Member-only story
I Had to Stop Saving My Mother to Start Saving Myself
Letting go was the first step toward my own well-being
I never imagined the day I’d abandon my mother.
When I was a kid, I imagined that when I grew up I would be so wealthy I would rescue my mom from my father’s rage. I imagined I would buy her a house right next to mine and we’d live happily ever after. She’d be normal again. Perhaps someday, she’d be the mom I knew as a little girl, the one who tenderly stroked my hair at night before I fell asleep. I imagined she would carry on complete conversations and laugh in joy with me again. We’d walk to the park together like the good old days when I was a little girl. She’d write in her journals and I’d be on the swings calling out for her to push me.
But not every story has the happy ending we write in our heads. Sometimes, the universe leads us to an unexpected ending where we write our own version of happiness. You see, my mother has a disease that slowly distorted her reality.
When I was 12 or 13 my mother’s voices started to emerge and the paranoia became stronger. At the time I didn’t know she was suffering from paranoid schizophrenia. I just knew her behavior felt abnormal compared to my friends’ mothers.
