Tired Of Being What You Want Me To Be

SENSITIVE CONTENT WARNING: Emotional Abuse

The police are at the door, I have three unanswered messages sat in my inbox and my evening is about to go from hellish to the worst night of my life. First I hear the stomping of their boots as they march up the stairs, then I hear the conversations between them. Finally I hear the calls from dispatch over their radios as they arrive at my bedroom door with my delirious mother in tow. Mothers can come in many different forms, I just happened to be dealt one that has made it her personal mission to invade every ounce of my privacy. This is a woman that enjoys stripping my individuality directly off my bones. 

The thought of running away from this house and never looking back has crossed my mind at least a thousand times before. Tonight makes it a thousand and one. This whole messy argument started with a seemingly off hand dig at my boyfriend, who she hated the mere concept of. Even before she met him, she never had a nice word to say about him, not that he once did anything to earn himself such a bad rep. One small question of his motives for being with me and our evening very rapidly snowballed into a full blown screaming match between the two of us. This fight gave her the perfect excuse to call the police. All she wanted to do was to make herself out to be the victim. Like I’m the one that’s been keeping her under house arrest for the last 21 years. 

Now they’re here, looking over me as I lie on the brink of mental exhaustion on my bed. The officers speak at me rather than with me. They recite all the ridiculous accusations my mother has made against me. If only they knew how deep her influence on me runs. If only they knew that I’ve reached my wits end. I sit up as they speak to me and remain as calm as I can. Trying my utmost hardest to prove to them that everything my mother has fed them is a lie. I’m not a danger to myself or anyone around like I’m sure she told them I was. When asked for my input, I deny the lot. I tell them she’s got it all wrong and that she’s overreacting. 

Like mother, unlike daughter, I most certainly am not a liar. I’ve felt how much her lies have hurt me over the years and I refuse to inflict that pain upon anyone else. The police end up concluding there isn’t much they can do about the situation, telling my mother as such on their way out. Despite her protest they proceed back downstairs to make their exit. I listen as they descend the stairs. Mum follows them down and sees them out as they undoubtedly move onto their next call. The heavy slamming of the door behind them acting as the ringing of the bell to signal the next round of sparring.

She comes hurtling back up the stairs and crashes her way back into my room without a single regard for my wishes of wanting to be left well and truly alone. She plants herself at the end of my bed and begins to scream at me some more. All she does is drone on and on about how wickedly selfish and vile I am. As wrong as I know she is, it’s still difficult not to believe her. It’s nothing I haven’t heard before. For the sake of self preservation, I choose to block her out, so that she fades away into nothing. I see her lips moving as I look at her, but I can’t hear a word. 

Her verbal assault continues for at least an hour before she comes to see that she’s not going to coax a reaction out of me this time. Upon accepting defeat, she storms out of my room and retreats to the living room downstairs in a huff. It was starting to feel like I was never going to be graced with the privilege of being alone with my thoughts ever again.

I’ve been suffering through this abuse for over two decades. Why did I let it get this bad? Why did I allow myself to put up with it for this long? The answer is simple; because I didn’t know any better. Living in this complete control was my normal up until about 6 months ago when I first met Calvin. Slowly I was introduced to his family and his friends and that’s where everything started coming undone at the seams. Initially, they kept their opinions to themselves. However, the closer they grew to me, the more their concern for me also started to grow. It wasn’t until they started questioning my strange behaviour that I ever considered that the complete say my mother had on my life wasn’t normal, that it wasn’t healthy.  

She kept me so well shut off that it became impossible for me to draw comparisons between my relationship with her to other mother-daughter dynamics. She constructed a warped sense of reality around me, so that I would fall straight into her web of lies. She didn’t allow me to have friends as a child. She pulled me out of school before the time I hit 10 years old. As I got older, the control only became more intrusive. She would shout at me for getting home late from work. She kept me busy with chores around the house on my days off. She had a particular problem with me talking about the new guy at work that I had a little bit of a crush on. The reasoning became more apparent as my work colleague eventually became my boyfriend.

As I sit in turmoil, telling myself that I can’t take any more of this, Calvin remains my only solace. Simply seeing his name at the top of our conversation thread is enough to keep me tethered to this world. 

Police are gone now. I text him back following the prolonged period of radio silence. Mum has finally gone back downstairs. My hands shake as I grip onto my phone, clinging onto my lifeline. My tears roll down my face and onto the screen to create tiny pockets of pixelated rainbows. 

Are you okay? I was getting worried. What’s going on now? He replies within seconds.

I want to tell him I’m okay, I want nothing more. Sadly, though, that’s not the truth. 

I’m not okay. I press the send button. I can’t live like this anymore. I can’t stand the thought of spending the rest of my life dancing to the tune of my mother’s twisted abuse. 

Then don’t. He messaged back in a heartbeat. Say the word and we’ll come and get you. Cody and Joel are already in the car.

I read the words over and over again. I’ve known these people for six months and they’re willing to come rescue me at 2am. They don’t owe me anything and yet they’re willing to walk over hot coals for me. They treat me like family, which isn’t something I’m used to. 

I can’t. 

It breaks me to refuse their offer of unconditional kindness. My logical side is screaming at me ‘let them help you, get the hell out of here’. The internal battle feels like it’s splitting my skull in two. 

Why not? Calvin looks for some understanding. What’s stopping you? 

It’s a good question. It causes the countless years of fear I’ve faced to bubble up to the surface. I'm scared of my mother. She’s the one common denominator in every single one of the memories that haunt me. I’m scared she’ll catch me trying to get away, that she’ll lock me up and throw away the key. She’s sick enough to make sure that I never see the light of day again. 

Mum will see me leaving after curfew. She won’t let me leave. My words are rapid and frantic. I maintain my vice-like grip on my phone, praying that Calvin sees it’s too risky. If I put one toe out of line, or make a single sound, I won’t make it. She’ll sink her claws so deep that it will be impossible to run away. 

She’ll be asleep soon. You only need to make it to the street. We’ll park right outside. Me, Cody and Joel won’t let her stop you. He doesn’t give up on convincing me otherwise.

I believe him. I know they would do anything for me. I take a hot minute to wrestle the doubt away and take a leap of faith. I accept the hand Calvin is extending through the phone screen and grab onto him for dear life. At this moment, I trust his judgement over my own. 

Come and get me. I send the text before giving myself the chance to back out. 

We’ll be there in 15 and not a minute later. 

I spend 5 minutes throwing the essentials into a backpack and the remaining 10 minutes sitting in a ball on my bedroom floor as I ride out the waves of a panic attack. I breathe in through my nose, out through my mouth. I focus on the feeling of the floor underneath me in order to keep myself grounded. I run through my exit route through my mind hundreds of times in preparation for my great escape. I need to cross the hall, go down the stairs, sneak past the front room, open the lock on the front door and bolt it to the car without making a peep. 

The vibration from my pocket startles me as I receive the message from Calvin.

We’re right outside. You just need to get out the front door and you’re home free. You’ve got this, it’s just this last step. 

I read the message, but don’t reply. I thrust my phone back into my pocket and pounce right up onto my feet. I can do this. I WILL do this. 

I throw on my coat, heave my bag off the floor and make my way into the landing. This is where it starts to feel real, as I loom over the top of the stairs. I push aside my thoughts of failure and proceed with caution. I make my way down gingerly, taking extra care not to stand on any of the creaky spots as I descend. My steps are feather light the entire time. I successfully navigate my way to the bottom floor without causing a disturbance. 

I pause, gather myself and peak my head around the open doorway into the living room, the light from inside flooding out into the otherwise dark hallway. In an unusual turn of luck, my mother is flat out asleep in the comfort of the armchair. The beating of my heart in my eardrums subsites slightly. 

I tip toe past the dragon’s lair and release a muffled sigh of relief as I stand directly in front of the front door. All that’s standing between me now is a panel of wood and a frosted window pane. I place one hand on the latch and rest the other on the handle. 

It’s now or never. Do or die. 

Fuck the stealthy approach. I need to get our of here as quickly as humanly possible. She’s asleep. That much alone gives me all the head start I need. I can easily outrun her. I know I can. 

It’s time to rip this band aid clean off. It’s time to start the healing process. 

I force the lock open, slam down the handle and rip the door open at an immense velocity. I hear the banshee scream from the other room as I wake my mother in the commotion. Her screeching frightens me to my core, but I push on regardless. I’ve come too far to fall at this final hurdle. 

I throw myself out the door and sprint down the driveway. I hear my mother hot on my heels. I don’t look back, I keep my focus on the red car that’s parked outside waiting for me. I watch Calvin in the back seat as the expression on his face falls. It’s not the peaceful get away he was hoping for. He leans across the back of the car and opens the door for me to save time. 

In a complete and utter whirlwind, I throw my bag in, not caring where it lands and dive in head first. I yank the door shut behind me with Joel already stepping on the gas to put a safe distance between me and my mum. I watch as her shape disappears into the distance. The pressure is lifted off my shoulders right away. 

I don’t get a second to catch up with my own emotions before bursting into a cascade of tears. The relief is crushing, like the weighted ball has finally been removed from the shackles around my ankles. 

Joel focuses on driving, Calvin focuses on engulfing me in a tight embrace and Cody, his sister, focuses on giving me words of encouragement. 

“You can relax now, she can’t hurt you any more.” She reassures me as she places a hand on my knee. It feels comforting, it feels safe. “You’re safe with us.” She gives me a smile that has only intentions of kindness. 

I open my mouth to thank them, to tell them how much I appreciate them, only to be met with intense sobbing. I can’t get my words out. I can barely take in enough oxygen. Calvin squeezes me tighter, something he always does to calm me down, and wipes my tears away with the sleeve of his hoodie. 

“Ssssh,” Cody soothes me, letting me it’s okay not to say anything. “You deserve this, you don’t need to thank us.” I look up at her again, seeing that she’s still smiling at me, still doing her best to make me feel better. “Let’s just get you how, you must be exhausted.” She squeezes my knee once more and lets go as she turns back to look out the windscreen. 

All at once, it dawns on me. Cody called her house my home. Just like that. Without question. Without making me work for it. I’ve always been told that home is a safe place and I always found that hard to believe. It should be somewhere that any person can be themselves without judgement, without having to walk around on eggshells all the time. 

As I sit in this car, considering how the idea of home should make me feel, I start to believe the age old saying that bricks and mortar are not the things that make a house a home. It’s not four walls and a roof that you need to feel peace. It’s the hearts inside those buildings that make them homeless. For me, those hearts are the ones sat inside this car with me. They’re the ones inviting me into their home without me even needing to ask. They want me to be here.

With them sitting besides me, I feel strong, worthy of respect and they make me feel like I matter. They make me feel excited for what’s to come. They make me feel human.