Dear Mom,

It’s been over four years since I last wrote to you.

I’m sorry.

I could come up with a bunch of excuses. Life got in the way. I took a break from writing nonfiction to focus on my novel. I got spooked by some responses to my previous letters to you. 

All are true in some way or another. But, as I’ve been thinking about it more lately, I’ve come to admit to myself the real reason I stopped writing to you.

I didn’t need you.

I know, that sounds shitty. It’s a tough sentence to type. Let me explain.

During my pregnancies and the very beginning of parenthood, I needed to have a dialogue with you. I missed our phone conversations. I wanted you to be around to take me maternity shopping. I wished you were there to snuggle with me while I was recovering from childbirth. I wanted you to hold my hand as I struggled with my sobriety. But you weren’t here. So, I wrote. And it helped.

As the kids got older, and I needed basic parenting advice, I had a giant support system of other mothers who could answer my important questions. How cold is too cold to take the baby outside in Chicago? How high of a temperature validates going to the ER? How do you get rid of lice? Is it normal for my son to be obsessed with his penis and making poop jokes? Should I worry if my kids don’t learn the first time they jump off the bed and hurt their foot?

All of these are questions that are easily answered by most parents, and of course Google helps too.

Now, I need you again.

After you died, I focused heavily on walking through my loss. First, avoiding feeling the emptiness you left, and then feeling it wholly as my hormones raged. Later, as motherhood approached, I turned my attention to not losing myself entirely as my life shifted. Now, all these years later, I’m beginning to find that I am, indeed, lost. Not lost because of your absence or because of my kids’ presence. It’s no one’s fault. I’m simply not sure where I came from and it’s making it difficult to figure out where I’m going.

This is why I need your help. I have so many questions for you about my own childhood. The missing pieces to my life’s puzzle. The pieces I believe you kept close to your chest and weren’t able to hand over to me before you left. 

Of course, you’re not here to give me the answers I seek. So, I’ll ask you anyway. Maybe typing it will help me find my own answers. Or at least set me in the right direction. 

As my kids are getting older, I find myself wondering what my childhood was like in comparison. Somehow, I don’t remember much of it. Maybe it was the decade and then some of being drunk or under the influence of one of many drugs. I’m not sure if blacking out during my adolescence somehow erased entire sections of my childhood, or if it’s normal for adults to not remember much of their early years. But my memories are quite blotchy.

I worry about my kids. I worry about whether or not they’ll have lasting friendships from elementary school. I wonder, did I have trouble making friends? Did I struggle to form strong connections with my peers at a young age? Did you ever talk to me about how to make friends? I know I had times in middle school and later where I felt lonely. Left out. Not cool. I don’t remember talking to you about it. Did you know? Did you know about my insecurities?

You loved to talk to us about feelings. About being sensitive. I don’t remember talking about feeling alone. Did you ever feel alone? You despised living in the suburbs. You wished you were running around in the city. I know you had trouble making strong friendships with the other moms at school, as so many of them were much younger than you. But you had a lot of friends independently. Didn’t you? You had the friends from your own childhood. Friends from college. Friends from teaching. I know you lost a lot of friends when Paul was born, but then you made new friends. Friends of other parents who also had a kid born with severe birth defects.

I’m so sorry you had to go through that.

I know I project so many of my own issues onto my kids. Even if I don’t mean to. Even if I actively try not to. I can only assume you did the same. Isn’t that what parents do?

As I float through this time in my life, trying to figure out where I’ll land, I sometimes feel like I need to get my hands dirty. Like my fingers should be sunk deep into the earth. Planting seeds. Pulling weeds. You taught me how to tend to the gardens at each home we lived in. Somehow, I forgot all the knowledge you had passed down to me. Maybe my desire to keep a plant alive died with you. 

Am I lost because I focus too much on the external? I spend many hours a week working on my body. Exercising and meticulously planning my meals. Strengthening my muscles. Lowering my cholesterol. Improving my blood pressure. Keeping my physical being healthy. But what about my brain? What about my soul? You worked on your brain. You spent time journaling and constantly striving to be mindful. Ultimately, your brain killed you. It turned on you. It grew tumors and forced you out. Did you resent your brain in the end? 

Am I lost because I’m too small? I yearn to go bigger. To make an impact in the world. To conquer fears and put myself out there. To try harder and not so easily give in. But I worry too much. I watch my bank account dwindle. I stress about where the money went and when it’s coming back. I wonder if I made too many bad choices. Too many unnecessary purchases. Maybe I didn’t need to go to that concert. Maybe the kids didn’t need to be signed up for the sport they never asked for. Maybe they don’t have the need to fit in that I so clearly project onto them. 

I wish I could ask you how you made decisions when you were a mother to young kids. I don’t recall being signed up for extracurriculars. Did I not ask? Or did you simply say no? 

I think this is truly what is missing inside of me. Why I feel so lost. Having the desire to fill in the pieces of my childhood that I don’t remember. The moments you and only you would have the answers to. I wish I had interviewed you at the end of your life. Tried to fill in the blank spaces. But you had forgotten so much in the end. Your brain turning into mush.

Perhaps my brain is turning to mush. Maybe that’s why I don’t remember.

Anyway, that’s all for now. I’ll continue to write. To ask more questions. Hopefully, one day, I’ll find some answers.

I love you Mom,

Love Rachel

P.S. Did you throw away all of my favorite clothes when I had lice? I’m pretty sure I remember that.