After a few months of this, I reached my limit. I was trying to care for my mom and I yelled at her. This was a bad moment for me, because I had always sworn that I would never treat her the way my father did. That day I called her doctor and told him that I simply could not handle taking care of her any more. That was the day I made the decision to put her in a nursing home. I say I made that decision due to the fact that everyone knew who took care of her, and when I couldn't do it anymore there was no one else that would. My mom was moved to a nursing home within the week, and once again I moved out of his house.
I was not in a good place mentally at that time. I had made the one decision that I had tried to avoid for years, even against my mom's doctor's advice. Her doctor had been telling me for several years that there was no way I could continue caring for her without doing myself harm both mentally and physically. By this time I was nineteen, and my mom outweighed me by 230 pounds. I was still bulimic, and my body was run down. I was working more than full time, I rarely slept, and I now had the mental stress of giving up on my mom. Within a few months, I had met a new boyfriend, moved in with him, and let him take over my life.
This boyfriend was a heavy drug user, but I was so naïve that I simply did not know it. He had me doing drug runs for him, and when I figured out what he was having me do I balked. He then resorted to threatening me with violence, the police, anything he could think of. I was afraid of him, so I did what I was told. As a result of this I ended up in jail, doing time for the things that he had convinced me to do. After four months in jail, I woke up and realized how stupid I was. Six months of house arrest and three years of probation later, I moved on with my life.
I made a promise to myself while I was in jail that I would never go back. I am happy to say that eight years later, I have kept that promise. My mother's health failed even more, and she eventually ended up losing both of her legs. During this, my father found out he had cancer. He never went to tell my mother, and he refused to speak to her for over a year. I finally convinced my aunt that my mother needed to know the truth, but he died two days before I was scheduled to tell her. Instead of telling her that her husband had cancer, I was telling her that he was dead. My mother was distraught, but she handled the news better than I had expected. My biggest problem with his death was that I could not honestly say whether I loved him or hated him. My mom stayed alive for three more years. She got to meet my husband and her granddaughter before she passed away.
I live my life always remembering what I went through as a child. I learned many lessons growing up about what not to do as a parent. I look back on the mistakes I made, and realize that I might have been able to get out of trouble by crying that it was my parents' fault I made a bad decision. I would not do that when I was answering for my crimes, and I still do not wish I had. I knew that I was not raised in a normal or healthy home, but I did learn a lot. I have never been through formal counseling, even though I was told that I needed it. I did try to see a therapist, but she only wanted me to use drugs that had no affect on me. She was concerned about my lack of emotion. I still have a serious problem expressing my emotions, but I try to make sure that my daughter always gets the attention she needs if she is upset. She is only three, but I am confident that I have the ability to raise her in a totally loving and nurturing home. I refuse to allow the sins of the father to continue to haunt me; I certainly know that because of that, she will never have to deal with the issues that I did as a child.
