I got my letter. I waited weeks. Everytime the mail came, I got a knot in the pit of my stomache. I wanted to hear back from my mom so badly, but at the same time, I just was so nervous about the reponse that I knew I would get. By the time the letter finally came, I started to relax and give up. I was starting to think that I wasn't going to get a letter.

The day the letter came, I had picked up Chad from work. Evan was so ready for his nap, but we needed to get the car registered. So Chad droped Evan and I off at home while he and Lauren went to Jiffy Lube. After I put Evan down for a nap, I ran outside and grabed the mail. And that is when I saw it. My heart litterally skiped a beat to see that old firmilar handwriting. I just stared at the elvelope for I don't know how long. A neighbor honking his horn to say hello as he past snaped me out of my trance. I was feeling so many emotions all at once as I walked to my frount door with that letter in hand. Fear, excitment, trepidation, relife, anticipation, and most of all anxiety.

Weeks before I had poured my heart out on paper, stuffed it into an envelope, put and stamp on it and sent it on it's way. I had been thinking for weeks that I needed to write my mom. I had always thought that if I were able to tell my mom all that had happened, explain it from my point of view, maybe we could start to build a bridge. I foolishly believed that a bad mom was better then no mom at all. I would think of my feelings for Lauren and I had to think that my mom felt those very same feelings towards me. Although, I know that I would never do and say some of the things my mom did-I could never make Lauren feel as low and as unwanted as my mom made me feel. I was my mom's "little Lauren" so to speak. So deep down inside she had to want a relationship with me more then she wanted to be right. I called my dad at midnight one night after Chad and I had gotten into a fight. My dad made me feel better and reminded me what a good guy Chad is, let me know that everyone fights. When I told him that I was sorry for calling so late and waking him up, he told me just one thing-he said "Melissa, your my baby girl. You are my Lauren." It was the sweetest thing my dad could have said to me. I know how deeply my feelings for Lauren go, and I have never had someone's feelings for me explained so plainly and yet so fully before. So I guess I just always assumed that I was also my mom's Lauren. If she knew my heart, my feelings and fears-all the stuff that I have written before in my blog-her heart would soften and she would think about her baby girl for just a moment. Those are the hopes I had when I wrote that letter. I really did want a mom in my life. And I let her know that.

I guess I was expecting something like:
"Melissa
Thank you for the letter. I miss my little girl so much and I too want to start over and have a relationship with you. We don't have to figure everything out now, let us just have lunch. I have missed you and I love you so much.
Love Mom"
I don't think it was nieve to think that. After all it is what I would say to Lauren. Instead I got a letter that was cold and distant. A letter that basically said that my recolection of events was wronge and had she addressed me in a similar "tone" as my letter to her she felt "confident" that it would just make matters worse. So when I am ready to discuss things as they really are then she will be happy to talk to me. Thank you for the letter, I love as always, good bye.

That was it and I am left feeling a little empty. Chad said it was like a busines letter. I had my cry yesterday. I can't believe a mother would be like this. My "tone" was one of a little girl pleading to her mother. I don't think my mom even knows what she is doing. I think her pride and her need to be right is more important to her then I am. She needs Chad to be an abusive jerk. She can't accept that I just might have had post-pardum depression. I don't know why she would rather believe that Chad is a controlling over bearing abusive husband, then to think that she might have been wrong. And why is it more important to be right then her own daughter's feelings? I just don't understand and I never will.

The first person I called was my dad. I needed my daddy, someone who knew me from a baby and has seen my grow. I needed to hear someone's voice who unconditionally loved me. Someone who knows my mom and the way she opperates. He listen to me and when I got done, he just chuckled. He said "that is just your mom, Melissa. That is very typical of her. It is what I had to deal with for 30 years. In 30 years of marriage, she never said she was sorry. I am just so sorry that she is doing it to you because I know the hurt you are feeling right now." My dad is a man of very few words, but when he does speak, he ususally says very wise things. It was my dad that let me know that my parents divorce wasn't my fault, even though my mom had just alluded to me that it was-not an hour before. I am so gratful for my dad. I would really think that there was something unloveable about me if it wern't for my dad.

Because of my mom, I have no relationship with my brother and my older sister. And I have a very strained relationship with my little sister. The same sister I would stay up all night with laughing about things. I talked to her about boys, school, first kisses, hopes and dreams. And now, conversations with her are labored. She has turned into an aquantiance-not a sister, and that hurts. I am cut off from my aunts and uncles and cousins. I am the same girl I was at 16. I have the same thoughts and feart and habits. I am the same, so I am confussed as to why my siblings who know me and have seen my in my growing up years would think that all my mom says is right. I would think that they would know that some of the things my mom says just doesn't sound like me. That it doesn't make sence. She has robbed me of not only a mother, but she has robbed me of sisters and a brother. But I still have my dad and for that I am gratful.

I know that this is a long post and if you are still reading it then I know you truely care about my feelings. I am just venting and so hurt. I try to say that I expected it and that I am ok. I say that it was "typical mom" and I should have known. And while all this is true, I still hurt. Tears are running down my checks as I write this. It is like being rejected by my own mother all over again. But this time worse. I have learned however. I know that I definalty wouldn't treat my own children this way. I use to fear that I would end up having a horrible relationship with Lauren because I have such a screwed up one with my own mom. I have found that alot of people who have a difficult relationship with there moms have the same fear. But I know I won't. I am not my mom. I don't even know who she is, but I know who I am and I wouldn't do to Lauren what my mom has done to me. Her feelings are to important to me.

Her letter has been a kind of clousure to me. I have longed for a relationship with my mom, but I have wanted a mom that doesn't exsist. I want the fantasy. The shoping parnter, the sholder to cry on, the understanding heart, the sypathetic ear. I don't have that. So even if she responded that she would like to start fresh, she isn't the mom that I want. I don't want that kind of person around my kids. She would possion then agaist there dad and there grandpa. I need to stop wanting something I can't have and move on with my life. Her letter gave me permission to put her in my past and move on with my life. That doesn't mean that I am slamming the door on any possiblity. It just means that I am not going to expect my mom to come around one day. If she does then great, but if she doesn't then I am going to live my life for me and my family. I have shed my last tears in her name. I need to move on with my life. I am not the only one with this kind of sad story, but I am not going to repeat the past. I will have an amazing relationship with my daughter. And I know for certin that I have done all I could. I want to be free of her, and I will be. Starting now.