I feel poisoned. I feel heavy, weighted down with the past and with my unmet expectations. I feel lost without the love I was promised, a love that I was expecting.
I feel the weight of the rest of my life, living without my parents. Because of their choices. And because they were both selfish people who chose drinking over me.
I am angry. I am battered inside. My tongue hurts from biting it to keep from screaming that this is NOT FAIR. NOT FAIR!!!!!
I hurt. Jesus I hurt. My eyes burn from unshed tears. My throat aches with the lump of a thousand swallowed down words, from holding back the river of pain I have kept dammed.
I am an orphan. While my father still lives.
Mark tells me over and over that his parents are my parents now. And I believe him. And I try to see them that way. But what Mark doesn't understand, could never understand, is that seeing his parents as my own is a double edged sword. I see what I have, and I also see what I HAVE NEVER HAD. I hear him on the phone with them, and while I am so happy for him, I just want to scream- What about me? Why, Jesus, why?
Chosen. Chosen to carry this. To hold the memories of a sick twisted mother an an alcoholic uncaring father. My back is strong, my Lord, but it is not unbreakeable.
Lily asks me about her picture. "Who's that?"
I tell her my mother. She asks where she is. I tell her in heaven.
"Do you miss her?"
"Yes, very much."
The words are forced out of lips frozen from wanting to speak the truth.
No, I don't miss her. Because you can't miss what you never had.
I have had many people fill the mother role for me. But they are square pegs in a round hole. There is always the gaping void. There is always the truth that no matter who fills the shoes, they are not the one born to the role. Their presence sometimes only amplifies the fact that the role is unfilled.
My mother chose to walk away from me. To leave me to others.
My father chose drinking over me.
How can I reconcile that without seeing myself as broken?
Without seeing something so intrinsically wrong with me that my own parents could not or would not keep me?
Jesus covers. He fills. He heals.
But sometimes Jesus also allows the pain to seep back through. Because pain cleanses as well. Pain teaches. And pain shapes us into the person we need to be.
But pain is pain. And no matter where it stems from, the pain of rejection is profound. And it scars.
And I am scarred today. Today I am riddled with the wounds of a thousand words said and unsaid. I am scarred with the turned back, the phone that doesn't ring, the sadness of that little girl left on a doorstep to wait for a daddy that never came.
The teenage girl struggling to not want her mother.
The pregnant woman watching as the ultrasound screen lit up with a girl, and feeling her heart sink. Wondering- how will I do this?
The 36 year old woman crying over her computer, wishing things were different.
I am scarred.
Inside and out. I cannot look down at my legs without seeing the cigarette wounds. I cannot brush my hair without feeling the tiny ridges of a hundred blows. I cannot think of the word mother or father without a flood of emotion I just wish to hell I could push away.
Are you waiting for words of hope? Because today I don't have any. Today I reserve the right to be sad and broken and lost. I reserve the right to still be emotionally spent from trying to keep a smile on my face through Father's day.
I reserve the right to be angry as hell that I was chosen for this.
I am angry with God today. I want to pick up the phone and laugh with my mother and father. I want them to know my children. I want them to know ME. I want them to love me.
I want them HERE. Invested in my life.
Sometimes feeling this is a gateway to greater understanding and joy. Sometimes releasing is healing.
Sometimes the weakness of giving in to sadness bring an upbuilding of strength.
So I am here, in it. And tomorrow I will hope that the tide of Jesus rushes in to fill the voids.
