The Collins English Dictionary describes mothering as treating someone with care and affection. Associated words include nurture, raise, and protect.
It doesn’t describe someone who uses her children as emotional tools, shows them no affection, takes no interest in what matters to them and repeatedly puts them in harm’s way.
So, if the second description fits the person who gave birth to you, is it unfair to take away the beautiful title of “Mother”? Is it too severe to say she never earned it?
In my case, I don’t believe it is.
I never had a mother.
I had a person who gave birth to me.
Her name was Marjorie.
I know some people reading this will understand exactly what I mean. Others may find it harsh. Perhaps they grew up with a mother whose love they never had reason to question.
I saw that love in other members of my family. I knew what affection, concern and protection looked like. That made their absence in my own home even harder to understand.
Of course, parenthood can begin in difficult circumstances. A pregnancy may be unplanned. A relationship may have broken down. A parent may be struggling with bitterness, disappointment or problems of their own. Bonding does not always happen immediately.
But the child is the innocent party. Whatever the circumstances, they deserve care and safety. They should never be made to pay for an adult’s unhappiness.
What I struggled to understand about Marjorie was how little concern she appeared to have for us. How could she remain so nonchalant while her children were being beaten, showing neither concern nor remorse? How could she continue to place us in the path of a man convicted of two counts of attempted murder? How could the distress of her own children matter so little to her?
Was something missing in her? Was it connected to how she had been raised? I kept looking for an explanation, yet her mother and siblings showed the warmth and affection I rarely saw in her. Within the family I knew, Marjorie was the anomaly.
There are psychological explanations for behaviour like hers, and words such as sociopath, psychopath and narcissist are often used to describe it. Those terms are not interchangeable, however, and a clinical diagnosis requires more than recognising someone’s behaviour in a list of traits.
Marjorie was never formally diagnosed. Sociopath is the word I came to believe best described her, based on what I witnessed and experienced.
A diagnosis might have helped me understand her. Its absence did nothing to lessen the consequences of her behaviour.
She wasn't irrational every minute of every day. Sometimes she could appear perfectly ordinary. Anyone seeing only that side of her might have struggled to understand what we were living with.
And how do you persuade someone to seek help when, as far as they are concerned, everyone else is the problem?
Meanwhile, the children have to find their own ways of getting through it. Some rebel. Some become quiet and try to stay unnoticed. Some leave as soon as they can and never look back. Some carry the effects into adulthood, long after they have escaped the home where it began.
There is no single response to a childhood like that.
Me? As best I could, I tried to ignore what I couldn’t change and build a better life for myself. I looked on it as a massive obstacle course, one I hadn’t volunteered to enter.
And I awarded myself a medal for surviving it. (And a chunk of fudge)
I had no control over what Marjorie did. None of it was my fault. Those are two things I have had to remind myself of.
I like to think I came through without lasting scars, although those close to me over the years may disagree.
Perhaps the more honest thing to say is that I refuse to let those scars decide how I live.
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