Dear Mum,
There’s so many things that I want to talk to you about but
I can’t. They always say it’s therapeutic to write letters that you’re never
going to send, just as a way of getting things off your chest and I feel like
this is one of those occasions.
I know over the years I have sent you letters as a way to
tell you things and it seems to have worked for us. A couple of years ago you
showed me the one that I wrote to you when I was about 7 to say sorry for
calling you a twat; I had heard it at school and thought that it meant the same
as twit. I have no idea why you kept it but it’s hilarious and I’m glad that
you did.
I guess the first important letter I sent you was when I
told you that I was gay, like I somehow thought that you didn’t already know. I
remember being on the bus with my friends when I got your text saying that you
weren’t surprised and as long as I was happy and loved you didn’t care. I
remember bursting into tears; it meant the world. But for some reason, I still
didn’t come home for 3 days, or let you know where I was. Which perhaps on a
subconscious level brings me onto my next point.
The thing is Mummy, I wasn’t happy as I told you in the next
letter that I sent you not long after the first. That was when I thought I was
going mad. I didn’t tell you why I was going mad and I should have. The thing
is, you never actually asked what was wrong and it wasn’t something I could
just announce. You tried to get me help but I guess I wasn’t ready. I must have
been awful to live with. I remember you telling me once that you were scared of
me and that I made you feel like a prisoner in your own home. You never knew
when I was going to be aggressive (throwing shoes and crockery at you from the
top of the stairs seemed to be my forte) and you never knew when I was going to
cut myself again or try and take an overdose. But you never stopped loving me
even when to everybody else I was unlovable.
I remember sitting at the dining room table at 3am making a
collage of a rainbow with food on your favourite table cloth. I remember
hearing you on the stairs and thinking that you would be angry. When you came
in there was food everywhere; spaghetti hoops, mustard powder, potato peelings…
It was absolutely ridiculous and I remember looking at you and sobbing because
I couldn’t think of what to make the purple layer out of; you went to pick some
damsons off the tree in the garden for me. I never thanked you for that but
it’s all those little things that make you so amazing.
The week I started university was a week like no other. I
thought I was free of you and I didn’t appreciate just quite how much I needed
you; how I still need you. Things were okay for the first few days and then I
decided to tell you what had happened; what he’d done. That week is all a
massive blur but I remember walking out of a party, buying a bottle of vodka
and a packet of razorblades and going to sit on a bridge over the river. I had
every intention of ending my own life; I thought my plan was fool proof – if I
drank the vodka and then cut myself really badly and jumped into the river
there would be no way I would survive. I would be too drunk and in too much
pain from the cuts to swim and I would drown… At that point, that was exactly
what I wanted. But then you phoned. I nearly threw my phone into the river but
I could see you in my mind’s eye, sitting in the house where I grew up and I
had to speak to you. I told you where I was and what I was about to do and you
came to get me… You drove 150 miles in the middle of the night to make me feel
better. You took me home and I slept in your bed and didn’t let go of you all
night. I’m a bastard to sleep with; I know I grunt, I know I snore, I know I
wriggle but you didn’t mind, you were glad that I was there and you were glad
that I was safe.
You kept me safe that night but the truth is there have been
so many nights where you haven’t. You always tell me that you are a light
sleeper so the why the fuck did you not know what was going on? Maybe you did
know and you were as scared of him as I was… I feel really fucking angry with
you sometimes and I think you know that but neither of us really knows how to
address the issue. You’ve never been very good at coping with my mental health
and always manage to turn it around to be about you and how you feel. You need
to stop doing that because it is entirely counterproductive and makes me feel even
worse. You don’t understand why I cut myself; you always insinuate that it’s
shameful. I remember when we were arguing when I was 15; it was probably over
something minor and ridiculous as it normally was but I told you that I wasn’t
surprised that dad left and that living with you was unbearable. You responded
by telling me to go and cut my arms open like I always do when things don’t go
my way. Even to this day it makes me sick when I think about you saying those
words and I don’t think I will ever forget that argument; the way you said what
you said, the pure venom in your voice, and the childishness of your retort.
You always talk about self-harm as though it’s something
that children do and that they mature out of it. You don’t think I hurt myself
anymore, now that I am an adult you think that I must have established better
coping techniques. You’re wrong. Self-harming is as much of an issue for me now
as it ever was, and although the frequency and severity has decreased, I use it
to address issues that nobody sane would ever describe as childish and
immature. I guess it’s a really hard concept to accept if it’s something you
have never experienced but I just wish you had tried a little harder to understand
rather than freaking out and making it a shameful secret that I wasn’t allowed
to discuss with anybody outside of the house. You were so worried about what
other people may think of you as a mother that you failed to notice my real ‘shameful
secret’ that was being formed in front of your eyes. And even though you now
know about the real shameful secret you still won’t address it – you never
involved the police, you never told him that you know what he did, you never
checked to see if he did the same things to Holly, we never ever talk about it.
It’s buried. Along with everything else shit that’s ever happened in our
family. Why are you all so bad at supporting each other? Why don’t we talk to
each other? Why do we have to hide everything? WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU SCARED OF?
Mum, maybe it’s you that needs to grow the fuck up and face the truth. SHIT
HAPPENS.
It can’t have been easy for you. Single mum of two little
girls, one of whom is so intent on destroying herself and everyone around her
that you fear for both of your safety. I know that you tried to get me locked
up. I read the emails that you sent and the information that you printed off
about detaining children. I read the criteria and I noticed how you had
carefully highlighted and annotated the information to make me look like some
kind of a monster. Bollocks to you. Do you know why I never got detained mum?
It certainly wasn’t because I wasn’t ill enough because at that point I was
absolutely fucking bonkers. No, it’s because you didn’t want anybody to know
that we weren’t fucking perfect after all. You’re a coward mum but I’ve known
that for a long time. No self-respecting woman allows the father of her
children to throw an iron at them and then beg them to come back when they do a
midnight flit. You don’t even know I know about all of that. Well, guess what,
even as a fucking 8 year old I was more perceptive then you were as the stupid
middle aged woman that you turned out to be.
I didn’t want this letter to turn into a stream of abuse,
calling you out for every mistake that you’ve ever made in your life. I just
kind of wish that you were more able to acknowledge your mistakes and fix them.
When I was a very little girl you could make everything better but then I
realised that actually the world is an incredibly shit place and you are
completely powerless within the system, just like everybody else. Your hugs
still help though. I wish I could have one right now. I just want to hold you
and never let go. Even though I’m 4 inches taller than you and twice as wide
you still seem able to envelope me in affection and take away all of the pain.
I love you so much and you’re my best friend, I need you to
know that this isn’t your fault. I need you to know that I forgive you. You’re
my favouritest ever but don’t tell the others ;)
I love you to the moon and back,
Your lost, lonely, terrified little girl
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