#essay-posts

we first said it platonically,

my head laying on your lap

as we ate popcorn and watched movies,

recovering from long summer days,

our friends piled onto an overcrowded couch.

months later, just a taste of romance.

you said “i love you” with the tang

of our first kiss fresh on your lips.

we spent our first week dating

eating halloween candy

on that same overcrowded couch.

with winter starting, a new flavor came.

in an overcrowded football stadium,

you danced to some cheesy song

blasting over the speakers.

in this moment, i realize i’m in love with you.

i trusted you more than anyone i had ever met.

valentine’s day was sour.

you broke up with me the next day.

“i love you” becomes few and far between,

with a hasty reminder that it’s only platonic.

that doesn’t last very long.

we convince ourselves otherwise.

i moved away at the end of the summer.

my visits bring bittersweet reminders

of how things used to be.

we confess to ourselves and each other

we spent the last 6 months unofficially dating.

“i love you” is allowed to be genuine again.

two semesters away at college is a long time.

the sickly sweet love begins to spoil.

you rinsed away our romance in late april,

almost 2 years since our first “i love you”.

everything goes quiet for a bit

before revealing something platonic again.

love is like an everlasting gobstopper,

revealing new flavors over time,

and although poems can’t go on forever,

there’s no telling what will be next.

honestly, i’d be fine if this was the last taste;

Simply put, my mother is emotionally abusive. She is over-controlling and an alcoholic, and constantly victimizes herself in situations that she has caused. She doesn’t support me in any of my endeavors, and is more critical of me than both my older cousin or my younger brother.

My mother was raised to believe that those who suffer with their mental health are just “crazies”. Because of this, she has never gone to a therapist to get help with what is so obviously a form of anxiety. She constantly has high blood pressure (to the point of being hospitalized on occasion), suffers from insomnia, and feels like she needs to overcontrol whatever aspects of her life she can so that she feels like she has any control at all. Because she continues to think of these symptoms as a physical illness rather than a mental illness, she drinks. A lot. I’m not saying her mental illness makes her inherently bad, but instead how she copes and internalizes her fear of mental illness, and how she lashes out emotionally and physically at my younger brother and I.

My mother is overcontrolling to the point where I, an adult woman, still do not have access to my savings account at any given moment because she doesn’t trust me with my own money. My mother is financially manipulative and passive aggressive, and any time I ask for some money to moved from my savings to pay for rent or something, she’ll proceed to read through all of my recent purchases and belittle the choices I’ve made in the past year since moving out.

At one point, when I asked to have access to my savings account, she cried for over an hour because “oh woe is me, I’m such a terrible mother to you, I should just DIE,” and “your older cousin never would’ve treated my twin sister like this.”

There’s a lot she doesn’t know about my older cousin (see: A Story For Another Day 1). But it’s interesting that he is turning 25 this year, works at a local bowling alley, still hasn’t moved out of my aunt’s house, and has made no progress on his college degree, and is a child molester, and yet he gets praised constantly.

I turn 19 in a week, graduated with honors with my high school diploma and associate’s degree at the same time last year, and moved out and work two jobs, and yet I’m the one who’s “lazy” and “entitled”. Entitled for trying to make something out of myself? When I did six extracurriculars, plus college coursework, plus a job during my senior year of high school, I was told how I “didn’t deserve” the leadership positions I had earned and reminded how everyone else was better than me. I was even constantly compared to my younger brother, who did athletic extracurriculars and got good grades.

I am an adult, and yet I’m still afraid of my own mother. She kept a tracker on my cell phone because she didn’t trust me enough to just tell her where I was going. My younger brother never had that issue. When I asked to turn off my tracker because I AM AN ADULT, she threatened to have my cell phone turned off entirely.

The worst part out of all of this is that I’m deathly terrified of becoming my mother. I have an addictive personality, and because I can’t use my insurance without my mother knowing, I can’t afford to see a therapist. I’ve used alcohol as a coping mechanism before. Sometimes I’m afraid that maybe I’ve had an above-average life and I just subconsciously victimize myself to get the positive attention my mother never gave me. Sometimes when people I care about try to leave my life I cling onto them harder because I’m afraid of rejection.

Thirty years from now, am I going to be a woman who belittles her own family to make herself feel better about her life? A woman who pushes her children into competition with one another, and who clearly picks a favorite every time? A woman who financially manipulates her adult children?

sometimes when i lie awake in bed, i think about what i would say if i married the guys i’ve talked to at any moment. i run the vows through my head as i imagine shapes in the popcorn that lines the ceiling of my little apartment, and i hear the rain pitter-pattering against my window.

if i married you today, i could already tell you what i would say.

you became one of my best friends at one of my lowest points. we spent every day together, and i learned really quickly that you were always the softest shoulder to lay on during movie nights, and the strongest shoulder to cry on. we dated for a short period of time, but we were in different periods in our lives; i was leaving for college in the next year, and you still had a few years left in high school. but even after we had broken up, it wasn’t like anything really changed; we loved each other in secret, secrets that we hid even from ourselves for almost a year.

i remember the day you told me you were still in love with me. it was a long text message in a grand finale to an argument we had. i read it in the mall parking lot, and i cried.

i dated a couple guys in college, but i never had the same gut feeling that i had when we first fell in love. i’m an emotional person, i know, and i’ve definitely said “i love you” more times than i can count, but you make me want to keep saying it. and when you get tired of hearing “i love you” after the billion-and-seventh time i’ve told you this week, i’ll just have to look you in your deep brown eyes and try not to get lost in them when i say to you, and i truly mean it:

i really needed this whole thanksgiving break tbh. i was in the midst of a heavy mental breakdown, and i initially had only planned to visit my hometown on thursday only. chicken tenders was the one to ask me to come down wednesday night, and then he and i stayed the night at our friend cherry blossom’s house thursday night (and played drinking games with cherry blossom and her mom which was really fun tbh mrs. blossom is more of a mother figure to me than my own mother could ever be), and chicken tenders convinced me to stay for the high school football game the night afterwards.

wednesday night, chicken tenders and i went to chick fil a with orchid, and then he and i went back to his house to watch john mulaney’s the comeback kid and the good place.

we woke up thursday morning, and i left to visit cherry blossom and her mother. i brought them some walmart-bought pumpkin bread because i don’t know how to bake and stayed at their house for a little before driving to my parents’ house to surprise them for thanksgiving. (side note: are all families as supportive and loving as cherry blossom’s? my family felt so cold and distant in comparison.) it was okay, but i sat next to my older cousin during dinner (see: a story for another day #1), which put me a little on edge. around 7pm, i was initially planning on just heading home, but i got a text from cherry blossom (who’s one of my absolute best friends, and my roommate’s younger sister) saying that chicken tenders was at her house. i decided to drive over for a quick visit, but after a few rounds of uno and a realization that the turnpike was shut down and my drive home would’ve been an extra hour than usual, i agreed to stay the night and have a few drinks. 

we ended up playing a memory matching game and never have i ever, with losers taking shots, and it honestly was the most fun i’ve had in a while it was also probably the most drunk. after cherry blossom and her mom went to bed, i accidentally worked myself into a really intense panic attack, but chicken tenders managed to calm me down.

the next morning we sat and talked for a while before i offered to drive chicken tenders home since he lives on my way out of town. after we got in the car though, he asked if i was hungry, and offered to pay for denny’s (which has been a staple for us since we first started dating). after a really great breakfast, we called orchid and invited her and the guy she’s talking with to meet us over at chicken tenders’s house. when he and i arrived home, we took a quick shower before orchid got there, and then orchid asked if i would come to the football game, as it would be her last game in the home stadium as a band member. after the game, i took chicken tenders home and met orchid, violin, and pomeranian at mcdonald’s for iced coffees and clarinet was working so i asked him to kill me with caramel because i love having so much caramel in my iced coffee that i can feel my heart hurt and chicken tenders texted me that he wanted to give me gas money before i left town, so i made another quick stop at his house, where he made me pinky swear if we’re both single when he graduates, then we’ll officially start dating again.

long story short, as a wise man once said: 

“thanksgiving eve, a tradition like no other. go get blackout drunk in your hometown ... and go home with an ex ... and have sex in their parents house, tonight’s your night and nobody can take it away. forget the haters and the naysayers, it’s your time.” 

              - twitter user Gregggyboy, 2018

so initially i thought that the chicken tenders principle was based on one person (i.e.: the metaphorical chicken tenders himself). however, i’ve come to notice that since dating tom brady (the ex with the same name as a football quarterback who isn’t tom brady but whatever lol), i’ve found that i’ve lost the spark with chicken tenders.

and originally i thought this meant that tom brady broke the chicken tenders principle. but upon further consideration, i think i’ve realized that maybe tom brady is just a situation where i can’t go to the chicken tenders restaurant anymore and as a result, i’ve just found a new default menu item at a new restaurant. ergo: the chicken tenders principle isn’t about a person but about my tendency to avoid taking risks as much as possible.

i didn’t realize until i was about thirteen that i didn’t have a healthy relationship with my mother. i mean, looking back, it’s clear, but hindsight’s 20/20 and all that.

before that, ever since i was little, i always associated my mom with kala from tarzan. tarzan was one of my favorite movies growing up (the soundtrack was the first album i ever owned), and my mom had a very similar presence to her. she’s not a very big lady, pretty short and stocky.

my idealized version of my mom is forever imprinted on the gorilla mom from tarzan, and lowkey i cry during any scene she’s sad. she’s warm and gentle, while still being playful and supportive. a perfect mom.

however, now that i’m older and recognize my mother’s emotional manipulation for what it is, i’ve associated her more with mother gothel from tangled.

alcohol tw // smoking tw

growing up, my mother was a heavy drinker. i never thought anything of it, with alcoholism being normalized in society. it wasn’t until i started drinking myself that i began to realize its influence on me.

my first drink ever was a glass of champagne at my then-boyfriend’s family’s new year’s party. i didn’t like the carbonation, drank about half of it, and left the other half sit overnight before waking up the next day and drinking the flat remainder because i didn’t want to be wasteful.

i drank a few times after that, sneaking travel sized bottles of fireball and peach vodka at sleepovers, but i had never gotten actually drunk until i moved into my own apartment.

the first time i ever had gotten drunk was a mess. chicken tenders came up for the weekend to celebrate his birthday with me (this was subsequently the last time we hooked up). we paid one of my roommates $50 for some fireball and apple juice, and i ended up probably on the verge of alcohol poisoning.

i still drink occasionally, usually socially, only once by myself, but the thought of becoming a raging alcoholic like my mother haunts me. with my mental health as it is, i’m accutely aware of how close i am to the brink of alcohol abuse, how i could slip at any moment.

similarly, my grandfather used to smoke, heavily. my dad chewed tobacco until cigarettes killed my grandfather. and yet, one night when i was on the verge of a mental breakdown, i bought a pack of gas station cigarettes. to this date, i’ve smoked three. i only smoke when i genuinely feel as though i’ve exhausted all other options on trying to feel better, when i feel i’ve slammed against rock bottom. to this day, i’ve only ever told one person about this, and if you’ve read any of my other stories, you can absolutely guess who it is. he made me promise to throw them away. i told him i did, but they’re still sitting in my desk drawer, laying in wait for my next breakdown.