Toxic is toxic. in Phoenix

Sometimes I have to realize something, really think about it and actively process it, and sometimes I have to force myself to accept that a person that I love is actually pretty toxic to me and my well-being. I am realizing this today about a person that I really don’t want to let go of, but I think I need to. For myself.

Sperm Donor’s mom. We were best friends, almost closer than he and I were, definitely closer than he and she were. We loved everything about each other, her and I. She was the mother I always wanted and I was the daughter she’d always wished for. She was always there for me, and I for her. We always built each other up and were fiercely protective of one another. She always said if Sperm Donor and I ever broke up, she was sure gonna miss him. All of her 6 children (Sperm Donor being the only biological of them) treat her like shit. Her older sister, the matriarch of the family, treats her like shit. Everyone has always treated her like a hypochondriac while I did everything I could to help her because I knew she was in pain. Her sister and everyone else called her lazy.

Well, obviously, Sperm Donor and I broke up. Sides were taken all around, his family, my family, all of our friends. It was an ugly, horrific time in my life that I do not wish to relive any further today. When it finally happened, though, she took something I had said to her, twisted it all around, and said I had lied. I did not lie. I never lied to her, never, not once. Her son lied to her all the time. But, well… Her sister, the evil aunt, immediately started coaching Sperm Donor on how to take the kids from me. She worked over 30 years as a case manager for child protection. His mom stopped speaking to me. He would hurt me physically and then call the police. His cousin’s husband was a county sheriff. He’d show up, they’d take my kids to the mother’s house, and that would be that for a day or two or three while I cried and begged and pleaded for him to bring my kids home. Because there was nothing at all I could do about it. We weren’t married so whoever had physical custody of the kids at any given moment had legal physical custody. This happened no less than 4 times in less than a year and a half. Me getting my ass beat, cops showing up, my kids going away for a day or two, child protection showing up and doing nothing, cops doing nothing, everyone in the county in the pockets of his family and nothing I could do about any of it.

When I escaped, when we all moved away from his family and my family and I was finally on my own with just my boys, everything changed. I took all of my power back. I filed for child support and got it, along with sole legal physical custody of the boys. He isn’t even court ordered any visitation. And I have raised those boys so good! They are phenomenal people. He had absolutely no hand in who they are becoming other than as a perpetual disappointment to them. They have seen me struggle and never give up, they have seen me grow as a person, as a mother, and as a professional. I was as much raised by them as they were raised by me. They were the one thing that kept me moving, never quitting, never giving in to depression and suicide. I couldn’t let my story end because the chapters of their stories with me in them aren’t over yet.

She acknowledges that her son is an abusive piece of shit. She has looked me in the eye, face to face, and said it. But. There’s always a but, you know? “I know he’s an asshole, but he’s my son.” I’m sorry, (not really), but that’s just gross. If my son did to a woman what his father did to me, I’d give him a verbal lashing so bad, it would sting for years. But, see, because I raised my sons, because they saw what their dad did to me and how hard it was for me to get out of it, and because they respect me. They see the way their dad treated me as a way not to treat people.

So, a few weeks ago, my older son mentioned his dad taking him and his brother to grandma’s for Thanksgiving. Sperm Donor didn’t mention it to me. (Why do I feel like I’ve written about this? I know I’ve discussed it in chats with a couple of people, but did I write about it here?) I finally asked his mom and she hadn’t heard a thing about it, so I was like okay, I’m just gonna plan my vacation for Thanksgiving week since I’ll have so many days off work that week and the little dude will be out of school. Then I talk to Sperm Donor and he says he’s not going to be able to afford it. Then, a couple of days later, he tells me they’re going. I’m like… wait… did you talk to your mom? Because she’d mentioned maybe going to see one of his brothers and said she’d get back to me about it. Yep, he’d talked to his mom, they were going.

Oh.

I still haven’t heard from her. That was 3 weeks ago. And, you know, this isn’t the first time something like this has happened. He and his mother make some plans and tell the kids and just leave me out of it. The worst part about all of it is the realization that she’s faking. Whenever we have our epic 3-hour-long phone calls, whenever I visit and we sit up talking all hours of the night like 2 schoolgirls, and she tells me how much she loves me and values me as a friend, and that she still considers me her daughter… it’s bullshit. It’s all bullshit. She doesn’t actually care about me other than the purpose I have served of providing her with grandchildren. Because those phone calls and visits, they are months and months apart. And it’s always me. I always call her. I always arrange the visits. When she comes here, she’s coming to see my sons and her son and his wife. She spends 10 minutes with me, if I’m lucky.

And it goes on and on and on. It’s been over 8 years since Sperm Donor and I broke up. Eight years of this with her. She only treats me like I exist when she needs me. She never checks up on me, never calls just to say hi or ask how the kids or doing. I’m not being melodramatic, it’s literally like never. Only when she can’t get information from my older son or her son will she finally resort to calling me to find out what’s going on.

No more. If I am going to be traveling near her and have the opportunity to bring a kid or two with me, I’ll drop them off. If I need a couch to crash on and her’s is available, I’ll crash on it. But I’m done looking at her like a friend who genuinely loves and cares for me and my well-being, because the reality is, I’m always left feeling let down, diminished, unimportant. I deserve better than that.

No one should have the power to make me feel less than.