truth is, in so many ways, I already am without you. You seemingly keep dying over and over and over again.
I don't know what I'd do if you died tomorrow, but i don't think i really need to know.
I believe you just might outlive us all.
You've smart. You really are. And you know it.
You've convinced us all that you've wanted to die so many times, drowning yourself in opium, alcohol, and slashes on your malnourished wrists.
You've done this continuously for about 20 years or so, long before I was born.
And I have to wonder, if you were constantly spiralling downward, obsessing over your compulsive behaviors, and running from your truth. If you really wanted to die for twenty years and tried so hard to do so, HOW THE FUCK HAVE YOU MANAGED TO STAY ALIVE?
And I know why, It's because you don't want to die. Maybe you think that it's the only way you can make people realize how much they care. Maybe someone will realize that they need you.
Well, I've needed you for the past seventeen years. I didn't need you to be diagnosed with a terminal illness to tell me that. I only needed mother daughter day in girl scouts, and asking my dad to buy me tampons. I only needed crying from the pain of a 43 year old man putting my hair in pigtails (hahahaha) and walking across the stage in the auditiorium to receive my class ring.
But, I survived without you, and you've survived without realizing how much people love you, how much they need you. It would be great if you knew that they did.
Mom, you know what we have in common? We are survivors. We're tough. We're smart.
I just really wish that you'd use that for your betterment.
I have to distance myself from you before i know the facts.
But if this is for real, I'll drive 6,000 miles to hold your hand through it.
YOu've hurt me and I've hurt you and this letter is so contradictory and gramatically incorrect and nonsensical, but it's what I think I needed to say. I'm ready to do good things for myself, and stop creating piles of shit for myself to walk in later.
I love you.
Hanna