It may not be easy for she and I to create a healthy relationship dynamic, but I believe it is possible. While it is true that the synaptic pathways of our brains are “the path of least resistance” for our thoughts, reactions, behaviors, our neurobiology is capable of great plasticity. My mother, while historically unstable, wasn’t and isn’t abusive. That would be different. I would not tolerate an abusive relationship or put my daughter at risk of harm. My mother is a kind and caring person, but she is also damaged and fragile from a long history of lacking protection and security. That frailty meant that she couldn’t be what I needed and wanted in a mother as a child, but my needs and wants or no longer the same as they were then. My daughter’s needs from her are also not the same as my own as a child. My daughter has two stable, consistent, more or less healthy and well adjusted parents. Her grandmothers are her playmates, babysitters, confidants and are naturally more indulgent.

I just want a friendship with her. I want to address the parts in me that are not at peace with my past. I believe that radical acceptance (not to be mistaken for approval) may be key here. That once I fully accept the things in my growing up years that caused me pain, disappointment, frustration, once I release my sense of entitlement for the childhood I wanted to have had and accept all events and circumstances as contributors to my becoming who I am today, I can stop resenting her and love her with the same compassion and openness that I love other people close to me. I feel like resentment and animosity are forms of suffering and suffering unlike pain is always a choice.

I wholeheartedly believe that this is possible but I’ve only just begun exploring what steps I need to take to get there. I expected to receive an infusion of hope, wisdom and encouragement on this site as it seems that is what it is mostly about but people telling me it can’t happen is fine too. It makes me have to think deeper and harder. It does nothing to diminish either my faith or my determination to see this through.