Running for home

Nothing. Absolutely nothing.

That's what's on my mind. Sitting with her on a Mexican beach, margarita in hand and looking out at the perfect, crystal blue waters. There's light breeze in the air as we both take it all in. My mood is as calm as the water. It's perfect..... and then she asks me the question.

“What are you running from?” she says.

Que the waves.

Now, this might seem to come out of nowhere, but it's not really. I know what she's alluding to. It's a question I've been asked before and I've known is likely coming my way again. There's nothing malicious in her asking. She just wants to understand.

But I also know this might be the beginning of the end for her and I. Sometimes.....this question is a beginning of an ending.

I know all this without having to think about it and before I say anything, my mind begins to wander to that old familiar place.....

As long as I keep running I'll be ok  I think to myself. I repeat this over and over in my head to try and calm my exploding heart. My bare feet, racing me into the unknown, through the streets of Verdun Montreal. It's sometime in the middle of the night and I'm running through an area you don't run in. Not this late at night anyways.
And especially not at nine years old.

Running into the dark, I can remember the fear. The fear of the unknown. The fear that I'm on my own now. Alone. Lost in the streets, cold, no shoes, and knowing that everything has changed. Knowing that it won't just go back to the way it was. 

Knowing that my mom and I won't survive this. 

I remember this as the moment I realized that my mom won't be there for me in my life. The day that I lost hope in that. It was when I realized I can't depend on her anymore. That I can't count on her to be my mom anymore.
To try and say how we got there isn't easy. The story of my mothers unravelling is a long one that goes back past my father and her, to her upbringing and even her mom before that. My mother had a hard life and with it came demons, demons that seemed to rear their head when I was about five. Before that, she was by all accounts a great mother. Caring and attentive, happy and loving. 

But that changed and for whatever reason, my mom began to unwind. To fall apart........ as things tend to do. The drinking started. Heavy drinking that changed her. Made her mean, unstable and abusive. Then the loser boyfriends. Then the parties. Then the drugs.

Over the next ten years I watched her slowly fall apart. I watched her become a stranger. 

I watched my mom who was my best friend and who I connected with more than anyone turn into the biggest source of pain I would ever know. But I stayed by her side. She was still my mom and I loved her as much as I could love anyone. We had always had a special connection that meant the world to me. Before the unravelling, we would tell stories and laugh about how we didn't fit into the world. How we were different. We would dance in the living room, listening to records and stay up late talking about life. We would put the couch cushions out on her old rickety balcony and lay there late into the night, watching the moon. She used to tell me that I was “wise beyond my years” and that I had an “old soul” as I would stay with her on the weekends and listen to her talk of her problems. She would tell me everything, asking me what she should do and what I thought. I desperately tried to convince her to stop drinking. To stop doing drugs. I begged her to leave the drug dealing boyfriend and get herself together again. 

I was trying to save my mom. I thought I could fix it.

I was eight years old.

Later in my life, I would have a counsellor tell me that this was too much responsibility for a child to bare. That it wasn't a fair responsibility. At the time however, I thought it was my duty. I was proud to be able to be there for my mom and help her as she struggled. The problem was, things didn't get better. Each weekend I visited, I watched her slowly get worse, her paranoia and depression pulling her away from the real world. Pulling her away from me. Incapacitating her. Destroying her.

Then one day things got worse.

When I was nine, I came out of my room one night to find that the loser boyfriend had finally overdosed on heroin. I remember standing there, looking down at him dead on the floor. Someone who I knew. Who I spent a lot of time with. Who I had just talked to that very night; lying there. No longer alive. Just an empty body. Right in front of me. I just stood there, taking it in, all the while it being eerily silent in the crowded room of strangers.... before my ears realized my mothers horrible screaming. That screaming was the scariest part of that night.

It seemed, the party had finally ended.

Looking back, I can see now what I didn't see then; that that was the turning point for my mom. She was never the same from that moment on. Sure, she went through the motions as my mother but the feeling was gone. She had always had a spark in her eye, but after that....... it just kind of faded away. 

We all have a breaking point. That was hers. But it wasn't mine.

Mine came later.

Mine was that cold memory that began this story. That night I ran barefoot though the streets of Verdun. That thought of .... As long as I keep running I'll be ok. Propelled by a newly born realization of being on my own. It's a feeling that has never fully left me after that night. 

To say why I ran away that particular night I don't really know. Sure, I had every reason... but I had had every reason many times before and stayed anyways. It wasn't safe for me to be with my mom anymore and it hadn't been for a long while. She couldn't take care of herself anymore, let alone take care of me. She was no longer my mom.......but I had always stayed anyways.
Until that night that is. That nights screaming fest, that nights rage, that nights complete breakdown of what is ok as a parent, was the night I finally figured it out. That was the night I hit MY breaking point. Looking into her eyes to try and find that old spark but seeing nothing there anymore. Nothing but hate. 

And so I ran. I ran into the night and kept running until the sun rose again ....and until she had long since passed out.

And yet, much like my mom, I still went through the motions after all this.... but in my heart, I knew it was over. She was gone. 
Soon enough, we had moved across the country, following my dad's work and now I traded our weekends together for nights listening to her drunk ramblings on the phone. Listening to her feel sorry for herself. Nights wondering if tonight would be the night she would finally make due on the threats and kill herself.... but it never happened. Instead it went on for years. Five long, angry years, before one day, I hung up the phone and stopped picking it up.

I finally gave up.

There was a lot of angry years after that moment and many years more before I finally talked to someone about it.
That same counsellor who told me that it was too much responsibility for a young child to bare also later told me that I likely blamed myself for my mother failure. That I blamed myself for not being able to save her. Worse still, that I was convinced I wasn't a good person for giving up on her when she needed me most. That I hated myself for leaving her. For running away. 

I thought it was my fault.

Time however, is a powerful thing and twenty years later I've come a long way from those days full of hate. I've learned a lot on my adventures through this beautiful world. This journey of travel and self discovery has helped me make sense of me and my days with my mom but like they say, old habits die hard. Life has shown me that a habit can be a hard thing to break. Whether it be a habit of drinking. A habit of hating yourself.

Or a habit of running to feel safe.

Running for home.

I think about all of this sitting there on that tranquil, waveless beach.....when she asks me again
“What are you running from?”

Nothing dear. Absolutely nothing.

Original artwork by Elicia Edijanto