AI: Mother’s Day
By So today is Mother’s Day, and, as I’m 800km (which is about 500 miles?) away from mine, not too happy a day for me.
What the distance has done, though, is bring us to a place of understanding I could never picture we’d ever have before moving out. A place where I know I can speak my mind and talk about my life and seriously not be judged. But as awesome as that is, I still haven’t been able to come out to her.
And today, specially, I’ve been thinking about that. A lot. (And have, thus far, reached no conclusion whatsoever). So my question is a simple one:
What kind of relationship do you have with your mother? Are you celebrating Mother’s Day by her side? Have you come out to her and how did she take it?
The Afternoon Inqueery (or AI) is a question posed to you, the Queereka community. Look for it to appear on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays, at 3pm ET.
My mother divorced my father almost two years ago. It was about time. They’d both known he was gay since before they got married, but they each thought he could change, or that it was just a phase. Their marriage went well for a while, but it started to go sour when I was 7 or 8, and from then on it was a downhill slide into horribleness. They finally had the financial means to get divorced the summer after my senior year of high school, she moved out a couple months later, and I tried to keep up a relationship with her for a little while before basically estranging her. Every time Mother’s Day comes around I feel angry and sad, but I try to think of all the positive mother figures I have in my life: my grandma, who lives with me and my dad and basically raised me, my birth mother and my best friend’s mother, who was always a second mother to me. Mother’s Day doesn’t have to just be about your own mother – it can be about all the women in your life who helped turn you into the person you are.
My mother and I live about 2 hours apart from each other, which is perfect. I love my family, and like seeing them – occasionally. It is hard, we don’t have a lot in common, and they have been extremely unsupportive of my transition. On the other hand, they are good loving people, and we all try to do the best that we can with our relationship given that we see that issue really differently.
I called Mom today, and we talked for a few minutes about school, our summer plans, and her plans for the day. It was a nice talk, and she is starting to get more comfortable with the fact that I decided to quit my job to go to school full time.
I don’t speak to my mother anymore. She was abusive to me throughout my childhood. She’s pretty much the same to anyone close to her.
I feel better all around without her in my life. My brother still lives with her, which sucks and makes me feel guilty, but I can’t really help with that. I know some kids to go live with their older siblings when their parents split or what have you, but I can’t support him.
Generally, I try not to think about it much. On Mother’s Day, I appreciate not being required to keep in contact with her.
I’m hoping my mom and I can be better friends now that we live apart from one another. She has been making an effort to be nice to my girlfriend, but she’s still clearly uncomfortable with the whole thing. We spent Mother’s day together with the rest of my family, eating and talking. It was pretty nice.
I visited my mother and it was nice. Although I came out to her years ago, it’s not something we’ve talked about recently. She’s made comments in the past that indicate she thinks I should label as something I’m certain I’m not and that she knows me better then I know myself. This was annoying when I was younger and more and more frustrating as I’ve gotten older.
But in a lot of others ways she’s been tremendously supportive and I love her dearly. So, it’s complicated.