Dear DC:

Thank you for your concern and grace, and for your kind words: it makes me feel good to read them. (By the way, I assumed earlier that you were a man, for some reason; now I realize you are a woman).

“It is true that she could abuse us when we were kids as no one held her accountable. We were little and utterly vulnerable. No way to defend ourselves. Therefore easy for her to exploit within the walls of our house. Cane marks were hidden and I used to go to school with elastoplast in several parts of my arms to hide those bruises. She hit us to vent her anger – not to help us be better humans“-

– Be the person to hold her accountable now: not by doing to her what she did to you (abuse, exploit, hit, leave cane marks and bruises), but by not availing yourself to more of her abuse. You can see to it that your mother continues to have a home to live in, food to eat, medical care and socializing opportunities (with people she does not abuse) without you having any direct contact with her: no phone calls, no visits in-person, no letters/ email messages.. nothing.

“She hit us to vent her anger ..Perhaps she did not understand how else to release her own frustration“- she hit you because she had a good feeling when she hit you, same as with my mother. She understood enough to do what felt good to her. Same as having had the affair with the married man: it felt good. She could see, of course, that you were hurt when hit and bruised by her and by that man- but it was not important, in her mind, what you felt.

“I think we continue to care for her – because of a sense of obligation and guilt“- you have no obligation to remain abused by anyone. Guilt belongs to her, it is erroneously with you. Guilt is maintaining your Core Injustice.

“And also, forgiveness? Aren’t we meant to forgive someone?“- only AFTER that someone (1) sincerely acknowledges that they did something wrong (2) expresses sincere regret for having abused you, (3) corrects the wrongdoing and no longer abuses you.. !!! (4) and then.. asks you for forgiveness.

Did she do any of these (1-4)?!

“My 2 siblings (brothers) are looking after my mother now. They are in the same country. My twin brother lives with her and deals with her everyday.  I am the only girl. And the youngest.  Hence, hugely disappointing for my mum that I now live a life independent of her“-

– She doesn’t want you living with her or close to her because she values you as a person, but because she values you as.. something she owns, something she can speak to any way she wants and get away with it. As you deprive her from your physical company, you are depriving her of more frequent opportunities to abuse you.

“It is hard to comprehend how selfish she was as a mother – to abuse her children the way she did, and then to allow a man to further abuse her children”- moving away from pain and toward pleasure is a basic natural motivation of all living things that are able to feel pain and pleasure. Your mother is no exception: she feels distress (pain)=> she hits or verbally abuses=> she feels better (a relief, a satisfaction and/ or joy).

“And I have, in the past, told her what I thought about her abuse and affair with the married man.  I could do this as leaving her – to study and work in another country – has enabled me to look more objectively at our childhood. …at least, called a moderate halt to her abuse, albeit temporarily. I grew!”- congratulations! I hope you keep growing farther and farther away from her.

“The last time I visited her (about 2 years ago), she cooked me a fish knowing that I was allergic to it. She could have killed me. I was sick for a few days. I confronted her on that and she said that she ‘forgot’ although a few days before that, she reminded me of my allergy to that very fish. I never know if she did that accidentally or deliberately. I am not in her head. My twin brother said that she never fed them that fish for years and it was only when I was back that she cooked that particular fish. The evidence points to her deliberately doing that – but maybe it was pure accident. It is utterly confusing Anita. I wonder if you have any thoughts on that?”-

– think of it this way: is it possible for a mother somewhere in our world,  to deliberately make her daughter sick, maybe even dead?

Let’s look at some news headlines: “It seems an unthinkable crime. But after a Cornish woman was found guilty of poisoning her baby girl with a lethal dose of salt, we investigate the chilling rise of the mothers who, instead of nurturing their children, slowly murder them… The girl’s mother was yesterday found guilty at Truro Crown Court of intentionally feeding her over a tablespoon of salt, having googled the safe amount a child her age could consume the day before.” (the sun. co. uk/death by salt trend parents murder, March 2018), another: “Mother confesses to poisoning her children: ..A 27-year-old mother of two who was on the run for almost a week after allegedly killing her two children by putting rat poison in their food handed herself over to police on Saturday, Gauteng police said (enca. com/ south africa/ mother confesses to poisoning her children, May 2017).

So.. some mothers poisoned their children knowingly, on purpose and were convicted of the crime.  Why is it then that YOUR MOTHER is incapable of doing what those mothers did?

As children of any age we can’t think of OUR mothers to be evil. We can think of other people as evil.. but no.. not our mothers! But .. the children murdered by their mothers thought the same about their mothers, they did not think it was possible!

“It is hard to see my mother objectively – so many mixed emotions, early conditioning“, “It is utterly confusing Anita. I wonder if you have any thoughts on that?“- I think that your mother, like mine, used to be a good girl.. long ago, before you came into her life through her body. You never met that good girl- that good girl is gone, and what you have in your life is an bad woman who is willing to poison her daughter so to (1) punish you for becoming as independent as you have become of her, (2) to show your twin brother who is living with her what will happen to him if he dares to move out, and to show your other brother what will happen to him if he dares to leave the country too, like you have done.

anita