A strange contract

Photo taken in 1964, in Pin-Izelles, Belgium.

I entered into a strange contract with the woman who was my mother. Severely mentally ill yet never diagnosed, she was unrelenting in her destructiveness towards the little girl in whom she saw the unloved little girl she had once been. She placated men with flirtation, submission and flattery, and on good days told me how troublesome they were, offering me a way to love her. This I did with all my heart, hoping she would one day receive my love, and begin to love me. But instead she would turn on me, starting by criticizing, jokingly, so I couldn't react. Or she would preface by saying she cared about me, that was why she was worried about my yellow teeth, or my fat ankles, or my bad art, or what I said. I felt scared, and trapped. She may have mentioned my arrogance or laziness while serving food or a drink, and not thanking her may have jumpstarted the attack. She may have looked at me as though I were about to kill her as I sat demurely on the couch, with deadly fear in her eyes, glazed over as she entered into the ultimate victim state, followed by her revenge - always the same: "I'm going to take you back there." That was the pedophile network. Or, she got to the same place differently. When I least expected it, she would tell me "we're going there now." Then, I would be gripped by that deadly fear, and beg her not to take me. In these desperate times, I was convinced that the way she presented herself to the world was real, that she loved me and that she'd have mercy on me. But she knew no mercy: these were her moments of power and glory, and she relished them to the utmost. She wouldn't stop until I was utterly destroyed, until I felt that complete annihilation was the best I deserved. After I was rescued from the network, she found a way to bring me again, sneaking behind the back of the bosses, those men she supposedly feared and admired so much. Once again, I survived. She used her final trump card, and molested me. My mother was psychopathic. She had no shame. She thought of herself as all good. I tried to carry all her shame and evil for her. I'm loosening the ties with this soul, and letting her go, gently. And I'm letting go of all those others whose unresolved trauma I tried to take on, who don't have the courage to face themselves and keep trying to put their burden with me. I don't need mercy. I'm letting go of the men who have no courage, because love requires it. I'm reclaiming myself, standing strongly on my own.