Something else to keep in mind is that your love may be one of the few things that person feels through all their numbness.

As for you, take care of yourself and don’t get too caught up in their drama of destruction. Do what you need to do for you. Like expressing yourself as you did here. It’s a gift for yourself and may be for others as well.

My love is with you.

Second, my heart just wants to open up and take you in, to hold you close and protect you and make this all easier for you. The hard part is that we all live with the reality of who our parents are. They have their stories and their wounds and they unfortunately pass those on to us. The amazingly beautiful thing is that we get to choose our response. Your wisdom and insight to your father and his addictions have become a backbone to your life choices. You are choosing strength instead of weakness. I know how big your heart is and that you have compassion for him and that is the most any of us can do. I had the same relationship with my father. I wanted to love him, his addictions made sure I didn’t even really get to know him. It took a lifetime for me to accept myself for who I really am, instead of who I was through his eyes. Alcoholism is a horrible destruction of life. It robs everyone involved from the love that was meant to be. I grieve for you my beautiful daughter, I know too well your pain and I would wipe yours away if I only knew how. Keep being the wise and beautiful woman that you are and you will draw the strength from your life experience. That the doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. so they say…..

I LOVE YOU.

“That’s all up to the intention
Of who originated the statement
We just fall victim to interpretation
Be it lyrics, text or conversation
With or without explanation
Sometimes we often get lost in translation
We’re constantly used & abused
Due to various views
People may be left confused
But don’t get it misconstrued
Blame the builder not the tools”.

Good stuff. Thanks.

As you grow, so do I. Thank you.

I will never forget Robert who stood at your mom’s and my wedding and spoke. He spoke about only one thing and that was TRUST. After 10 years of marriage, I understand even more so the value of that word. It is the cornerstone of love. And quite ironically, love seems to be a cornerstone of trust.

So, you ask some powerful questions. So powerful that they beckon me to share with you something that I’ve not known how. Perhaps it is your courage that inspires me.

That person you describe – your old self – I know very well. Sometimes like it was yesterday as a matter of fact. Your lies use to torment me because I held such love in my heart for you. Even though I could see beyond the lies (sometimes), they built on top of each other until I became numb to your words. It crushed me. To this day I am sad about that. I am sad that I turned away, and yet I knew no better. What I did know, and still do, is that trust is fragile. It is what gives love it’s crystalline structure. You see? Love is not fragile on it’s own as many say. It is trust that is. And once it’s broken, it may repair soon enough, but if dropped again and perhaps more, what then?

Now time has passed. I have been healing on the inside from what seems like years of battle with you. We will never get those years back. They are gone. Even so, and perhaps what matters more, is that we are here. The future has not yet been written.

The truth is, you have been a great gift in my life. I now know that even though trust can be shattered and relationship wounded, the strength of love can offer forgiveness and healing. I apparently still am in that process of healing, and I want you to know – my love for you has always been there, buried underneath.

“Just remember in the winter
far beneath the bitter snows
lies the seed
that with the sun’s love
in the spring
becomes the rose”. – Bette Middler

I do love you. In my heart you will always be my daughter.

I practiced something while you were growing up and your words here demonstrate to me that it was worth the effort. I always looked past this moment…you know the one we were standing in while you made up your story about what was going on or not going on….and I saw you in my minds eye as a strong, honest, trustworthy woman that didn’t feel like she had to manipulate to get what she wanted. I saw past your need to throw up a smoke screen and believed in you. You are that woman and becoming more of her everyday.

I can’t tell you how to recognize those people that you can trust – you have to learn that one on your own, or tell you how to trust the ones you love even when there’s doubt. What I can tell you is that when you focus on trusting someone and treat them as if they are trustworthy if they are they will show up for you and help you believe. If they are not, you will eventually know for lies have a way of finding their way to the truth…as you so beautifully expressed.

btw…I am proud of you.
love your devoted mother….