Dear Tee:

I read your recent message first thing this morning

“That’s sweet of you to say, but I suggest you better spare your knees – you want to have them working smoothly for decades to come 🙂 But thank you anyway, you’re a sweetheart ❤️”-

This is the first time you referred to me as a “sweetheart” and it brings the first smile to my face today (and it’s almost noon).

Actually, I read that walking uphill is very healthy for the knees because it strengthens the muscles you suggested I should strengthen. Therefore, as if it’d be a win-win, I will climb a mountain for you, and a tall one. just give me the word 🙂

I wrote: “I see the Hope for a New Story. A story breaking away from the old story.” and you replied: “So happy to hear that! ❤️”- In the new story, Tee, I get to be the main character.. huh, and ❤️ is the theme!

“Another inspiring verse from the song: In your hands- The birth of the new day

“A new day, free from the false narrative, embracing the truth of who you really are, not who you mother conditioned you to believe you are… I’m happy that you’re seeing the prospects of that new day and the new story unfolding before you ❤️”-

Yes, Tee, ad reading your response right above strengthens me.

“I just thought slave as in you were her possession, she did with you as she pleased.”- Correct. Zero agency= enslavement.

“I guess I’m not surprised that she hasn’t expressed any concern for you either as a fetus, or as a baby or beyond (specially not something that would indicate a mistake on her part, a lack of care for you). But I’m sorry that no one else mentioned anything, or at least not that you know about it, e.g. your father, or perhaps one of her sisters (although it would be no surprise if her older sister, the one who abused her, didn’t show any concern…).”-

Again, it feels like you were there. your attention to details, what I consider to be your superior intelligence, your insight, your empathy.. All these make me feel this way, that you were there and that I was alone there.

“I guess she grew up in very deprived conditions, with no maternal (or paternal) care. Her older sister – who became her caretaker after the orphanage period (if I remember well) abused her, so again, she received no care and empathy there either.”- You remember correctly.. although I don’t think her oldest sister was a caretaker in any way.

“And so she didn’t have it in her: she didn’t have the capacity for empathy, neither towards herself (which is visible from starving and hating her own body), nor towards others, including her own children.”- correct.

“Oh I see, there was no predictability and no comfort in any aspect of your relationship with your mother. There was nothing to hold on, so to speak, nothing safe. So for you, venturing out to the US wasn’t such a scary idea at all.”- yes, venturing out to the U.S. was running away from the biggest threat I’ve known= the mother.

I’ve said it to myself countless times during the years and decades: I have come across selfish, abusive, heartless people but none- in my personal experience- as threatening and abusive as she has been to me.

Remember the image of her cutting her head off photos? She had cut my head off so many, many times (the relentless, no boundary shaming, humiliating me. She had some discipline in regard to the physical beating (not breaking my bones), but no such discipline in regard to the WORDS she used against me. So, no.. nothing remotely comfortable about being with her.

“I believe a part of it may be that you were a bit dissociated, so you didn’t even think of what might go wrong – you just bought the ticket and off you went, hoping for something better, better than what you had at home, I guess?”-

I was very dissociated. It’s only in the last couple of months or so, that I noticed.. a lack of dissociating. What a relief! The feeling that I wasn’t there, that nothing was happening to me.. that derealization, I think it’s called.

I wrote: “She shot daggers of shame from her eyes to my heart, a big ouch every time.”, and you responded: “Yep, that’s familiar… 🙁”.

She shot daggers at you too.. Covert daggers (the indirect kind), Overt daggers? I am sorry, Tee.. Daggers Hurt, particularly from “”mother””.

“Oh okay. Yes, you said that after she went home (and already during her stay), you felt horrible and fell into despair. You left NYC (and I guess your new husband) and flew to New Orleans, ‘for no particular reason other than hoping for a relief.’ And you stayed there for a while. I guess that’s when he decided to ask for annulment, right?”-

Yes. I don’t remember the extent of my communication with him before or after. It would have been the perfect time for me to have therapy, still in N.Y. That idea never came about.

“Yeah, unfortunately another proof that you could never please her, that you’re never enough, no matter what you do.

“A covert narcissistic mother cannot really accept gifts – she cannot accept an honest gift from your heart – I think because she would need to open her heart and receive your love (a gift being an expression of your love). And she cannot do that: she has to believe that you don’t love her and that it’s only her who loves you. In her twisted mind, she is the one who gives, who loves, while you are the faulty one, the undeserving one, whom she nevertheless ‘loves’ and provides for.

“She gives, you receive, because she believes you’re unable to give, you have nothing to give. That’s I think the twisted reasoning behind the covert narcissistic mother rejecting our gifts. Not sure it’s true, but it might be..”-

As I read this, I remembered.. I REMEMBER, I collected wild flowers for her. I was somewhat excited, looking at the beautiful, multi-colored flowers, anticipating handing them to her and her being happy.

I remember somewhat.. I remember the hit of her anger, her disapproval as I handed her the flowers. She reacted as if I insulted her. What did she say (It was so, so very long ago.. but I vividly remember the flowers sparkling under the spring sun above).

What did she say? .. Something about those flowers meaning nothing because there were so many of them all around, that she could have picked them herself, on her own.

See, Tee, what I mean by it’s like you were there.. You make me REMEMBER.

“I’m glad my experience is helping you ❤️ It took me years to understand this dynamic, it was so insidious. I’ve only started to understand in the last couple of years.. Aah, I feel heavy just thinking about it. But okay, it’s much easier once you understand it and don’t fall for their pity party to easily..”-

Did you give her flowers too.. a gift, gifts.. and she..?

“That’s because I’ve experienced such situations, not in interpersonal relationships, but in everyday life, when I start catastrophizing and thinking of the worse, when there could be a number of other, more benign reasons why something is happening. But fear blinds us to other, more trivial or more benign possibilities, and we only imagine the worst.”-

Even asking the above, I was/ am worried, imagining my questioning would offend you, intrude on you, leading to you withdrawing from me.

“Wow, that’s bad that no one even tried to tell her to calm down. They just took their yelling and screaming without saying a word. What was it that she was upset about? Maybe there was some truth in what she was saying (and that’s why the music teacher felt intimidated?), but the way she was saying it was completely inappropriate.”-

The best I figure, the music teacher- during class- made fun of me, calling me “auntie” (as in me being too serious, too “old” for my age, I figure). Svika, a boy in that class ran the short distance, to tell the mother. She walked there, getting the teacher out of the classroom, while all pupils, all teachers, standing outside, watching.

.. “Mother” should have bonded with the music teacher over making fun of/ humiliating me.. But “Mother” wanted all exclusive rights to humiliating me.

Following the whole fiasco, “Mother” didn’t comfort me, of course.. She was offended by being overshadowed by the teacher..?

“But it can also be that many decent people don’t know how to react in such situations (when they are verbally attacked), and they are kind of shocked and taken aback, and can only gather their thoughts later.”- I imagine there were decent people there.

But none to take me away to safety. Maybe safety was too scarce back then.

“Oh that’s horrible. I think that’s an example of coercive control, which Copilot mentioned in its analysis. She controlled your behavior by threatening to kill herself. She forced you to behave in a certain way by threatening suicide… appalling 😕-

Yes, coercive control, bullying. Cruelty, heartlessness.. Huh, she cut her head off the photos.. Her heart was cut off long before, as in literally No Heart 4 Me.

This is why your “❤️ 🫶 ❤️”, particularly you being a WOMAN means so much for me.

I am forever grateful, never will switch to suspicion and distrust, not when it comes to you, Tee. For sure!

If I brought you 🌼🌻🌹🌷🌺, I know You’d gently take them off my hands, and with a smile, you’d bring them up to your face, smell them, and I’d see your smile extending.. And I’d know I’ve done something good (tears in my eyes).

🌼🌻🌹🌷🌺 Anita