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So, I think most of you guys know my mom is a pianist. I was in the middle of some kiddo feelings toward T (like "Are we there yet?" in a car ride where the destination is our next session). Suddenly, I felt like, I wish I could take my T to see my mom play and sing, to see she can't possibly be the horrible, narcissistic person I've made her seem like to him somehow...that she can be so beautiful, like an angel. That she has so much feeling inside her.

And yeah, then I feel, again, like she was just meant to do that, because she has so much passion there. And she was never...ever...meant to be my mom...maybe a mom at all. And I was just never meant to be and it would have been better for her if I never was.

So, then I was just filled with kid-feelings of wanting to see mom play (yes, somewhere deep down, I guess they are not completely apathetic about her, but they ONLY feel connected when she is playing and singing). So...she has some youtube videos up and, unfortuntely, not the best, because she sounds better on an actual piano than a keyboard...but there is one song "Open Arms" which is among the ones I would hear her sing when I was little. So, I watched it and told Boo, "Look, it's grandma." Boo said, "And grandma's singing!" And I see her singing and playing and, maybe not looking happy, but focused and passionate. I guess the kids want to know why she never looked that way about us...why she looked wild, angry, impatient, frightened, tired, numb, but never lit up, passionate, focused.

And now I'm feeling like it's impossible that she is this horrible person I have somehow made her out to be. It's all in my head. I am the worst daughter. It's ridiculous for me to be so messed up by this person. And if she was as severely neglectful and abusive as I seem to have convinced my T, despite saying it is no big deal...there has to be something wrong with me that brought that out in her.

Anyway, wish I could share the youtube of her with you guys, but not wise on the OF, as it has her name.
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Yaku,

Why does it have to be all one or the other? My mother was a horrible mother and did some really evil things, but like your mother was a piano player. A very good one. The only good memories that I have of my mother are when she was playing piano. In fact, I just talked to T about this yesterday. When my mother would play, she would allow me to be in the room as long as I was quiet and she couldn't really see me. I would sit behind her and in those times that she would play she was very focused and passionate and emotional. Very unlike how she was with me. I couldn't connect directly to my mother, but I could connect to her through her music. When we both focused on the music it acted as a bridge between us to forge a connection that otherwise wasn't there. So now when I remember those times it can be really bittersweet. It doesn't mean that I'm wrong and she was all good and it doesn't mean that because I remember so much bad that she's all bad. Surely even the worst people in this world have at least a few redeeming moments and qualities.

What I hear is you desperately trying to distance yourself from the pain by blaming yourself and holding onto the "good mother". It's normal to do that.

(((hugs)))
Thanks for relating to me, STRM. I guess. I know she is both good and bad, but...I feel like when I watch her play, there is no way she could be AS bad as it seems like I have made my T feel she is. And, I've actually tried to be objective and fought him on some of his conclusions. I feel like I've made her look so bad, humiliated her to my T. Ugh, I think I'm having memories here, not a present day experience. She was always very sensitive about people knowing how things really were, not that I ever went out of my way to tell anyone when I was little. She would react...badly...and also convince me those things weren't even true.

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