Forensic toxicology
Well, this morning I contemplated writing a line like this:
I feel sure my mother will have to take me apart in some way for going back to full-time work, since that’s the choice she didn’t make.
I thought it might be unfair.
This afternoon she called me to ask me if I didn’t think that perhaps V. is abusing Noah.
Like that.
Her reasons: 1) he wanted me to soothe him after yesterday’s pinch (true) and not V. and 2) she says he had “fingerprint bruises” on his arm 2 weeks ago, which I did not see. (My mother says she pointed them out to me. I do remember talking about bruises, but I thought we were looking at his shins, where he does have some impressive “I’m a toddler, and it’s summer” bruises.)
The way that she asked was creepy and abrupt. That she asked was kind of creepy and abrupt.
On one level, people should ask these questions, if they have concerns. I, of course, wonder this every week (is the person I leave my child with hurting my child), because I have no trust whatsoever.
The problem for me is separating that base level of fear and mistrust from my real instincts and from real evidence or reason for concern. My first reaction really was to wonder if I’d missed something, especially these fingerprint bruises. I’m pretty sure I didn’t. Carl doesn’t remember them either, and we both gave baths and did lots of changes during that time.
I won’t eliminate the possibility but I think at this point the evidence that I have seen and my own gut (under the fear) say no, my mother is fucked. So let us proceed on that basis…
Godamned fucking shit this kind of drama makes me mad. I realize that it was the 1970s & 80s, but a) she missed a lot of abuse b) she was abusive herself and c) I am reasonably sure that with my grandfather it definitely was starting around this age (2). Given all that, she might not just call up at 2pm out of the blue and drop this kind of baseless concern on me.
Except I am sure there is something twisted and Jungian going on on one level.
On another level, I think this is the lashing out about going back to work and honestly? It was a good one. I had to get Noah’s school forms in this afternoon and it made it much more difficult to do the fairly basic task of just taking them there and dropping off. It made me feel like I can’t protect him at all no matter what and I should just not work and stay inside all day.
She really found a button to press. It’s been a long time since a simple phone call caused a meltdown in my head, with me totally upset, Lyr totally upset and wanting not to work outside our house, Lynn spouting off, and general mayhem and chaos and borderline non-functionality, like missing the deadline for the forms (technically Thurs) and all these things.
And it is this kind of thing that kept causing problems growing up: if there was something going on, what happened instead of looking at that and dealing with it, my mother made something else into a crisis instead. Which had the dual effect of ignoring the real, and causing a lot of fear about other things. And the sad thing is that occasionally, like today, it still works.
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4 Responses to “Forensic toxicology”
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Her behavior sounds Jungian to me. I mean, how many abuse survivors suddenly have to come face to face with their own abuse history when their children reach the age at which that abuse began? It might be a similar mechanism at work here. Noah’s reaching that age at which your abuse began, abuse she didn’t want to / couldn’t see before. Sad thing is–and it’s sad enough when abuse survivors gw through it–is instead of thinking “God, I was so small when that happened to me,” in this case it becomes “God, she was so small when I let that happen to her.” That could might lead to over-vigilance in seeing bruises that aren’t there… or being angry enough to make them up. People can both ways when their failings are pointed out, from what I’ve seen.
Either way, she sounds like my mom five years ago, and you have my sympathy.
Your journaling, and your ability to handle parenthood as well as you seem to, impresses me everyday.
Next time she pulls that crap, hang up on her. Your purpose on this planet is not to take on her guilt, no matter how hard she tries to give it to you.
I’m really trying to contain my anger here…
You wouldn’t be human if these twisted tactics out of Advanced Abuser 301 didn’t key in your conditioning.
It’s a tribute to you that regardless, you have retained your own sense of what is right, most remarkably in differentiating those keyed-in reactions and any true need for concern. Like O, I am constantly impressed.
Like O too, I’m reminded of my own mother, who on being told she would have nothing to do with my soon-to-be born child, had a seizure on the night I went into labour and stayed comatose till she died two weeks later. It took some time to sort out the mixture of guilt and profound gratitude I felt.
Mmm… can you remind me to comment to your blog when I’ve already had coffee. Typo city!