The post I hadn’t dared to write – or my life as an abuse survivor

This is the post that a lot of people are going to stare at and look at in confusion. It’s the post that will get a reaction from people who knew me growing up more than people who know me now. It’s one I didn’t think I would ever be ready to post and I know given the community I grew up in it will put me at the centre of gossip. But you know what? Fuck it. I’ve spent the past few years dealing with the flashbacks, coming to terms with my past, and learning that I am not to blame. I’ve grown as a person and I’ve changed too. This is my truth. And now that it’s been over a year since my darling grandfather died I can and will put it out there. I waited as a sign of respect for the man who on finding out just a fraction of what I’m about to share here told me to call him ‘dad.’

Dearest Maman, My Darling Mum,

61 isn’t that old. Not by today’s standards. In fact, for women, the age of retirement is no longer 60, it now matches the age of retirement for men. We often think that we have all the time in the world. And most of us don’t think of our own mortality until much later in life. I’ve thought about mine daily for as long as I can remember. Mostly because I’ve always had a death sentence over my head thanks to my heart condition. What I never thought about was your mortality. I never questioned that my mother would be there to watch me grow. Never asked if you would be there to watch my children grow up, if I a) lived long enough to have them, or b) decided to have them. I never worried about you being there for my graduation, or my wedding. Never pondered if you would be there to talk to about the myriad of things women talk to their mothers about. Not even when the M.E. and the Fibromyalgia left you exhausted and sat in your chair and me a teenager carer. I never ever questioned that you would just always be there. Even with everything he put us through, I still didn’t worry that you would be anything other than present.

But tomorrow, on what should have been your 61st birthday, like so many birthdays before, you won’t be there. In May it’ll be 16 years since I woke to that phone call that changed my life, the one that still feels as unreal as it did that day. No 18 year old should hear the words “Your mum died last night.” echo down the phone. The weight of them still sits heavily on my chest, as if an elephant is trying to cause my asthma to stir. It weighs on my arms and my legs, causing my own Fibro pains to shoot through me and burn at my muscles. There’s a hole in my heart that’s as small as you but as large as your heart. You may have only been 4 ft 11, but you had a heart that was 100 feet tall. And all of my friends who knew you whilst we were growing up would vouch for that. They all called you their second mum.

There’s not a day goes past that I don’t think of you. And I don’t think there will ever be a day that goes by that I don’t want to talk to you on the phone, or just hear you singing along to one of your CDs, just one last time. You may have been the most tone deaf person I have ever met, but the joy you had in singing made it music to my ears. I hope that Grandad will be celebrating with you tomorrow. I know you’ll both be driving each other crazy up there. But I also know the amount of love and affection you had for each other in life, behind the bravado. And I know that Uncle Tim will be looking out for his precious little sister. I often feel like Lee and I were robbed of our mother way too soon, but then I remember, we were so very blessed to have you in our lives for as long as we did. Goddess gave us someone special as a mum when She gave us you, because She gave us someone who wanted nothing more than to have children. And whilst you and I fought like cat and dog during my teenage years, and we both made mistakes along the way, I always knew, as I know now, your love for me is stronger than anything else. It’s why you’ve made sure that I have love in my life now that you’re gone.

I miss you, Mum. I always will. But I hope you know, I’m doing okay. And I’m so grateful that I’m loved by the people I have in my life whose unconditional love reminds me of yours.

Your Longed For Firstborn

xoxoxoxo

Fifteen years still feels like yesterday

In 4 days your youngest child will turn 26. It will be the fifteenth birthday of his that you haven’t been there for. Today marks 15 years since you phoned me before the cinema and told me you felt unwell. You refused to let anyone call the on-call Doctor, you didn’t want a fuss. Fifteen years since you and I last spoke, fifteen years since you last told me you love me.

Fifteen years ago tomorrow, I sleepily picked up my phone to a call that would rock the very foundation of life as I knew it. I lost so much more than a mother that day… I lost someone who was becoming my closest friend as well as my closest ally. 

It took a long time to stop being angry with you for leaving. It took an even longer time to stop being angry at myself. Each day is a new step, and Mum, I’m getting there. I’ve come so far, especially in the past two years. I hope that you can see that and I make you proud. I hope you’re telling Grandad how you are proud of my accomplishments like you told SJ when I was at uni and she would share a cuppa with you. 

We may have fought a lot, you may have given me more responsibility than I should have had at a young age (through no fault of your own), you should have left him and taken us with you long before he did the most heinous thing he did, but despite those things, you proved time and time again that you loved me. You weren’t massive on hugs or saying how you felt, but you made sure we knew. You protected me from nightmares, took your first solo flight to come to my side in hospital, taught me to cook, gave me a love of period drama, stayed up with me to watch Bad Girls on ITV even though it was past your bedtime (I met Simone by the way, Mum, and she was lovely and gracious), and I know from recent years, you are still making sure I’m safe and have the support I need.

I miss you, every single day, and I love you more each moment that passes. 

To all the non-birth mothers this Mothers’ Day weekend

The U.K. seems to have a different Mothers’ Day to the rest of the world but this applies to British mothers here too.

I see the love in your eyes for your children, be they still under the age of eighteen, or grown adults. I see the way you feel each of their struggles and how it hurts you when they hurt. I see you light up when they are happy and achieve something they didn’t think they could.

The emotions you display when they tell you that they love you show how you truly believe, whether through adoption or otherwise, no matter what they call you, these are your kids and it’s worth all the highs and lows to have them in your life.

I see the way you wish you could have been with them from the very start, that you wonder if it makes you any less of a mother. As a child of more than one mother, I can tell you it doesn’t. Your desire to be a mother to someone who needs you and your unconditional love for them make you one. 

When your child, who has been through the mill on the way to becoming yours, pushes back because they don’t know how to handle the love you show them, and they are used to being abandoned/abused/neglected by those who should love them and those who claim to love them; I see the hurt in your eyes being replaced by the determination to see them through this and show them you mean it, that you aren’t going anywhere. 

You are so very special to those who count you as a mother. They are thankful every single day. They know that whether they call you by your first name of use a motherly moniker they are without a doubt a part of you as you are of them. Biology doesn’t matter. Not when souls connect like yours have.

Happy Mothers’ Day, ladies. 

London, Easter 2016

A week away in London, a week of minor stressful moments, but overwhelmingly a week of reaffirming and making friendships, growing closer as sisters, and taking the time to see things normally missed in a long weekend away. This week has been amazing.

My body has mostly behaved in regards to pain levels, I randomly met a hero from my teen years, I saw people I love dearly, JDV and I learnt that squabbles just make us closer… we randomly met up with mutual old friends, we bumped into one of my oldest friends… It’s been a serendipitous trip. 
I’ll miss you London as we head back up North. I won’t miss the crowds and the chaos but I’ll look back on this trip with fondness and smile at the good that it has brought along the way. 

We visited St Paul’s Cathedral for Easter Evensong and in doing so paid tribute to Grandad. I said a few silent prayers for those who have helped me along the way through life. We’ve seen the cheaper side of so many Starbucks and walked over 50km. There have been overload moments but not a full meltdown. We saw an exhibition at The Tate Britain on Art and Alcohol that moved us deeply, walked along the Southbank and over Tower Bridge. It’s been a good break.

I’m looking forward to seeing my rodents again and sleeping in my own bed, but I’m sad to say goodbye to the memories of this week. We’ve had some extremely special moments not recorded on camera, but etched in our minds forever.

To those involved in those moments, you know who you are. Thank you for being a part of this journey we call life.

Grief with Asperger’s

If you read my blog regularly, you know that I recently lost my Grandad. It’s been tough. Grandad was and is my first hero. He was the man who gave me a love of so many things and taught me about language. I still feel like I’m caught in some terrible dream.

Everyone goes through grief at different speeds, it comes out in different ways, and yet it has it’s similar stages. There’s denial, anger, sorrow, acceptance… And a few more I forget. But as an Aspie, going through the stronger emotions can be a terrifying experience.

For me, this particular loss is harder to deal with than others as it sets off some of my PTSD triggers as well. But overwhelmingly I see the Aspie traits intensified. 

I feel like I’m trapped in my head. I want to scream and shout and cry most of the time. But I find it hard to do so. It’s not that I’m not an emotional person, I just can’t figure out how to let those emotions loose. It leads to frustration and more stimming than usual. I press my fingers into my thighs and arms as hard as I can in order to try and feel pain which might release the tears. I’m snappy, seriously snappy, how JDV is putting up with me I don’t know. I’m also constantly shutting down.

My negative emotions are the ones  I find most difficult to deal with, and so it’s when I start to feel them bubble up that I go into meltdown. They taste sour and feel spiky, kinda like cactus spikes pressed into my internal organs. I forget to breathe and my arms and legs close inwards, my fingers finding somewhere to press into tender flesh.

When I’m like this, whilst I’m physically shutting down to close off the pain, I’m also hyper aware of every little thing around me. It sounds contradictory, but it’s true. I feel the individual fibres of my clothes, hear every noise at ten times its actual loudness, lights become brighter and moving even an inch seems like some epic task of passing through the space of an alien territory. I find it hard to sleep and I wake at the slightest sound or breeze. 

When I do sleep, my dreams are in vivid and lurid colours, which I know is a reflection of my state of mind. Normally my dreams are colourful but not to the point where things are the wrong colours and my brain screams at the wrongness of it all. 

For me, grief is an overwhelming mess of the senses. It consumes my thoughts and cycles through my head at a speed I can’t describe, round and round, constantly repeating the same thoughts as things I touch, see, smell and hear, become too much. If I could turn it all off I would. 

Alfred Charles

  
The man in the picture was my first ever hero; my Grandad, Alfred Charles (surname protected). He was a WWII Navy veteran, Princess Anne called him a liar when he told her his age, my mother sprayed an entire brand new bottle of Charlie perfume over his feet when he pissed her off and it was that that made him certain she was the right daughter-in-law for him.

Grandad made the best jams when I was growing up. He had a train set in the attic that was epic considering the tiny space it was set up in. He taught me how to care for fruits and vegetables in the garden, and repeatedly told me I didn’t have to be the way people expected me to be. When my father outed me to him, Grandad told me that I could call him ‘dad’ instead. That his son was in the wrong for kicking me out for loving women. He told me that he couldn’t care less whom I fell in love with as long as they never abused that love or me.

Grandad passed away yesterday evening. His heart literally just gave up. He was only a couple months shy of his 96th birthday. As a child and even as an adult I saw my grandfather as the unstoppable force. He was always so sure and so certain. It still hasn’t quite sunk in that my unstoppable Grandad has been stopped. 

At a time when so many public heroes have passed on so quickly and suddenly, I want to make sure that one of my heroes and one of the many unnamed heroes of the British Forces is remembered. Thanks to veterans like my grandfather, I grew up on an island not under Nazi occupation, and I’m free to live as a disabled, genderqueer, lesbian boi. 

To my father

I’ve written endless letters to you and never sent them. I’ve burnt the ones on paper and deleted the ones on the computer. I’ve tried to understand why you did what you did and I’ve failed in coming up with one reason as to why either of us deserved it. And it’s taken love from an unlikely source to help me see we didn’t do anything to warrant your behaviour. The fault was not in us but in you.

I won’t focus much on what you did to Mum, except to say my teenage self begged you to leave rather than continue to cheat on her. You didn’t. You were too selfish to see it would have made her final years less fraught with unhappiness. She hid it as best she could from us, but I saw it in her eyes when she thought we weren’t looking.Your snide comments and your constant emotional abuse have left me with deep scars. And for a long time those scars were filled with anger and hate. They still sting and haven’t fully healed over, but the anger and hate for the emotional abuse has subsided. I still find it hard to trust new people but I’m working on that and I think it’s helped me better judge who I want in my life and who I don’t. 

You gave me a distinct distrust of men and yet I work with them all day, I have male friends in my life whom I have learnt to trust, and I’m seeing that you aren’t around every corner. 

You chose to see me the way you do. You chose to focus on my sex and the fact you think women should serve men. You chose to publicly act like a decent man and privately become the monster who caused part of my self harm and PTSD. I chose to never go back after you kicked me out and I choose to look for the good in my life. I choose to embrace those who see me for me and not for what I can give them. I choose to smile when someone takes the time out of their day to contact me.

I’ve spent too long fighting demons you helped to create. Too long dealing with nightmares and doubts. You made me question the motives of everyone around me. But no more. I’ve still got a way to go before I can truly say I’m free of those demons but I’m getting there. One day I’ll forgive you, I’ll never forget but I will forgive. And it won’t be for your sake but mine. Until then, I have arms to hold me when I shake, shoulders to cry on, and more love in my life than I ever realised was possible. In the words of Sarah from The Labyrinth – YOU HAVE NO POWER OVER ME!

On my childhood best friend’s 35th birthday…

My darling Dizzy Frizzy Blonde, we’ve known each other over half our lives, scary thought, isn’t it? Mum always said you’d be my Linda (her childhood BFF) and she was right. We can go long periods without talking, but we always pick up exactly where we left off, and it feels like no time has passed. We’re in our 30s and ‘responsible adults’ now, but given half the chance, we’d still skip down King Street, hand in hand, singing Disney songs like we did all those years ago.

Long before I knew I was gay, I think you knew. And a part of me thinks you knew (but have never said you did), that you were my first love.  It was an innocent love, a childhood crush, but it never created an awkwardness between us. We’ve never spoken about it, but then, we never needed to. You’ve always accepted me just as I am, warts and all, and your love has always been unconditional.

Looking back, I think you saw a lot more of what went on behind my family’s closed doors than I thought you did at the time. But you’ve never pushed me to talk about it. You’ve just always been there with open arms and extra hugs when I needed them. Our teenage friendship whilst so innocent had a level of maturity to it. We never doubted that we would always be there for each other and I don’t doubt that to this day. 

In some respects we appear to be chalk and cheese. You have an inherent femininity and I defy gender boundaries. I was always the brash one whilst you have always been more demure. But we share so much more than that, we are so alike, that I don’t think we could have ever been anything other than friends.

You have always been more than my BFF, more than my sister from another mister, you are a part of me, and I love you so very dearly. 

Happy Birthday my darling Dizzy Frizzy Blonde! May this year bring you love, joy and happiness! And endless conversations for us both!

For God Tells Me So….

I’ve been sat this morning watching a documentary on Netflix called “For God Tells Me So.” It’s about the division within American Christianity regarding the LGBTQ community. There are families who have changed their view because their child came out, a mother who lost her child because she didn’t accept her, and a family who still doesn’t accept their daughter’s partner being anything other than a friend.

I watch these documentaries as a bi-romantic genderqueer lesbian because I want to know the people with homophobia and transphobia , I want to know they can change. It’s a compulsion for me as the child of a homophobic and transphobic man. I need to know that there are birth parents out there whose love has overpowered their religious dogma and found peace with the sexuality of their child and reconciled it with their faith.

I am fortunate in that I have found my adoptive Momma. She has accepted me for all the things that I am. She loves me for me, gender, sexuality, disability, everything. I do, however, still find a part of me longing for that biological affirmation of who I am. It’s something I know that I will never have from my birth father, but I pray that my Mum is watching over me and is proud to have a child who is out and proud and in a loving relationship.

I choose to believe that Mum, together with God, brought Momma into my life so that I would know the unconditional love I have always craved. The love and acceptance that every child should have from their parents. God given love.

The tie that can’t be severed…

Even on my darkest days, when my monster convinces me that nothing I know to be true is real, when it has me believing that she doesn’t care, my heart still manages to persuade me to talk to her. Even when it’s scared that the monster is right.

Yesterday the monster had me completely convinced she didn’t care. A rather large battle with it was pretty much lost… But then there she was. Smiling at me. And suddenly everything was ok. 

I just wish I could explain to her how hard I’m fighting against the monster, how I’m training myself not to go for the ways that used to quiet it. How the one thing she said stays in the back of my mind. A constant reminder. It’s what stops me from giving in. Even when all I want is for the monster to stop.

She’s my strength even when the monster has me almost convinced otherwise. I can’t thank her enough for that. She has literally saved me. And yet I still find it hard to open my mouth and tell her what happens when it gets  bad and how she really gives me hope. Or to type the words. I’ve tried…

Something I’ve always wanted…

For a long time I felt cheated out of the kind of relationship I saw between my friends and their mothers. The way they could tell them anything, the way their mothers looked after them, rather than the other way round. The conversations that they were able to have.

That’s not to say that I didn’t love Mum, I did and still do, but we started reaching the turning point of friendship just before she died. We never got to the stage where we were comfortable discussing things that others could. And it stung. 

But now… Now I have Momma. That very relationship is blossoming. I can tell her anything, I can discuss things I only dreamt of discussing with Mum. Perhaps it’s because we started as friends, but I doubt that. We very much have a mother/daughter relationship regardless of DNA and distance.

Today I’ve realised something, there is no barrier in what I can confide in Momma. There’s no question of whether I should or shouldn’t tell her whatever is on my mind. And for two people who find it hard to open up completely, I think we are doing a fantastic job.

Grief

This week hits me like a tonne of bricks, every year. I always think that it might be easier, but it never is. Tomorrow I celebrate 3 years in my little flat and on Wednesday I will mourn 14 years since I lost my Mum. The pain that comes from it is always intense and horrendous. And the tears flow freely. Things have changed this year in that I have more support, but the pain is still as intense. Mum was the glue that held my biological family together, and with her gone, those bonds have dissolved into nothingness.

I feel so lonely at this time of year. My emotions run riot and combined with my PTSD it generally tends to mean I’m left feeling overwhelmed all the time. Every step feels like a massive one. Even going out for my front door is a huge step right now. And I need to check if the hoover bags have arrived in the mail, but I’m still sat here in my pjs, wanting to hide from the world. People tell you that it gets easier with time, and I’m sorry but that is a lie. Grief just changes each year. It’s still a gaping wide hole in your heart and soul, and it still knocks you for six each time it hits you unaware.

I’m trying to get this written down so that I get it out of my head. I need to at least try and get the thoughts and feelings out there, but it’s not like I expect anyone to really read it.

To my two mothers…

Mother’s Day is fast approaching in the UK and I’m not going to be in for most of it as I’ll be at a little event in Scarborough called Sci-Fi Scarborough. So I thought I’d post this now. Whilst it’s fresh in my mind. I am fortunate to have two mothers in my life, one is the biological mother who raised me, and one has only come into my life in the past year, but she treats me as if I am her own. So the two letters below are for them.

On the eve of your 59th birthday

I don’t think I’ll ever truly put aside the pain I feel at you not being here, Mum. I don’t think there will ever come a day when I’m not wishing I could phone you. It’s been almost 14 years and I can’t shake that desire. But this year’s post is something different, because you’ve brought someone into my life who is helping me reach for the stars. Actually a handful of people. In the past 12 months my life has changed, and I know you had a hand in that. Only a mother would guide her child to the people that would help that child grow in so many ways.

You’ve brought friends, mentors, an angel, and hope back into my life in the past year, and even if you were here, I wouldn’t know how to thank you. I’ve found my life taking some unexpected turns since your last birthday, when I sat and asked you ever so silently if you would help steer me to where I need to be.  I’m not pretending that it’s all been a picnic, because it hasn’t. But I can look at the past year and see the changes that have occurred. I’m so very grateful for each and every one of them. I’m still struggling with certain things but, I have faith and hope that it will get better. And part of that is due to the people who have entered my life. One in particular whom I know you sent my way. At just the right time, as always.

Thank you, Mum, for watching out for me, even now. You are and always have been my rock. And even as I mourn your life ended too soon, I will celebrate the love you nurtured within me that is finding its way to the surface once again.  As I play one of your favourite songs, sung by one of your favourite artists, I know that the words reaching my ears are right.

We’ll meet again, don’t know where, don’t know when, but I know we’ll meet again, some sunny day.

How do you cope with particularly difficult days?

I’m not going to tame this post. It’s not going to be something fluffy and sweet, what is below the cut may trigger people. But I need to get it out, so it may be a post you want to skip by. Trust me on this, I could just skip writing it but that ain’t going to happen. I suggest if you could be triggered for self harm then don’t look. By self harm, I mean eating disorders, alcohol abuse, drug use, and cutting, these are my forms of self harm and that’s what I see them as, it doesn’t mean that everyone does and I respect that. It’s not an easy post to write, but it’s one that I need to get out.

2014 – this year’s summary

This year has been memorable for several reasons. Some global, some not. There have been definitive landmarks for me and I know that some of them have paved the way for 2015. I’ll try to keep this concise, I’ll fail. Because this year has had a lot of different intertwining moments. So in no particular order, here is my 2014

A catch up on the life of Scribblenubbin

So I haven’t updated in a while. And I keep meaning to but I’m so completely and utterly behind in everything. This past week I’ve been getting home and working on my latest project which, quite frankly has taken over my life thanks to support and encouragement from someone I did not expect it from. It both terrifies and excites me and that’s all I’m willing to say on that matter but yes, yes it’s  been an interesting ride. If this latest project does  what I’m hoping then things will start to change even more and that is a scary scary concept but a leap of faith I have to take and want to take (even if JDV has to keep reminding me of this fact on a near daily basis).

Sometimes goodbye is easier than hello

I had a friend whom I loved deeply.  He was like the other side of my Genderqueer self.  We would talk for hours and hours about things that seemed to only make sense to the two of us.  We would talk about time as a non-linear construct, past lives, gender identity, and all of it was deep and meaningful.  The only problem was he had a habit of dropping off the radar for months at a time and usually without a goodbye.

The last time he did this to me he was gone for a year.  Then he came back and wanted everything to be on his terms.  I wasn’t buying it.  I reached the stage where I couldn’t do it any more.  If he wanted back in it would be on my terms and there would be no disappearing without a word for months on end.  I had had enough of him pushing my abandonment issue buttons and he needed to realise my heart doesn’t have an open door policy.  There’s only so much it can take before it’s shut and the chances of that door opening up again are slim.

This resulted in him disappearing from my life again and so with the help of AH and our dear friend G, and my friend GD, I let go.  It pained me to do so, and sometimes even now I wonder if he’s ok and how he’s doing.  I still miss our late night conversations and the way he seemed to get me completely.  But my heart is mine to protect and I had to do what I felt was right.

Talking to GD today, I find out that once again he’s done a runner.  Maybe he can’t cope with things and maybe that is why, but I can’t honestly say I’m surprised.  It happens without fail every few months.  I still love him, but I reached my breaking point and I hope for his sake others don’t do the same, because one day, I fear that all those doors that were once open to him will be shut.

Mum

On Thursday you should be 57 years old.  I should have been spending the last few weeks deciding on what to get my insanely difficult to purchase for mother on her 57th birthday.  You would have, of course, told us all not to get you anything, but I would have spent every day since Christmas wondering if you’d like that scarf you were eyeing up when we went into town, or if you’d prefer earrings or a necklace.  What about those leggings you liked in the catalogue but wouldn’t buy for yourself because I need new glasses or LPE needs a new set of football boots and you’d rather give us the money towards them?  Would Blue Grass still be your favourite perfume, or would you have changed it when a new fragrance came out?  Would you still keep that bottle of Charlie in the cupboard because it reminded you of spraying an entire bottle on Grandad’s feet back before you got married, because he made fun of you?  He still says it took a month for that smell to disappear entirely.

For a mother and child we were so diametrically opposite in so many ways.  You hated to read and loved to watch soaps and Jeremy Kyle.  I love reading and writing and prefer science fiction and fantasy shows and films.  You couldn’t stand the slightest bit of mess, whereas I let it build until the weekend and clean like crazy.  You were 4’11 and took after your mother’s side when it came to weight, I on the other hand struggle to maintain a healthy weight and lose it quickly and am 5’6.  But I have your eyes, and apparently, your smile too.  We shared many a Saturday afternoon singing along to Doris Day and Connie Francis and we both inherited the LB temper.

You gave me a love of 50s music and taught me how to bake at your side.  I remember sitting on the kitchen counter whilst you baked when I was just a toddler.  Thanks to you, I’ve been able to do my own laundry, make a cup of tea and cook a full meal for five since I was 8 years old.  And no I don’t think that makes you a bad parent, I think it makes you the best mother I could have had.  You loved to go walking on a weekend if the weather was good, even if a short walk would take all day.  You encouraged us to enjoy our passions and never once flinched when I took on gymnastics, ballet, tap, modern, character, national, archaeology club, school dance clubs, drama, running for House Captain, going in for the sixth form buddy system, all of it.  You encouraged me to add stewarding at the Jersey Arts Centre to my already horrendous schedule on top of everything I did at home and school and to take on a part time paid job as well.  I still don’t know how I did it all.  I think your encouragement is what got me through.

You were so proud when I got into uni, so much so you would tell anyone who would stand still long enough to listen.  I even once caught you telling our cat, Monty how proud you were of me.  Of course you denied it though and consequently said the one word that would guarantee he would ask for what you said ‘Tuna’.  It was a distraction technique because you didn’t talk about your emotions and feelings.  That wasn’t how you were brought up.  But I knew that you loved me, even when we fought, you never gave me any cause to doubt it.

I wonder what you’d have said if I got the chance to tell you that I am attracted to women, that I’m genderqueer, that teaching wasn’t for me, after all.  What would you have done when you saw how your husband reacted to me coming out?  And most of all, every single day, I ask one question, out loud or in my head, not knowing if you hear me but hoping that you do: do I make you proud?

My children, if I have them, will never know their Meme.  They will never be able to run into your open arms have you scoop them up, like you did with me as a child.  They will never know that even though you were tone deaf, there was nothing that could make me smile as much as hearing you sing along to The Deadwood Stage sung by Doris Day.  They will never see you denying how much you love Christmas only to go all out with the gifts and the food because you want it to be special for everyone.

So on your 57th birthday, I’ll light a candle, have a cup of tea, and sing Happy Birthday for you, just like on the 10 other birthdays you’ve not been here for since you left in May 2001.