At least I'll get more done this way.

I'm amazed at how very angry I am at TB for what he's doing. I tried really hard when he was younger to encourage him to have a good relationship with his father, even when it was to my own detriment (and isn't this always the way it goes?). I know that I didn't do a great job with that - I was fighting my own issues and battles with regard to my relationship with TB's father, so I was probably not the best person to be giving advice, or to be encouraging in any way regarding that topic. But there was no one else - just me - for a time, anyway, and eventually there was Hon, who always wanted a good relationship with TB, but never got it...mostly because TB found it much more fun to shoot emotional potshots at Hon, and blame him for anything and everything possible. I suppose it's not just mothers who wind up taking the blame and the fall for their children - it's anyone who goes into a relationship with their heart outside their skin, just waiting for the hammer to fall - hoping it doesn't, but knowing that the opportunity is there all the time.

Unfortunately (I say unfortunately, because I truly believe that this is a bad way to live and to feel, and I hope it doesn't really last), the days that pass when I hear no word from TB are stacking up like bricks, or rocks, or any other strong and sheltering objects, and I am placing them around my exposed heart. I can take a lot, and I will take a lot, if I have to, but not the mind games, or the manipulations, or the immature disregard. Even though I am TB's mother, the one who should just lay down her life and give up everything for her child, I won't. This is not something that is beneficial to TB, and it certainly isn't beneficial to me. I could go to Ex with my hat in my hands, cringing and cowering, and ask that he please, please pass along a message, or tell me when he hears from TB. I could open myself up to even more hurt that way. But I have to ask, why should I take abuse just because I am his mother? Does birthing a child automatically mean that I am open to whatever emotional crap he decides to throw at me? Because he didn't agree with my parenting style? Or my decision to leave a violently drunk and abusive marriage?

Feh. I reject the stereotype of the long suffering, always willing, selfless mother. Excuse me, I am a human being before I am a mother, and that's the case even if I have been a mother longer than I was not one. Just because I don't remember what it was like to be PeacemongerGirl, doesn't mean that PeacemongerGirl doesn't exist somewhere in the makeup of PeacemongerMom. I love my son very, very much, and if he calls or writes or sends me smoke signals, I'll be open and responsive to him.

But I won't allow my life to end because of some issue he has with his father, or with me or with the brand of shampoo he's having to use, or any other million and one things that he might think are my fault, and that society might allow him to place at my feet because I wear the Scarlet M. I did the best I could do with him - he wasn't the most maleable of clays, if you know what I mean - I did my best, but sometimes the best just doesn't cut it. I won't just jump for joy and leak around the eyes if he writes me - no, I think I'm done with that for now. Now I'm just pissed. I suppose that that is the wrong thing to be as a peacemonger, but peacemongers get tired too, and irate and crabby and hurt. I'm hurt, and I'm pissed, and I hope I remember this if he does decide to write.