There’s irony that, while days before what would have been my long dead mother’s birthday, social media informs me that 30 years ago that day I became a single working mother, the day that officially my then husband moved to Arizona by himself although he actually had moved out of the apartment several weeks prior. 

His move and my firm knowledge that, under no circumstances did I ever even entertain the thought of relocating there after he got settled, meant that there I was - exactly where I had sworn to myself for decades I would never, ever be - a single working mother. And the reason for my previous resolute determination not to marry and certainly never to have a child – my mother.

We do as we got done. And I was terrified that I would do her. Although she died when I was in my mid-20s, her presence still loomed large over my adult life, I still heard all the damning words, still felt the sting of her raised hand, the emotional whelps of the expression of her anger on my body and psyche took years and countless therapy sessions to unlearn, unhear, unfeel, stop believing. All the while frightened that I would continue her damning legacy.

A few days before my husband left the house for the last time, in the late evening light, as my two-and-a-half-year-old daughter was settling down in her toddler bed, I sat on the floor beside it and asked her if I could ask her a question. What would she think if it was just she and I in the apartment, just the two of us going forward. She looked down, thought a moment and then slowly spoke: “well, there’d be less yelling in the house, you wouldn’t cry so much, and I wouldn’t have to make you feel better.”

My heart broke. She had heard the yelling although we thought she was oblivious to the tension that was between he and I; I hadn’t masked and hidden my tears as I hoped I had, and somehow, this very young child believed it was her responsibility to make her mother feel better. There. That. In a flash, I realized that she had already indeed gotten the legacy from me. I had tried, unsuccessfully for most of my childhood, to make my mother happier, less displeased with - I thought - my being. If I could ease things for her, be more something; prettier, kinder, quieter, more like her, less a problem, better behaved, smarter, the stern, harsh, unsmiling face would soften into the mother I wanted, needed. It was the perfect example of how I never wanted to have a child - I had unknowingly perpetuated a behavior and belief that, not only never had the desired result, but most importantly was wrong, harmful, and inappropriate that any child should ever bear the burden of believing they could improve the mental well-being of a parent.

But that was where we were, she and I. So, I set to make some changes. First, however, I had to come to terms with my internal anger at my husband, and at myself, for ever believing anything he said that made me break my own promises to myself. Thought of how my mother likely raged at her husband for having died too early in all our lives, leaving her with two young children and little financial resources. And how that anger fed her disappointment in how her life was unfolding, and how it leaked into, and onto, our day-to-day life. 

Eventually my anger ebbed and I found myself learning from my mother’s traits; if she had turned right, that meant I would turn left; she withheld, I’d pour out; she grew hard, I’d be soft and yielding, she unwilling to look within, I’d examine my inner world; she’d criticize and mock, I’d support and praise; she was unable to see me, I’d eagerly accept, seek to understand and see my child; her hands and words inflected pain and self-loathing, I’d hold, caress and nurture.

So, it’s dawned on me, these years later, that I don’t thank her - my mother - very often. I worked so hard for so long to distance myself from her, still leery that behavior learned at her side would leak onto my child. Took me a long time to work though my disassociation and then let the anger rise to the top and to come to terms with who she was, what she did, and what she had endured. Including making me the single working mother that I became. 

And it was the best thing she did. 

Thanks, Mom.