Letting Go...

 On the subject of letting go...

My estranged daughters have been 'gone' for... three years-ish? I've missed everything about their lives since the older graduated college and the younger graduated high school. I've respected their wishes to stay 'away' for long stretches. Once, two years ago, I received a Mother's Day card from my youngest. I consumed it like a starving person would cherish any crumb of anything to sustain them for another day. Nothing since.

I will soon be fifty three years old, my life two-thirds gone, more or less. I'm keenly feeling the odds turning against me, day by day, against my desire to remain hopeful. I'm starting to spend a lot of time telling myself that I'll likely be dead and buried without a reconciliation with two of the human beings I love more than my own life.

Unlike some, I can look back and see all too clearly the chain of mistakes I made to place me in this circumstance. While I do believe I did my best, I know at times my best was defined by my own emotional wreckage from my own troubled upbringing and lack of coping with the aftermath of my divorce.

At the same time, while I'm grateful that my estranged daughters do not any longer (to my knowledge) indulge in screeds against me on social media, and hopefully the fabricated lies and other outrages have stopped... still, I am devastated that the forgiveness I've humbly asked for has been withheld. My relationship with my own mother was a pure dumpster fire at times, and my father was not in the picture. With all that, I loved my parents and I forgave my mother for some pretty outrageous treatment when I was young, and we went on to establish a solid bond when she was older and I was off into my suburban-mom life. I was able to care for her some in her final years... gone three years now, and I miss her. 

I realize with my own mother that she was there for me way more than I gave her credit for, for many years. I hope it doesn't take the same with them.

I am trying to hold in my mind my own responsibility for the rift with my daughters, but also my marrow-deep belief that a good and decent person finds forgiveness for those they love, however much hurt and resentment may have interrupted a relationship.

Let me be clear about something, as I mention my mistakes and my shortcomings as a parent, there was NO abuse of any kind. My estranged daughters and I were very close for a very long time... I'd articulate my mistakes largely as a case of holding on too tightly as they began to wrap up their high school years, plan for college, and get ready to fly, as children do. Maybe if I had had a settled life with a partner during that transitional time possibly things may have been different. But it wasn't and my focus was keenly on them.

I have suffered from PTSD since I was a teen resulting from an abusive step-father. I worked hard in therapy through my twenties to overcome this before they were born. When my marriage to their father began to disintegrate, the trauma from that triggered the PTSD to return along with the grief of losing the family life I loved. This made me less of a good parent than I should have been. It wasn't malicious on my part, but it wasn't their fault, either. It was just a mess, as life is often a mess. 

I just find myself questioning how my smart, principled, mature, successful estranged daughters are morally and emotionally able to sidestep the normal human response to forgive, and extend grace. As I did to my absent father and self-absorbed, outrageous, larger than life and sometimes neglectful mother. I forgave them, loved them, and in my mother's case, built a mature and adult relationship on top of the wasteland that was my childhood.

I love them, my estranged daughters... but some days, because of that, I don't like them very much, whoever they are in the process of becoming.

Grace and peace to you all, wherever you are on your path. I hope you're all able to rest tonight, with gracious dreams and a better tomorrow.