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Rachel with a Damsel Fly in her hair |
Everyone has a
mother, human, animal… all life has a mother.
Earth is a mother!
I often wonder
why we can treat our mothers so poorly and blame them for all the wrongs in the
world. We often have high expectations
of our Mom's and when she doesn't bend to our every demand, she suddenly
becomes a villain in our lives; responsible for all of our missed opportunities
for joy.
I speak from
experience here, I blamed my mother for becoming ill and suddenly believing
that I was her mother, the evil villain, the person responsible for her
decline. It felt like my life ended on
the day I began to need to wipe my mother's behind for her.
Rendered helpless by my beliefs and emotions,
I could not see the true blessings the Universe was showering over me. I didn't understand that my mother became my
daughter so that I could experience motherhood. Through my time as my mom's caregiver, I
experienced a mother's love for a child.
The love I have for my mother-daughter, has shown me that LOVE is the
true mother of the universe. It's out of
this love that each of us are here. Our
mother's loved us enough to give us a chance at life.
I am grateful to be
on the other side of the chaos that seems to come with being a caregiver to a
parent, especially one with dementia.
My MIL and I didn't
always get along as we do today. Just a
few short months ago, we seemed to loath the sight of each other and the sound
of our voices were akin to nails running across a chalk board from days gone
by. Our expectations of each other,
ideals that were shielded in the silence of our existence, overshadowed our
relationship.
Our troubles heated up when I picked a fight with my MIL. I
attacked her only perceived sense of independence, her ability to come and go
as she pleased. Rachel is an old lady
who defined her independence through driving her car. I was thrilled in the fall of 2012 when she
had made a decision to give up driving.
She told us that she didn't know when she felt well enough to operate
her car.
I suppose having a
head on collision with another motorist who was stopped at a stop sign made my
MIL think twice about her ability to drive.
Rachel didn't see the car as she cut a corner way too sharp. The driver at the stop sign saw Rachel coming
and attempted to back up his car to avoid the collision. He was able to reduce the damage to his car,
but his car still needed a tow truck.
The accident shook
Rachel up a bit. She wasn't wearing her
seat belt and sustained a head injury.
Rachel refused to go to the hospital and insisted that my husband bring
her home, bloodied head and all. The
sight of her coming through the door with blood dripping down her forehead was
horrifying. The following few months
would prove to be challenging for our Mother in law and Daughter in law
relationship.
In order to solve his mom's transportation
issue, my husband took time off from work to help Rachel figure out how she
could get around without a car. The
senior center in town, a beautiful place for folks with lots of activities
every day and people to spend time, appeared to interest her. Rachel led us to believe she would take
advantage of the senior services. She
didn't. "Those people are too
old." She answered me one day when I asked why she didn't want to go. Ok… and 90 isn't old?!
The winter months
passed. My MIL had made peace with the
fact that she shouldn't drive her car.
Until, last April (2013) Rachel began to feel better and decided she was
going to go out to drive her car again.
I was sitting at the table eating a late lunch. I heard Rachel's car keys jingling. "I'm going out!" She exclaimed like a defiant teenager.
"What? In your car?
You are driving your car?! It's
3:30 in the afternoon!" I lost all
feeling in my body. I began to think of
her getting into trouble with her car, causing property damage or worse,
killing someone. I worried about my
husband and me being liable for his mom's actions because she lives with
us. I feared losing everything because
Rachel felt the need to operate a motor
vehicle, even though she couldn't see very well.
I was prepared for
this day, I knew she would drive again because I wasn't able to always jump and
take her out at a moment's notice. My
MIL didn't like the idea of having to plan when she could go to the store; her
reasoning was "she didn't know if she would feel well enough." Her logic made no sense to me. I had to do something to protect us from any
potential lawsuit brought on by Rachel's recklessness.
Immediately after
she left, I printed out a complaint form from the States Department of Motor
Vehicles website. I filled the form out,
writing all the reasons why her privilege to drive should be revoked. I talked about how she refused medical
treatment after her head on car accident and that she refused to see her
primary care doctor. I was scared for
the public and didn't know how to get everyone else off the road when Rachel
was in her car driving. The only
solution I thought of was asking the DMV to reconsider their decision to allow
my MIL to operate her car legally. She
barely passed her vision test when she needed to have her license renewed a few
years ago (I took her to get her license renewed!)
I hopped in my truck
with the sealed and stamped envelope, drove to the post office and handed the
clerk the filled out form to be sent to the states complaint department. It was a risk, my MIL could find out who turned
her in by writing them a letter and asking who did it. I didn't care. Our relationship already was horrible and I
didn't see any hope for us mending it. I
needed to protect our assets and any innocent person who could possibly be
injured in an accident.
My husband was
nervous when I told him what I had done; our relationship became a little
rocky. Something had to be done with
Rachel who was behaving like a spoiled child with the upper hand. Fearful of the war that was about to erupt
in our home between Rachel and me, tensions grew. I didn't care. I was sick of Rachel and her bullshit. My emotions were still raw with the loss of
my mother.
About a week passed
and the letter from the Department of Motor Vehicles arrived for Rachel. I handed her the letter when it came in the
mail. We had stopped talking to each other
before the letter had arrived. I had
attempted to explain to her how irresponsible it was for her to drive when she
couldn't see very well and admittedly told us she couldn't determine when she
felt well enough drive. I told her that if she thinks she can drive,
she can do everything for herself, get her own food, do her own laundry…
"you are on your own." I
stopped cooking for her. I stopped
talking to her. I began to imagine she
was invisible. I ignored her and she
ignored me. Life sucked around here.
My husband took
Rachel to the doctor to get a physical and a note stating she was capable of
driving her car. She mailed the form to
the State Department of Motor Vehicles.
She was okay to drive according to the doctor and the state continued to
extend her the privilege to drive in this state
Life became
rougher. I was angry that I had to live
with my MIL who did not give me any respect.
Never has she wished me a happy birthday, not even my 50th birthday a
few years ago. She didn’t go to my
mother's service, boy did this hurt my feelings. My expectations of her were not being
met. I hated her more for not being
something she wasn't able to become, a loving mother in law. The more loathing I did over my MIL the
worse I felt. Everything was turning to
crap around me. Something needed to
change and I knew from past experiences that I needed to be the change.
I went to a Institute for Brain Potential seminar that told me how to deal with highly volatile
people. I learned about personalities
and the disorders that many people have, even myself. For the first time in my life I started to
understand narcissism; humans, all of us, have narcissistic tendencies, some of
us take it to the extreme. The course
didn't answer all of my questions, it left me asking myself, "how do I get
bigger? How do I fix this?"
Questions remained
and my relationship with my family was not improving. I cried a lot and knew that I needed
help. I found a psychologist to talk to
me, someone to help me make sense of the epiphanies I was having about myself
and my relationships. My shrink, she
helped me figure things out and peace returned to my heart and mind.
My heart grew eyes.
I changed
myself. I changed how I viewed my
Mother-in-law and every person that is a part of my family. I realized that our expectations of people
when they are not met, is what causes all the troubles in our lives. Suddenly, things became clearer for me, I
couldn't fix everyone's problems, everyone has free will and love, real love,
comes without strings attached. I cut
the strings I had attached to my expectations of others and began to focus on
myself. I had learned years ago that the
best way to change any situation in life is to change my perceptions. Only I could change me, only I can control my
thoughts and actions.
I changed.
I filled my heart
with love. I worked every day on
myself. I began to live consciously and
became more aware of others feelings. I
practiced communicating my thoughts, minus the emotion that seemed to fuel
flames of discontent in the past.
I began to cook for
my MIL and feed her nutritious foods.
She had been eating junk and prepared packaged foods that she would pick
up for herself at the local supermarket.
Her health was declining. She
looked horrible. She continued to drive
her car. I still worried about the
innocent lives she could snuff out with her car. Enough!
If I can't beat her at her game, I will join her. If I could help her feel better, to have
better days, she would possibly be a more alert driver.
I'm not sure what
changed my MIL's view of me, maybe it was the day I brought her to get her
driver's license renewed a couple months back.
I don't even know when the change in her occurred I wish I paid more attention, but I changed
too and our world was renewed.
I released my fears
and expectations and something amazing happened to me, all my unhappiness was
replaced with a sense of freedom. I
chose to be happy and have a full heart, even for my MIL, my husband's mother.
Today, I see her as
the woman who did her best to give my husband a chance at life. She was unwed and pregnant. She could have aborted him, but she didn't. Her love for him, even though it may have
gone unnoticed, remained strong and caused her to look at me with
suspicion. She loves him, he is her
greatest accomplishment in this lifetime.
My husband is her only child, her only son. I was the "other woman" in his life
and she subtlety let me know I would never replace her.
I didn't want to
replace my MIL. I wanted to include her
in our new family, make her part of our lives, give her more good days until
her last day…. Just like I did for my mother.
Mothers have lots of love for their children, even if we can't see it,
mother's love stay with us long after they have left this Earth.
Personally, I am
grateful to have experienced my mother's love, she may be physically gone but
her essence lives on inside my heart.
Mom, she's part of me and I am part of her. My wish for everyone is that no matter how
much you blame your mother for all your troubles in life, your mother loves you
and you are forever connected by love.
Free your expectations and experience your mother's love.