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In the days since my mother passed I've had the chance to do some serious thinking about our relationship over the years.

Looking back over the years, the cracks in my mother's mental health started during her second marriage. She had married a very abusive man who made our lives hell, and considering the childhood my mother had and the fact that was institutionalized before getting pregnant with me, it's probably not a huge surprised that the cracks started forming.

I know at one point I used to blame my brother for how my mother started treating me, but it was never his fault. It was the asshole who was his father that is partially to blame. Another part of the blame lies with my mother's refusal to seek professional help when she was clearly (to me, at least) losing her mind.

I was finally able to look past the toxity of the past 34-35 years and remember when I was still able to call her 'Mom' when talking about her to my friends. It's only as the years went on and her mental health was slipping that I could only refer to her as 'Mother'.

I can remember when my mom turned Mama Bear the day I arrived home early from school with adult hand-shaped red marks around my neck after my abusive grade 1 teacher Miss MacDonald thought it was appropriate to attempt to strangle me in class. In front of the rest of the students. My mom used to think that my complaints about my teacher were just because I didn't get along with her...that day proved that the bitch was acting way over the line when it came to me, and my mother called the school and told the principal to have the police there before she got there or she was going to beat the shit out of Miss MacDonald.

But over the years I saw less and less of the woman who would defend me and protect me. In time she decided that whatever was wrong in her life was my fault. And that I deserved whatever I got. That included beatings that she herself would lay on me for any reason she could find to justify her actions.

I wish that she had not changed over the years, to the point where she seemed to hate me and call me down to my face and behind my back. Some of the worst things were said behind my back, things she never expected to get back to me. But those words always found their way to me in the end.

But I suppose, at the heart of it all, she did love me in her way. And hated me as well.

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