Hope

How do I begin? Do I tell you her name? Do I tell you her age? And if so, do I tell you how old she was when her mother first beat her? Or do I tell you how old she was the last time she did it? Do I tell you what she did every single time to “deserve” it? Will explaining these things excuse what her mother did to her? Yes? No? I’ll let you decide for yourself.

Her name was Clara, she was 18 years old the day she decided that enough was enough, that if her mother laid a hand on her once more she was going to leave, forever. Then she started thinking about her home life, her two younger siblings; Carlos who was only 13 years old and Cecilia who was only 10. Siblings whose lives would probably change drastically if she left. Kids whose mother would probably start beating if Clara left. That’s when she realized she couldn’t leave without them. The more she thought about it, leaving wasn’t a viable option. She was about to graduate high school, she needed her parents to help pay for college or get a job to be able to pay for it, but she was worried if she could handle it all because if she leaves, her siblings leave with her. Now, how could she go to college, work AND take care of two children, that was the impossible part, that was the flaw in her plan. She didn’t want to drop out. She didn’t want to depend on her parents anymore, and she didn’t want to leave her siblings behind.

Her inner monologue became even more confusing when she thought about everything her parents gave to her that they didn't have themselves; she had a roof over her head, food on the table every single day, she had an amazing education, she had loving siblings, and sometimes her mother wasn’t in a “bad mood”. Sometimes, actually most of the time, her mother took her medication, her mother was a normal person, with normal ways to express the way she was feeling. But then came the days she claimed she was “healed”, or the days she claimed her medicine changed her as a person, that the medicine was taking away everything that made her… her. In other words those were the days she didn’t take her medication. Those were the days that she got extremely angry when Clara didn’t pick up her books from the dining table quickly enough, so she would slap her. Then she would tell her that she only did it for her benefit, that it hurt her more that she could ever imagine, that she didn’t like doing it, but it was a mother's job to teach her children in any way she could.

You may be wondering what was Clara's father doing during all of this, well he was working. He was working really hard to provide for his family, therefore Clara didn’t blame him for not noticing at night when he arrived trying to hide how tired he actually was, what her mother was doing during the day. Something you need to know about Clara’s parents is that they are very old school mexican people, yes those still exist. They were people who were raised to believe that a man and a woman had very different roles within the family. A man should work to provide for his family and should never stay at home, he is the breadwinner. A woman should only stay at home, do the housework, raise the children, feed the family, and make due with what the husband provides. They both agreed that whatever Clara’s mom thought was necessary to teach and punish their children was the right thing to do, because at the end of the day it wasn’t Clara’s dad’s job to discipline, it was only his job to provide. So he just didn’t realize what was going on at home.

Clara believed that if her dad found out about her mother not taking her medication, slapping her and sometimes beating her when she got angry, he would leave her, which meant more trouble for Clara. So she stayed quiet, she told her dad that her bruises came from her playing with her siblings, not from trying to cover herself from her mothers hands, that time she talked back to her mother. She told him that the scratches she had were from their neighbor’s dog being too rough when they played and not from her mother finding her shoes in the living room in one of those days she didn't take her medication. She protected her siblings, she made sure that she was the only one who suffered the consequences of their mother’s rage. She made sure they were on their best behavior when their mother was “being her true self” without the medication.

“Being my true self” that's what her mother called it. Clara wanted to laugh out loud everytime her mother told her this stupid excuse to why she was in a bad mood, or when Clara asked why she wanted to stop taking her medicine, Clara’s mom believed that she should be able to live without her medication. That she doesn’t need, that God made her this way for a reason, and God doesn’t make mistakes. She felt that praying should be enough for her, she saw her mental illness as a result of her and her family not going to church enough. Clara didn’t see the logic behind this and even tried to explain to her mother that this wasn’t anybody’s fault not even God’s. That her mental illness can be treated with medication and that she needs to take it, not only for the good of the family but for herself. But everytime Clara mentioned God, her mother would slap her and tell to stop talking blasphemy about Him.

In one of those occasions, yesterday actually, Clara was alone with her mother so she decided to talk to her, she wanted to talk about her mental illness and eventually about their mother-daughter relationship, but before she could even get to that part her mother started yelling at her, and telling her how ungrateful she was and that she should apologize for all the things she made her go through, she said “You want to talk about difficult living situations? Imagine being your mother! Imagine having a daughter so ungrateful that she talks to you the way you’re talking to me, imagine having someone as lazy and rude as you for a daughter. I hope you never have to deal with what I dealt with you. Do you know how difficult you make your father´s life? How much harder he has to work because you don’t have a job to pay for your own stuff? How useless you are? How do you expect to find someone who loves you, let alone a husband if you keep being the way that you are? You should be grateful we haven’t kicked you out”.

The only thing Clara could was cry, those crocodile tears of hers, as her mother calls them. Then her mother got angrier because she sees crying as a sign of weakness “I´ll give you something to cry about” she said and started hitting her, this time Clara didn't have the strength or the will power to try to stop her, she just stood there crying and thinking maybe she did deserve this, maybe she was ungrateful, maybe she didn’t see something her mother did so she let her, she just waited for her mother to get tired, but even deep inside her she was hoping her father would arrive and see her, then he would take her and her siblings with him, somewhere far away, but she knew that was never going to happen. The next day she woke up, with bruises on her face, arms and even if she couldn’t see them she had a feeling that she had bruises on her back as well, she didn’t even remember her mother hitting her in the back.

Clara went downstairs to make herself breakfast, but she was surprised when her mother welcomed her with open arms and a variety of pancakes and bacon, her favorite. She sat down, not looking her mother in the eye, when her mother spoke. “I’m sorry, last night got out of hand and I should not have done that, so I started taking my medication again and I hope we can talk about the situation like civilized adults…” Clara waited to speak, looked at her mother shocked because in the years this has been going her mother has never apologized for hitting her ever. “I would love that mami, but I'm done. I don’t want to see you ever again. Tell my siblings I love them and I assure you I will come back for them” She replied. And simply walked out the door. Clara felt something she had stopped feeling years ago, she felt hope.