Estranged on Mother's Day

Here in the good old USofA, we are awash in flowers, chocolates and brunches on this Mother's Day.  It is a good thing to honor your mother and to thank her for all the wonderful things she has done for her children.  But what if you don't want to see your mother?  What if your mother has created such  pain for you that you have to turn your back and cut her off?

When children cut off a relationship with their mom, there is always a reason.  The mom may not understand, or may not acknowledge the depth of the hurt the child is feeling.  The mom may desperately try to reconcile and repair without success.  There is pain all around.  The only person that can initiate a reconciliation is the person that initiated the estrangement.

I am one of the lucky ones - my mom was the greatest and I hold her memory close since she passed 20 years ago.  We had our bad moments, I guess, but I don't seem to remember that part.

On this Mother's Day, I want to acknowledge that not every mother-child relationship is a source of comfort, that not every wrong has been forgiven, that some children and mothers withdraw from each other in order to establish a zone of safety.  Estrangement is a type of prison, but one that the incarcerated often enters gladly. Even a comfortable prison is a trap and shrinks life's possibilities.

Here is a good piece on estrangement