Late Drifty Rambles

My mom raised seven of us. None of us are even remotely similar. No two of us have the same faults/issues.

My mom raised seven kids alone. Never home. One of us babysitting the others. Worked 60+ hour work weeks up until 5 years ago.

My mom is 64, helping raise my three year old nephew. Still doing the part of a nurturer. Breaking her back. Still as staunchly unforgiving of others as she has always been.

If you are not family, or adopted family, you are no one. I like that about her. But it’s also sad. She has no room for forgiveness for anyone outside of her children.

For us, she has endless love and forgiveness. As you should, I suppose.

I don’t know.

My mom is black and white. I’m all grey. While she is sympathetic. I am heavily empathetic. While she is understanding, her understanding is not as far reaching.

I am soft. Inside me, I always have her voice. The booming echo of judgement. Knowing what she’d say/think. I question if I am not being strong enough in any given moment.

I’m not hard edges. She’d argue that I’ve experienced more trauma and heartache than she. However, I am watercolor, while she is pen and ink.

I deeply try to understand others. I acknowledge that my experience will never allow me to fully grasp theirs. No matter what.

My mother…Well…She’s angry. She has the hardest shell. She’s an island with skyscraping walls. She has been burned so many times that she has become someone who is nearly impenetrable. Unless you are in her heart.

When I speak to her, sometimes I feel small. I know that I look weak to her sometimes, because I am so soft and full of empathy.

I have been in a war with myself for the last year.

A war of boundaries and empathy.

Maybe I am empathetic to a fault..I’m sure I am. All the same, I don’t regret it.

I have leaned into love. I figure…with love, you can never be wrong. So I try to have boundaries while also loving endlessly. Understanding as much as I can.

But I’m not sure my boundaries work. They’re made of salt.

It is painful. Though I wish it weren’t. I am always trying to give my all to everyone. I wish I could give that endlessly without feeling empty and sad when I don’t feel any of it back.

And it’s not that I feel I am doing this to receive it back. But… something about giving it, and feeling that energy get lost in the ether, makes you feel smaller. When none of the light comes back, you start to lose light to give.

I feel bad, that I try to give that much. Because my mom would say that you should not. Unless of course, you are her child. She would say that you are allowing people to take advantage. You are being their crutch. You are being used. Not cared about.

So it’s hard to talk to her. When I explain the way I have come to understand and feel for others, she tells me I am blind. That my empathy is debilitating because I am excusing everyone else.

And…I understand why she sees that. I am constantly battling myself trying to figure out what is right.

Is my nurturing nature a disability at this point?

I excuse my boundaries because my empathy paints their picture over mine?

The thing is….It doesn’t feel wrong.

Deep down. It does not feel like I am making a decision against myself.

I love understanding other people. I love feeling their feels, whether bad or good.

Something about it makes me feel beyond myself.

It’s like…the same feeling you feel when you hike to a high point, and at the top, you get to see everything below you, and for miles away. You feel small. You are forced to realize the expanse of the world around you, it all feels so much bigger than yourself.

That’s what it feels like.

Maybe the word is…expansive?

Anyway.

That was a ramble. While I am in despair, I am also connecting with myself on a deep and necessary level.

Whatever. I guess.