The sins of the mother

A storm is brewing.

It’s on the horizon and has been building up for the last month.

It is a storm few will  experience and it is a storm that those few will be unable to find shelter from.

Mothers Day. A day that the many will find joy and laughter in and the few will find hate and screams in. I am one of the few, the few who have taken a vow to care for the kids whose birth-persons hurt. I call her birth person because I can’t call her mother. I can’t hold my hurting children and then refer to the woman who hurt them as “mother”.

It is Friday and I am preparing my home for the impending storm. Like I said, it has been brewing for a month. It started its build up at school. The teachers have had talks of Mothers Day coming up, the art has been started, the family trees have been created, and the excitement of all the children is growing. Well, most of the children. My kids can’t tell you their family tree, they can’t bring in the baby pictures to show, and their distrust in mothers is still too strong to share in the excitement of the others. Their teachers can’t see that though, they participate with false excitement, with masks of joy and it only adds to the strength of the storm. As I sit here in the calm before the storm I prepare myself for the days that will lead up to the day I will pay for the sins of the mother. Today, my little ones will finish the art project they have been working on with big smiles and it will somehow end up broken before it finds its way into my hands, it always does. The poem that has been written with love in the eyes of their teachers will have passive aggressive undertones that only I will be able to see. The act of  a sweet little girl has been kept up for far too long and the scared and hurt emotions will soon erupt. 

They know how to hide it to the world around them. They know how to smile through the pain. There isn’t a person in the world that can see through the mask, well other than me. That is because I am the one that is privileged to see them without the mask. I am the mother, the one that represents the person that began the hurt. It started in the womb, their trauma. The protector of their little lives began hurting them while they grew. They each were born into homes that were not safe, the smells of dinner on the stove was replaced with smells of smoke and rumbling tummies. Clean sheets and a bedtime story was replaced with stained mattresses and screams in the hallways. Before they took a breath of air they learned that mothers can hurt you, after their first cry they felt that mothers can hurt you, after they were taken from the pits of hell they discovered the pain of loving and losing a mother. Now I am the mom. I fill the house with aromas of warm dinners, they sleep sweetly in a soft warm bed, I spend hours planning and driving to and from meetings that will help them heal, and I am the one that gets all the brunt of that anger and hurt.

I can handle it.

Most days I can handle it.

I deal with it.

Most days I deal with it.

Sometimes it hurts. Most days it hurts. It always hurts.

I know their trauma. I have read the reports but more than that I  have looked into their eyes during the rages. I see the fear every time they get comfortable in my arms. I get pushed away each time there is a connection. They are reminded of the hurt from day one and I pay for the sins of the mother that wasn’t a safe one. Holiday’s are the worst, Mothers Day is set aside for the person that hurt them first. It is one of the hardest for them. They feel pulled in two different ways. Anger towards the one that hurt them and love towards the one that chose them. Both carry the title of mother. Only one carries the weight of their pain. Only one is there during the rages, nightmares, fears, and tears. Only one stays safe enough to empty themselves of the pain on.

Yes, a storm is brewing. The masks need only be worn one more day. The glitter, glue, and  markers will all be put away and the eruptions will come and so I write…………….