There was one subject I had avoided for most of the night.
My mother.
Richard had brought her into the argument from the beginning.
He had accused me of turning her against him.
Even while I lay injured, those words had reached a part of me that the pain could not touch.
I had spent years trying to understand her silence.
When she married Richard, I was ten.
I had wanted the marriage to work.
I had wanted her to be happy.
I had wanted to believe that the man who brought flowers home and smiled at neighbors would treat us kindly when nobody else was watching.
When he began frightening me, I tried to tell myself that it was temporary.
When his behavior became harder to ignore, I hoped my mother would notice without my having to explain it.
Sometimes she did notice.
That was part of what made the memories difficult.
She was not always unaware.
There were moments when she looked at me and seemed to understand that something had gone wrong.
But understanding was not the same as protecting me.
I learned to recognize the difference.
I would come away from a difficult evening hoping that she might speak to him.
The next day, life would continue as though nothing had happened.
Dinner would be served.
The television would be on.
Richard would talk about work.
My mother would ask whether I had finished my schoolwork.
The ordinary routine would return, and I would begin wondering whether I had exaggerated the night before.
That was how silence worked in our house.
It did not erase what happened.
It made it harder to trust my own reaction to it.
When I grew older, I tried to talk to my mother more directly.
I wanted her to acknowledge what I had lived through.
I wanted her to stop asking me to make peace with someone who kept hurting me.
I wanted her to understand that my distance was not a punishment.
It was protection.
But every conversation seemed to lead back to Richard's feelings.
He was under stress.
He had been drinking.
He had misunderstood me.
I should not have answered him that way.
There was always another reason I should have been more patient.
Eventually, I stopped trying to explain.
I moved away.
I built my life in Virginia.
I stopped speaking to Richard.
I had hoped that distance would make my mother understand that I was serious.
Instead, the silence between us grew.
Three years passed.
I told myself I had accepted it.
That night, lying injured in my apartment, I realized I had not accepted everything.
Some part of me was still waiting for her to say that what happened to me had been wrong.
I was still waiting for her to make it clear that I had not deserved it.
I was still waiting for her to choose me without asking me to understand Richard first.
I felt ashamed when I recognized that wish.
I was an adult.
I had a career.
I had built a home far from the place where those memories began.
Why should I still need something from her?
Then I thought about the child I had been.
She had not had the ability to leave.
She had depended on adults to protect her.
She had wanted her mother to see what was happening and make it stop.
There was nothing shameful about that child wanting to be safe.
There was nothing shameful about the adult I had become still feeling the loss of what she had needed.
I had mistaken independence for the absence of longing.
They were not the same.
I could live without my mother's approval.
I could refuse to let Richard back into my life.
I could protect myself.
And I could still wish that my mother had done more.
Those truths could exist together.
I did not have to turn my disappointment into hatred.
I did not have to excuse her silence either.
For years, I had tried to find a version of the past that made everybody's choices easier to bear.
I had told myself my mother was doing the best she could.
Maybe she had believed that.
Maybe she had been frightened of the conflict.
Maybe she had wanted to keep the family together.
I could not know every thought she had carried.
But I knew what her choices had meant for me.
When I needed her protection, I often felt alone.
That was the truth I could speak without pretending to understand everything else.
I looked toward the broken doorway again.
The damage was still there.
It would need to be repaired.
The lock would need to be replaced.
The apartment would need attention before it could feel like home again.
I could not repair all of that in one night.
I could not repair my childhood by finding the perfect explanation for my mother's behavior.
I could not make Richard become someone else.
I could only decide what I would allow into my life from that point forward.
I had already made one decision.
I had sent the distress signal.
I had chosen not to keep the attack private just because the person who hurt me was family.
That decision frightened me.
It also felt right.
I did not know what my mother would say if she heard what had happened.
I did not know whether she would defend Richard or finally acknowledge the damage he had caused.
I could not build my recovery around waiting for her response.
I had done enough waiting.
For the first time, I allowed myself to imagine a future in which she never gave me the words I wanted.
The thought hurt.
But it did not destroy me.
I could grieve what I had needed from her and still move forward without it.
I could remember the child I had been without making her responsible for the adult choices around her.
I could stop asking myself whether I had done enough to deserve protection.
Protection should never have been something I had to earn.
I looked at the phone again.
The screen was cracked.
The signal had been sent.
It was a small object that had helped me do one important thing when I could barely move.
I had reached for it because I wanted to live.
I had not reached for it because I wanted to punish Richard.
I had not reached for it to prove my mother wrong.
I had reached for it because I was in danger and needed help.
That was reason enough.
I let the thought settle.
My mother might understand one day.
She might not.
Richard might try to explain himself.
He might never admit what he had done.
Neither possibility changed the decision I had made on that kitchen floor.
I had chosen myself.
And I was finally beginning to understand that doing so was not a betrayal of anyone else.
Click here to continue reading: PART 13: I Had Finally Stopped Blaming Myself for Calling for Help, but I Still Had to Face the Reality of What Richard Had Done
I Thought Three Years and a Locked Door Had Put My Childhood Behind Me, Until Someone Began Beating on My Apartment Door at Two
Part 12 of 20
