Aliannah and Aleeah (Episode 8)
Forget romance, the most difficult and complicated relationship must be that between parent and child.
I recently - please don't judge! - have started watching 16 and Pregnant, MTV's reality show about children having to deal with the folliest of youthful follies. It sounds exploitative, and perhaps it is, but what draws me into it episode after episode is the core concept of parenting: the to and fro between love and resentment for a life lost, from longing to frustration. Some kids handle it, some kids don't; semi-frequently the baby is lofted onto the shoulders of an exhausted grandparent in order that life can continue, while in the next episode the teenagers are transformed into loving, responsible adults before our eyes.
I'm not, as those of you who know me personally would guess, drawn to this show because of any inate love for babies or impending broodiness, but rather the tense dance of obligation that makes up the parent/child relationship.
Somewhere on the other side of the ocean, right now, my mother almost certainly lies in a bed, awake and bleary, depression permeating her every pore until her body begins to crumble. It has been this way for years - only recently have I begun to suspect that she may in fact be in control of her health and is playing it for attention and pity. The stakes raise every year: of the 30 illnesses commenly feigned by people with Munchausen Syndrome, she has had 27. In the last year, she has stopped leaving the house, stopped doing her own laundry, stopped everything but caring for her tortoise - the one creature she won't be able to sway with the victim card.
Do I sound angry? Because I am. I'm very angry. I'm angry that this adult woman is choosing frantic, lonely seclusion because it offers quick pay-outs of pity. I'm angry that this woman can have a normal conversation with my brother (who won't put up with her drama) but thinks it is reasonable to leave near-daily messages on my phone moaning and warbling about suicide and desperation and horror. I'm angry that I've not been able to follow my brother's lead and find myself a secluded mountain somewhere on which to hide from her. Faced with a woman who adamently refuses to do anything to help herself, I. am. done.
Except can one ever be done with a parent?
You hear of celebrity children emancipating themselves from their parents - Macauley Culkin springs to mind - and you hear of children raising themselves successfully when the parents have fallen through or passed away, so I hardly think the active role of parent is a sacred thing. Love is not mandatory or a given, nor is loyalty or selflessness or devotion. In fact, the only thing that seems assured, be it positive or negative, is an unshakeable sense that the parent and the child are doomed to be connected forever, come what may. Even the friends of mine happily adopted to loving parents wonder sometimes about the people who brought them into the world. A colleague seethes resentment towards her lifelong absentee father, and the painful spectre of another friend's estranged brother was palpable when her father gave the welcome to the groom speech on behalf of the family.
That umbilical cord never seems to fully disappear. In many families it is a beautiful thing - an unspoken agreement that at least one person will love you unconditionally, always. In others, it is painful bondage to someone who you would rather walk away from.
My mother is seriously mentally ill and refuses treatment, and as a result has played almost no positive role in my life for years. Visit with her are week-long ordeals in which I am told in alternating moments how I am all she has and how I am a terrible, manipulative, horrible person. I do not like her, and wonder often if what I describe as love is really nothing more than filial obligation. As the months pass, my mountain hideaway beckons with increasing fervour.
In movies, mothers swear to newborn babes that they will love them and protect them forever.
In 16 and Pregnant, mothers look down a oily-eyed aliens and wonder what they've done. There is nothing solid about the relationship, nothing taken for granted except that it's going to be difficult and it's going to be complicated.
I guess I identify.
I recently - please don't judge! - have started watching 16 and Pregnant, MTV's reality show about children having to deal with the folliest of youthful follies. It sounds exploitative, and perhaps it is, but what draws me into it episode after episode is the core concept of parenting: the to and fro between love and resentment for a life lost, from longing to frustration. Some kids handle it, some kids don't; semi-frequently the baby is lofted onto the shoulders of an exhausted grandparent in order that life can continue, while in the next episode the teenagers are transformed into loving, responsible adults before our eyes.
I'm not, as those of you who know me personally would guess, drawn to this show because of any inate love for babies or impending broodiness, but rather the tense dance of obligation that makes up the parent/child relationship.
Somewhere on the other side of the ocean, right now, my mother almost certainly lies in a bed, awake and bleary, depression permeating her every pore until her body begins to crumble. It has been this way for years - only recently have I begun to suspect that she may in fact be in control of her health and is playing it for attention and pity. The stakes raise every year: of the 30 illnesses commenly feigned by people with Munchausen Syndrome, she has had 27. In the last year, she has stopped leaving the house, stopped doing her own laundry, stopped everything but caring for her tortoise - the one creature she won't be able to sway with the victim card.
Do I sound angry? Because I am. I'm very angry. I'm angry that this adult woman is choosing frantic, lonely seclusion because it offers quick pay-outs of pity. I'm angry that this woman can have a normal conversation with my brother (who won't put up with her drama) but thinks it is reasonable to leave near-daily messages on my phone moaning and warbling about suicide and desperation and horror. I'm angry that I've not been able to follow my brother's lead and find myself a secluded mountain somewhere on which to hide from her. Faced with a woman who adamently refuses to do anything to help herself, I. am. done.
Except can one ever be done with a parent?
You hear of celebrity children emancipating themselves from their parents - Macauley Culkin springs to mind - and you hear of children raising themselves successfully when the parents have fallen through or passed away, so I hardly think the active role of parent is a sacred thing. Love is not mandatory or a given, nor is loyalty or selflessness or devotion. In fact, the only thing that seems assured, be it positive or negative, is an unshakeable sense that the parent and the child are doomed to be connected forever, come what may. Even the friends of mine happily adopted to loving parents wonder sometimes about the people who brought them into the world. A colleague seethes resentment towards her lifelong absentee father, and the painful spectre of another friend's estranged brother was palpable when her father gave the welcome to the groom speech on behalf of the family.
That umbilical cord never seems to fully disappear. In many families it is a beautiful thing - an unspoken agreement that at least one person will love you unconditionally, always. In others, it is painful bondage to someone who you would rather walk away from.
My mother is seriously mentally ill and refuses treatment, and as a result has played almost no positive role in my life for years. Visit with her are week-long ordeals in which I am told in alternating moments how I am all she has and how I am a terrible, manipulative, horrible person. I do not like her, and wonder often if what I describe as love is really nothing more than filial obligation. As the months pass, my mountain hideaway beckons with increasing fervour.
In movies, mothers swear to newborn babes that they will love them and protect them forever.
In 16 and Pregnant, mothers look down a oily-eyed aliens and wonder what they've done. There is nothing solid about the relationship, nothing taken for granted except that it's going to be difficult and it's going to be complicated.
I guess I identify.
Comments
I'm considering making an etching of the violins and maybe of the audience picture too.
If you're still interested in these pieces email me at bridgetfarmerprints[at!]hotmail.com
Thanks!
Hailey