Detachment

[Guest guest]

I feel like I detached from my mother sometime between the ages of 7-

9 years old (at age 9 I found that she had overdosed after weeks of

threatening to do so, and instead of being the good 'caretaking'

daughter I got my brothers up and on we were on our way to school;

family friend happened to stop by shortly after and got her help;

I've always questioned my actions that day, but I think I was just

ready to let her go and detached already at that point).

Anyway, I was thinking this over and I wonder if I am truly detached

from her, this uncaring and apathetic person who should have some

feelnigs for her, some compassion, some concern, some anger, some

sadness, *something*. Instead I feel nothing. I pity her when she

was a child and the things that happened to her. But that's the

extent of my feelings. I have tried to write her a letter but I find

that I care so little about most of it that I stop writing because I

have no desire to either show her understand or to show her

resentment. I don't feel anything.

But then I wonder if I'm just mental or something, that this is just

me telling myself to feel nothing because I can't feel everything I

would need to feel considering everything that has happened with my

mom. I have done so much over the years to overcompensate for my

apathy, not just because of how I thought other people would judge

me, but because I felt it was wrong of me to not care; and so I did

a good job, too good a job, of convincing people I was close to my

mom, probably even convincing HER, and I can't possibly explain to

people how little I care or else they're going to know I'm such an

awful person. I don't think it's normal for a 9 year old to be ready

to let her mother die and go on to school like nothing was

happening. And think about it all the time feeling that it would

have been so much better for my brothers and me if she hadn't been

saved that day. That is wrong, and I know it.

So I am just rambling here. I guess it took me awhile to come up

with a word to accurately describe my feelings for my mother, and now

that I found it (detached) I felt like writing about it.