What It Feels Like To Be Pushed Off The Edge

By Anonymous // As Told to Steffanie Richardson

Steffanie Richardson

More stories from Steffanie Richardson

I am stuck in this hell that you have forever created for me, and I will never be able to escape because you will always be a part of me. I loved spending time with you because you are my mother, and who doesn’t love their mother? I would always love you and thought you would always love me. It never crossed my mind that, that could change so quickly in just the matter of days… minutes… hours… or seconds. I can’t really remember because I try not to think about it. There will always be a part of me that will love you and I hope that there is still a part of you that loves me.

I was made by you, but yet I am not a prodigy of you. You can’t treat me how you want to just because you are having a bad day. Your mood swings are never stopping. And I wish that you just showed that you cared. If I could know that you care then maybe, just maybe, I could trust you again.

I can still remember that day I woke up to you screaming at me for no reason. Yelling at me, saying things that a mother should never ever think of saying to her child. I am truly sorry for whatever I have done to you for you to think that you can yell at me this way. I am sorry for however I have hurt you, but know that I never have hurt you as bad as you hurt me. I am sorry for myself because I let myself think that it was all my fault and that it would always be my fault.

You made me think that it was my fault that you were losing your job. I was just 11 at the time so I always thought that you were right. I thought that I deserved to be yelled at, that I deserved to be kicked out of your house and sent to my dad’s. Moving two hours away from everything that I knew—you, my friends and my school—wouldn’t be easy. Going from a school with a graduating class of 150 to a school with a graduating class of 300 scared me. I was scared with being so young and not knowing anything about the town or the kind of people in it. I was scared that I wasn’t going to make friends and that I was just going to be all alone.

I knew the moment you called my dad telling him that he needed to pick me up and that I needed to move in with him, that you didn’t care about me. You only cared about yourself and you still do, and I truly feel sorry for you. I’m sorry that you ruined our relationship. It will never be restored to what it once was.  You have proved yourself not worthy. I hate to see our relationship crumble at such a young age. You did it to yourself.

After a couple of days went by, you called and called for hours on end trying to beg my dad for you to take me back. How could my dad let you take me back knowing everything you have done? Part of me wanted to be with you so badly because you are my mother and I love you, but part of me didn’t want to be with you because you didn’t show that you cared. When you lost me, you started showing that you cared.

I wish I didn’t spend countless nights wondering when you were going to change and become the mother that I needed. I couldn’t wait any longer. I needed to move on and you needed to move on and grow up. As years went on and I got older, I realized that you had no reason to yell at me for what was happening to you.

I was too young to realize everything that was happening. But now that I am older, I look back at it while questioning so many things. Now that I am older, I’ve realized you may have just been having a mental breakdown and decided to take it out on me. But still to this day you argue with me and yell at me and refuse to let me come to your house. You have pushed me out of your life so much.

I can’t and don’t want to imagine my life without you in it. Life would be much simpler if you weren’t in it, but no one loves an easy and simple life. I love my messed up life and everything that has happened in it so far. I’m not going to let this ruin my life right now or my future. I’ve learned many things from many of your mistakes. I’ve learned to think before I act and to think about the consequences completely.

I will forever love you, and, no matter what, you will always be my mother. The things that you have done may have altered my opinion of you, but I will always love you. All I can do is pray and hope that you still love me the way you did when I was born. I have grown up to accept the fact that you may never change and you will always be the way you are. Our life might be messed up and crazy, but I’m okay with that now.

Thank you for what you did because if you never did it I wouldn’t be the person I am today; I wouldn’t have the friends I have today, and I wouldn’t trade them for the world.

I thank you for pushing me off the edge.