Becoming my mother's mother

I became my mother's mother back when I was 15 as far as taking care of her health. It took me almost 30 years to realize that 'her health' was what she held over me to control me. I was sitting in the hospital, September 1992 waiting room counting back from my age when I started taking care of her to 1992 and it was a revelation that it had been 30 years. YEARS!

I remember her slapping me in the face for something I said back to her, sometimes on a daily basis. Mom could be very cruel. She was very skilled at saying hurtful things. She continually said my older brother Alfred would never be anything because of his temper, my older sister Helen would never be anything because she was not intelligent, my younger brother Oren would never be anything because he was a dreamer 'just like your daddy' and of course I would never be anything because I was ugly. Mom had a sharp tongue and never let an opportunity go by to let Oren and I know that we were unwanted births and in fact, her health was ruined because of our difficult births. (It was after she died that it finally dawned on me that Oren and I had nothing to do with her getting pregnant with us! Sometimes it takes awhile to realize things.) Her biggest trump card was that all our financial difficulties were because of my birth in that I was such a sick baby that they had to sell everything to move to Florida to regain my health. She was a proud owner of an O'Keefe and Merrit stove and every time she saw one, I was reminded that she lost hers because of me.

Every time she got sick, somehow it always turned into being my fault. I remember how demeaning it felt to have her slap me. I remember the day I turned into her caregiver. She and I had been arguing over something and our arguments were usually about Daddy...something he had promised and not done. I don't know why I took it out on Mom when he did this but I did. We were in the dining room and she went off on me and slapped me as usual. I snapped and slapped her back. I guess it got pretty bad because I remember us both being on the floor and I won. Also, she 'got sick' over it. I didn't know what it was but it was bad. She was bedridden for quite a time after that and later she told me she had had a stroke. I didn't know at that time what a stroke was but I knew it was bad. From then on, every time she would lose her temper, which was often, somehow it always got to be my fault. As a result, I have never let anyone hit me again. Ever. In Mom's defense, she had a really rotten marriage in some aspects and had a rough time of it. We were two personalities that aggravated the heck out of each other. (Note: there were some wonderful loving qualities about Mom and I loved her. She eventually learned to love me but it was in the later years of her life.