There I was hanging out in my living room in Del Rio, TX when my mother prompted my brother and I sit down at the table. She exclaimed, “let’s have a contest to see who’s the better writer in the house!”
I was excited at this proposal–I knew I was better than my older brother. He was essentially better at everything else in life, but academics was where I shined. It was the foundation of my value and worth in the world. I was constantly belittled for how I was lesser than him in random childhood contests, but here, it was undeniable that I was the best. So, obviously, I was enthusiastic for the opportunity to publicly show this within my family. Writing was very new for me, but it was something that came so natural and felt like such a part of me, despite just getting started with it in school.
My mother said we would both write a quick story about anything, and she would judge who was the best writer afterwards. I thought this would be super easy. She was a high school English teacher, which made her an authority in my mind. I’ll go write something really quick and my mom will finally show him that I am better at something. While we were writing and I was quickly finishing, my mom leaned over and whispered in my ear, “I know you are the better writer, but I am going to let him win.” I remember being completely confused by this statement and feeling sentiments like, “why would she take this away from me?” or “does she have any idea how important this is to me?” None of this made sense to me. As I saw this playing out and she announced him as the winner, I quickly became enraged as he started to tease me as he did with everything else where he thought he was better. So, I outed my mother’s lie. I yelled to him, “mom told me mine was really better!!” In this moment, I could see my mother getting embarrased and wanting to comfort him. All the while, I was becoming so angry as I felt betrayed by her and by how she seemed to hold such little care for the one thing that was truly important to me. At the time, it felt like it was all I had, and she stripped it away from me in an instant.
This was the beginning of the end of a somewhat positive relationship with my mother. It turns out this was the spark of a realization (as a child) that what I needed was not important. I remember being enraged for a couple weeks–hating my mother. “How could she not see how much this meant to me? Did she not see that he bested me in every other aspect of life?” The only thing that made my life stand out was being good at school. This event became a ripple effect of distance in our relationship. She never came to talk about what happened or apologize. She simply let me seethe in my room screaming and yelling and expressing my anger toward her. She never came to comfort either. But in the end, I was a child, and I gave up my anger assuming she would never come to comfort me after the two weeks. The implicit message here was so powerful–my feelings weren’t important and no one is going to help me soothe them. Looking back, you could say this was probably the beginning of my struggles with depression as my self-worth plummeted and I had no idea how to meet my internal need for love, care, and support.
The Aftermath
That event started a shift of a kid being ecstatic about learning at school to a kid becoming disillusioned about how people just wanted him to perform for their own reasons. I completely saw through the subtle manipulation of positive reinforcement of grades. I could see that none of it mattered as my mother did not truly love me for it. So, I stopped trying. I refused to do homework or anything extra that I normally would beg the teacher for. My grades didn’t matter so they declined, while still being relatively okay since I was naturally gifted with learning. Essentially, I did what I had to. That is, until my relationship with my mother really declined and when the bare minimum in school was not enough for me to pass. I failed a class in 9th grade and started to care less and less about it all. This all came to a head when I was acting out and getting in trouble, which led to me getting in school suspension for days and days. That was too much for me. School was bad enough, but isolation for days on end was unbearable. Since I really did not care at this point, I dropped out of school.
Despite all this, I never lost my drive or love for learning. I noticed this as I started to get distance from school and still had big dreams about returning and doing something bigger with my life some day. Honestly, it never even crossed my mind to do otherwise. I just needed a break–from school and my mom. I also moved out a few months later once I had a full-time job at a fast food restaurant. I’d like to say all that was planned, but it was actually initiated by big blow up fights with my mom. I was trying to live my life as a grown up working person, while she was wanting to act like she cared all of a sudden–putting seemingly arbitrary restrictions on me. So, I left after one last big fight and went to crash on a co-worker’s couch. The truth is, I left with no where to go, but fortunately, I had people that would let me stay with them. I would have slept in my car if I had to. All I knew was that I was completely done with my mom and school.
Afterthoughts
There’s certainly a lot of perspective I have found after digging deep ino that pain. I’m sure there are reasons for everything that transpired. I can recall my brother having developmental struggles, which is probably why my mother wanted to give him this esteem boost. And my brother likely taunted and teased me so much because I was so much better than him at something that seemed incredibly arduous in his world. But honestly, knowing all of that does nothing for my experience and hurt. As I said before, this was just a spark. It was simply the first domino of many that created a well of pain that still needs much love, empathy, and support. This article is just one of many ways I can give that to myself. I hope this part of me feels honored for this heartfelt reflection.