Lifeless, Loveless, Hopeless

 Life is passing by

birds are flying

pages are turning

populations are growing

bridges are burning

people are

living, loving, hating

floating through life on a pointless path

all spinning together in a muddy mess

getting dirtier with every thought

progress evolves into destruction

destruction crushes hope

hope carries life

life is smothered out

all continues

lifeless, loveless, hopeless.

 

Anybody who has been left by someone they love knows the piercing burn of rejection.  Thoughts go through your mind like; what more could I have done, was it my fault, is there something wrong with me, am I unlovable.  To this day, I have moments where I cannot fend off my poisonous self doubt.  Maybe it was my fault that they treated me this way, maybe I deserved to be abandoned, maybe I am unlovable.  My most daunting task is trying to remind myself everyday that I did not deserve to be turned away by my family. 

When I arrived back home, my mom sat by and watched as my dad told me that I was not allowed back into their house until I apologized for betraying him.  I was going to have to sit across from the man who had driven away with all of my mom's money, claiming to have never wanted the life he had with us, stating that he had never loved her and was grateful to be rid of her and the life she had trapped him in and apologize for not making an effort to contact him while I had been trying to soothe my alcoholic mother out of the depression he had put her in.  There are absolutely no words for what I felt as my mom, who I had loved and supported through all the times my dad had left, sat there and watched me walk away from the house not saying one word to defend me.  She would always choose him.  No matter how many times he hurt us and left us, she would always choose him over us.  I lost part of my soul that day and I guarantee it will never be replaced.  My own mom turned me away when I was broke and sick and homeless because my dad had told her to.  She had put the illusive love of an abusive husband over the love of her daughter.       

At first, I could not stomach apologizing to my dad.  I went to an old friends house and stayed there while I went to the doctor and regained my strength.  I sat in my grief trying to contemplate my next step out of this predicament.  There was only one possibility.  I was going to have to go into that house, apologize to my heartless father, get all of my life possessions and walk away for good. 

As I walked up to the house, my whole body was quivering, my heart was pounding and my mind was pulsing with doubt.  As I walked through the door, I turned off my conscious mind realizing that I was about to do something that would betray all of my values and self respect.  Sitting across from my dad looking into his disapproving cold eyes, I told him the last self sacrificing lie that I would ever tell in self preservation.
"I am sorry that I betrayed you. I never meant to take mom's side.  I was here with her, seeing what she was going through and I tried to do what I could to help.  I didn't do it to hurt you."  He gave me a slight nod and a distant hug telling me that I was welcome to stay in the house as long as I needed.  I left a week later with all my belongings and would not return to that house until they had both moved away.  This was the day I lost my mom to the unrelenting grasp of abuse, she would never be her own person again.