To My Little Girl on the Swing

Dear Daughter,

This is an open letter to the little girl I raised into a woman. I know you don’t want to acknowledge my influence on your life, but I feel it necessary to voice my rebuttal. You see, everything I’ve loved and lost has claw marks. You always have seen the world in black and grey. Your version of the truth is not the actual truth, and I feel I need to set the record straight.

Seeing the reality of it all, those black and gray areas (that I once fought for) have so much more color. At the time of this letter, one of those areas is my unconditional love for my memory of you. You are the person who used to be known as my own daughter. Your the person that still refers me to “Mom” while speaking to your siblings.

The Truth is you would never allow me to love you. You took the sum of all our negative experiences together, even using my deepest pain you’ve seen (through the years) and hyper focused on just the negative. You dismissed any good I have done for you. Throughout the years, you twisted some of my deepest pain and turned it into your narcissistic version of your truth.  

The bond I thought we had never existed. You are no longer the 2yr old I pushed on the swings, and the little girl I taught to cross her legs at the table is no longer there. You’re no longer the girl I taught to shave her legs or the little girl I took to see her own mother in prison. I once supported your relationship with your natural mother, only to watch you be let down, time and again, on the important days she chose not to attend (Christmas, Birthdays, First days of school etc..). I was your voice when she stood you up, waiting in your favorite outfit by the front door, on Christmas Day. I fought for you. I expressed my profound love and protection for you as any mother would. I also tried to protect you from your grandmother, the mastermind behind it all, and the queen of manipulation herself.

I wanted to show you the love your own Mother ran from, refused and rejected.

See daughter, you were taught to have nothing but hate towards me from the very beginning, my dear. She clouded your organic love that you were suppose to form for me. I was loving and had nothing but good intentions for you. Your Grandmother filled you with jealousy, spite, and hatred towards me, and every one that knew her knew she did. You were innocent, as was I (I was only 14 years old when I started loving you), and I took you in as if you were my own. I didn’t have to do that. I could have been selfish and kept your father to myself, as your grandmother gave us that option when we moved from her home. However, I loved you and I loved your father. Unfortunately, your grandmother started to poison you against me almost from day one. Don’t you remember? ….

You don’t have to listen to her. She is not your Mother!

You know your family was never open to me in the beginning. Your grandmother has 8 boys, no girls. You are the first girl and grandchild in the family. Being the fact your natural mother was a drug addict and abandoned you, your wicked Grandmother was never open to the idea of anyone else loving you as their own…besides her.

You came into an open, loving home shortly after your father and I fell back in love with each other. You came into this loving enviornment guarded towards me and defiant. You were extremely disrespectful to my family who always treated you with kindness. Do you recall camping at my parents property, and my mom and I traveled an hour or so to get you boots so you could ride the quads because you forgot yours? You refused them a few times because you didn’t want to go camping or be with us in the first place. You finally took them, without even any kind-hearted “thank you”, just a gave a smug look, grabbed them and played. You played your little heart out that weekend. I knew then this was going to be an uphill battle when you didn’t see my efforts. You honestly never did. My good deeds always went unnoticed.

The last time I spoke to you was after your father kicked down my door to my  shop (2 years ago yesterday), and after I exposed the details on social media (something I regret. I take full accountability for putting such a private matter on display). You stated one thing that will forever echo in my head. “I will do whatever it takes so you NEVER get back with my Dad”  (as you thought I was the one that called the cops on him). I tried explaining what happened about your father’s irrational reactions and you spun the whole situation into how I “MADE HIM KICK DOWN MY SHOP DOOR.” I knew then you were no longer the innocent little girl. 

Here we are 2 years later. You have been successful. In the beginning, when I first left him; I had hopes of him putting forth the effort to repair our broken marriage and fight for his family (as he vowed to do). Instead, he chose to believe lies after lies. Some as ridiculous as sleeping with his own brother (that I can’t stomach the thought of).    

I didn’t care. I loved you and I wanted you as my own. I wanted to show you the love your own mother ran from, refused, and rejected. 

So while you were “raising yourself” (as you recently protested during an argument with your brother), your father and I made sure you had a home. A home with love, food, bedtimes, chores, rides to school. A home where you played the big sister role to your step brother (who you loved since he was 4months old) and your sisters. By no means did you raise my children for me (as you like to tell anyone that would listen). Yes, you would babysit while your Dad and I went through our phase of going out or when we had people over. By no means, did you ever provide a home, food, clothing or install any type of family morals or values. That is RAISING my dear. At this point, like any family, there was some dysfunction back in the early day, but it was very little to be honest, along with the common struggles of being a working mother, a wife, and a stepmother.

During those happy days (so I thought) there were things I have always hid from you kiddos and others to protect your father’s name, as I always have. I always took one for the team (so to speak). I became conditioned to protect my family with passion (Dad’s definition of “crazy” or Psycho) as I watched your Father drop the ball. Constantly. 

During my healing process I was asked to dig deep and ask myself…

“At what point, when did your beautiful family fall apart? When did you fall apart?”

Months turned into a year, a year turned two. I thought about these questions everyday. Playing each life event out while I sunk deeper and deeper into depression, knowing that our family would never be the the same again. This play by play reverberated in my thoughts daily.

Right about our two year Divorce Anniversary/Dads Birthday, ironically just days short from our past wedding anniversary.

It dawned on me…

This is where it all began for me …

Weeks after your first sister was born, I caught Dad with his hand down my best friends shirt, while I laid asleep on his lap . I have to say, all bets were off. My love for him shifted. After I confronted him about his actions, his reply to me has played in my head on a constant loop for years.

Babe, I’m sorry! You just had a baby. You just don’t look like that right now. You really cant blame me. I was on “E”.

Every day after that I became hyper-focused on my image. I wanted to be what Dad wanted me to be. Since we were young, I was never good enough (confirmed by a statement from your Grandmother). I remember when your Dad and I first started dating in 90’s and we went to the County fair. It was like a scene from a movie. Holding hands and gazing at one another in love. Your Dad suddenly stopped and pointed. He said…

You see that girl right there? I went to High School with her. She was my dream girl.

Come to find out, days before I left your father, he confessed (along with finding hidden emails from another one of your “Aunts” that was my friend with whom he cheated on me). This girl from the fair. His “Dream Girl” was the girl he left your Mom for before his diagnosis with cancer. This girl now lives in Oregon. The girl I caught him having an emotional affair with when we lived in San Diego. She was the one I caught him “sexing” with and finding out the details of what he was telling this woman (about me) was so devastating. This was all on top of learning he was consistently cheating on me prior to this. This woman was also cheating on her military husband with Dad while her husband was deployed, fighting in the war. This girl is now a widow from the war, I can’t imagine her guilt. After learning about it all, I became detached myself.

I couldn’t figure out how to catch his eye. I wanted to catch his eye in the same way he stopped in his tracks for the girl at the fair, or my best friend that had long, beautiful, black hair… (I’m sure you know her name). Those looks he gave to those women, were never given to me. I wanted to be the one that stopped him in his tracks.

Those days are still painful when I think back to how much pain I used to walk with. The guilt driven depression…That was when it all started. But let me tell you when I lost myself.

You were around your brother’s or sister’s age at the time.

You took something so very personal and ran to your grandmother, twisting the truth into this sick and malicious version of what you wanted the truth to be. You bastardized a choice I HAD to make for medical reasons. I remember this vividly, your grandmother’s voice still echoes through my head. Taunting me with a title of “Baby killer”. Your father uses this story often with his women (so they tell me).

You were  around your brother’s or sister’s age at the time (give or take a year or so). I remember being so hurt with you, but I couldn’t possibly hold it against you. You were far too young to process what you saw, and, no, it wasn’t a crime scene as your father tells it to his dirty little married whores. You saw me in a lot of pain. Physical and emotional. There’s no way you could have possibly understood the gravity of the situation at this time. My life was in jeopardy if I went full term. I hope you never have to make a decision like that in your life, ever.

You took that very fragile moment of mine and used it to cause more pain. This was the first time I had experienced truly the darkest depression of my life. This experience came quickly after learning what you told your grandmother. Quickly after that word spread like wildfire. I would answer the phone, with with your Grandma calling me a “Baby Killer” demanding to talk to her son. Shortly after that, you became rebellious. At 13 or 14, you started sneaking out. You were also sneaking cell phones your grandmother would buy you to arrange meetings with your boyfriend, and give her updates. You knew we didn’t approve of any of this. The worst part, you became extremely disrespectful to me.

Now, trust me when I say I have dug deep in my past to get to the root of this, so I can heal from all the wounds. With a lot of help, and a ton of work, I am finally at peace. I have suffered with my own convictions. I have come out the other side a better version of myself.  

Your brother and sister are very hurt with you to say the least. To hear you and your father bad mouth their Mother is leaving a profound impact on their perception of you both. My children know the mother I was, and the Mother I am now.

I lost myself during those guilt driven depression days that you have tried to use against me. Any other child would have unconditionally loved their parent and moved forward. For you, that bond was never established by the hate installed in you from your jealous grandmother.

Let me be clear. I am and will forever be that mother that is firm, the mother that has rules, the mother that has bedtimes and chores. I am the Mother that instills family morals or values. I do not bring random men around my children. I do not lie to my children about men and say they are family, nor do I date any of my friend’s men.  I especially do not date married men, nor have I ever tried to take another man away from his home. These are all the things your father has done.

I will not instill hate about your father to my children or instill hate about you to your siblings.

In my home they will always RESPECT, LOVE, AND HONOR their sister and father, NO MATTER WHAT.  I will always instill family first. I will always allow my children to speak their own thoughts and their emotions. I will always always allow my children to voice their own feelings about you both. I vow to never be like your grandmother and fill their loving hearts with hate. That is a behavior that is learned or taught. Their perception of you and your father is for my children to figure out.

This number one rule will forever be in my home.

Family First Always!

In closure, I want you to see the truth about it all. I gave you a loving home and did the best I could with the tools at my disposal. I’m not perfect, and I’ve never claimed to be. I own everything I have ever done. Your father knows every sin I have made (to the day I left him) and has manipulated himself so he doesn’t have to take any accountability for his role he played in our broken home. You’re an adult now and free to make your own choices. All I ask is that you be respectful towards your siblings and not try to poison them against their own mother, because you’re driven by your own hate and spite. They are going through their own healing process. They have seen far more than you ever did. They have seen our true struggle, down to boiling water on a BBQ pit to take baths while your father made false allegations (on his workmen’s comp claim) against my parent’s company. They have seen the abuse from both your father and I.

I don’t need them to be clouded by your misinformed judgments on past events that you don’t care to see or you know very little about. Please respect their pain even though it’s not yours. Their pain is still theirs. Be a good big sister and validate their feelings as they are old enough to formulate their own opinions. Your recent visit last weekend left in them a sour taste about you and your father. Your argument with your brother has added more validation on his perception of you. All he wanted to be was heard, not attacked about YOUR feelings about his mother . They were hoping it would be about them and your baby sister’s birthday, which your Father claimed he was saving for and yet had nothing to show for it. They know now what your father’s true intentions were, after being introduced to another woman. It was disheartening to hear your baby sister say, “I heard Dad say he named me after that girl’s daughter Mama”. Finding out that wasn’t your Aunt (as your father introduced her as), from what she said, was mind blowing yet consistent with your Dad’s womanizing scenarios I caught him in.

Your other little sister stated that she felt uncomfortable giving that skank a hug when you kept championing her to do so. Especially after learning it was your father’s ex girlfriend who lives in Texas and for whom he drained funds from his “savings” (supposedly for your baby sister’s birthday fund) that he protested about. Your sister was shocked to learn why your father couldn’t buy something as simple as underwear for her.  You father had nothing to show for his birthday “savings” besides a trip out of town to Dave and Busters to meet your so called “Aunt”.. Nothing seems to shock me anymore about that man. His lack of respect for himself and others will forever plague me.

They saw you try to manipulate their little minds about a woman you no longer know. They are old enough to process these facts and put them together. My oldest daughter just found out you weren’t my natural daughter at the time your father and I separated. Finding out the truth that you had the option to no longer love her mother only added more fractures to her fragile heart.

Please understand that their home with the only Father and Mother they have known and loved so very much, was gone in a blink of an eye. To watch (almost daily) as they learn more about the truth, by observing your father and his actions, has been nothing short of devastating to them. You and your father have made it your priority to drag their mother’s name through the mud. I’m strong enough. I can handle it We can do this dance all day long if you want. I have grieved you and I am now at peace. However, I hope you see who has been your collateral damage.

Please be mindful and protect them the same way I tried to protect you from such hate. Just love them unconditionally. If you can’t do that, I ask you keep your distance as you have, and continue to live your life, with your version of the truth, so you can grieve the loss of both your mothers. Please continue to adopt other women (as you have) to fill that void.

Allow me to do my job so I can raise them to be adults, and shape them with character, respect, honor and unconditional love. Allow me to shape them into people with integrity, without your interference. Your protection on your mental prison is not healthy for them. Using your fathers gifted gaslighting techniques are damaging. You both have made my children manic, depressed, and questioning of your and their mother’s and father’s motives. They should be able to come to any of us and feel comfortable being open and honest. That we will validate their feelings with tenderness and compassion. They feel betrayed. It’s my job as a parent, along with you father, to protect our children from evil people . I ask you to either focus on nurturing them, or wait until they are older to have a relationship with them. Give them time so they can heal from all the chaos that your father chooses to not make a priority. They love you. You’ll always be the sister they crawled into bed with and cuddled with in the middle of the night. You’ll always be their older sister and I vow to keep the spirit of THAT little girl I once raised alive. I will continue  to pray for a resolve and for us to work together as a team to heal and nurture your brother and sisters’ broken hearts.

You’ll forever be my baby. You’ll always be the little girl I pushed on the swings in my eyes.

I will forever and unconditionally love the memory of you .

I  La La  you Cyn-a-bunny!