Well, here it is. Mine is finished as of tonight.
When I first began writing this paper, I was extremely touchy about the topic that I chose to write about for, what I thought, was a good reason. It was just because I wasn't ready to hand over my most personal experience to some people who wouldn't understand it, and who wouldn't be able to appreciate it. That may still be true for some or most of you, but for the record, and for anyone who was extremely curious as to what I wrote about, here is the last of my final drafts for your reading pleasure. Enjoy.
This paper “concerns the tension between theory and, myth and reality, what mothers are told they should do opposed to what they do” (Birns and Hay 3). It is also a search for the answer to a question that continues to be a constant topic of debate: “which is stronger – nature or nurture?” (Ridley 27).
My mother . . . is not my mother. The First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints says, “Mothers are primarily responsible for the nurture of their children,” yet my mother, born into this church just as I was, has never upheld this ideal (The Family: A Proclamation to the World). Instead, it was my maternal grandmother who was always there for me. I have memories of my childhood where it seems as though my mother didn’t exist because I do not remember her. Gaps, I suppose you could call them. She never wanted children, and has always been an incredibly selfish person (Cochran).
My beginning is sketchy. I have no knowledge as to where, when, or how my parents met. All I know is that they never married. I was unexpected. I was a mistake. They lived together in their own house on Grundy St. in Tullahoma, TN for a while, but eventually moved in with my maternal grandparents and Sandy, my mother’s sister. My mother never spoke to me about this time, my maternal grandparents haven’t told me enough to satisfy my curiosity, and Sandy wasn’t involved enough to know much of what happened, and I haven’t spoken to my father about it. My father was not in contact with his parents at the time, so my parental grandparents were not aware of my existence until recently. My parents continually argued and fought during the time when my mother was pregnant with me. My grandmother tried to keep them from doing this, concerned that their fights were only going to bring me harm. Really, the only consistency I have heard from anyone – my grandfather, grandmother, and Sandy – is that my mother is a “bitch,” and nothing more. One day Sandy had had enough to do with my mother’s attitude, and she moved out. My parents’ arguments continued, and eventually escalated to my mother telling my father that she did not want him at the hospital when she gave birth to me. The way my mother treated my father forced him to leave after that, and the only time I have ever spoken to him was December 11th, 2006 (Cochran, Weaver). Even after that one conversation, though, Richard is still a black hole, a complete void. I don’t know him personally as I should, and have never met him face to face. The only vague ideas I have of his character come from what my family has told me, and I honestly do not believe that all of what they have told me is completely true.
There is a theory on how well attached a child is to its mother that states, “a baby who either cries profusely when the mother leaves and then is angry at her when she returns or is totally unresponsive to her is insecurely attached” (Birns and Hay 51). Sandy has related to me that my mother never had much of a maternal instinct – it was always Nana that woke up when I cried at night” (Cochran). My mother would frequently leave the house for days, or sometimes weeks on end, marking the first eight years following my birth. I remember wanting more than anything for her to stay. I’d watch her get dressed, put her make-up on, fix her hair, etc. I’d sit on her bed, she’d get mad at me and smack me, but I wouldn’t know why I was being punished. When she started to leave, I’d cling to her body (normally her waist or legs), cry, and beg her not to leave. She pushed me off of her; I’d fall to the floor, and not get up. She would then storm out of the house leaving me with Nana. I never stayed where Nana put me, though. I always sat by the door, crying, waiting. I know now that most of the time she was usually out partying, getting drunk, getting-laid, or whatever it was that she wanted to do at a certain moment in time. I actually remember her bringing a boyfriend home, and telling me, “Here, Samantha, here’s your new daddy.” She did that with her other boyfriends, too, but none of them ever wanted to have anything to do with me, including the man she married (Cochran).
Prior to my research, I would not have been able to sufficiently describe my mother. The only thing I can say concerning her true nature is that my mother is the epitome of Dr. Carol Pearson’s Innocent, which is described as follows:
“to Innocents, other people, the natural world, everything exists to serve and satisfy them . . . the earth is there for their pleasure. They have every right to ravage it, despoil it, pollute it, for it is here solely for them . . . Innocence is a natural state for children, but when carried into adulthood it requires an astonishing amount of denial and narcissism” (Pearson 26).
It really is amazing what we actually remember and what we choose to remember. I remember seeing my mother’s birth control pills once, but it was not until many years later that I understood exactly what their purpose was. All I knew at the age of two or three was that they were some special pills that my mother took that came in weird case. It wasn’t until years later that I knew their true purpose. She was protecting herself from another mistake like me while still doing what she wanted. She got pregnant once between the time when I was born and when my 8-yr-old half-brother was born, and had an abortion (Dyvig). I really did not think much of it at the time, and it has not crossed my mind since then, actually. Strange memories that I thought I had suppressed, such as the birth control pills, are being regurgitated because of this paper.
There is a sort of internal battle raging inside of me. I want to be rid of my mother, but at the same time there is that same small child in me screaming out for her mommy. I keep avoiding her, and this paper is my way of moving on. As Pearson describes in her book, I am leaving the stage of “the Fall” (Pearson 27). My mother’s name is Crystal Candy. It sounds like a stripper’s name. I know I need to write my story, to get all of this out of my system. Yet at the same time every bit of me is kicking and screaming. My fingers ache because they are so stiff. They do not want to move. There is nothing in me that seems to want to write any of this.
It is important to note that I remember everything clearly from this point on. When I was five years old, Crystal met a man named Edwin Anderson: a country hick with little or no education who practically worships his mother. No, that is not an exaggeration. His devout opinion is this: if a person is not from the same bloodline as him in any way, they are not his family, including Crystal. I really think that the only reason he actually married her was because she had good credit. She had been planning on buying herself a new vehicle, when he convinced her to buy a single-wide trailer with her money and credit so that they could move in together. There was no aid from him in the purchase of their living arrangements, but they loved each other so much and he would do anything for her. She bought the trailer, and they were about to move in together, when, GASP! they realized there was no place for them to put the trailer. They did not own any land, and Ed and Crystal could not afford to rent a space in a trailer park (Dyvig). Since my grandparents, my mother, and I lived on about 300 acres of land, they decided that they would place their singlewide trailer in our front yard. My grandparents agreed to this. Ed and Crystal married three years later, when I was eight. My mother did not take responsibility for deciding where I was going to live after their marriage, and instead of placing said responsibility on my grandparents, she left the extremely difficult choice of where I was to live for the remainder of my years as a minor to me. She said that I could choose either to move in with her and Ed or to stay with my grandparents. The only one I could talk to about this decision was my grandmother, because my mother was always with Ed. We had many late-night conversations about what I was going to choose, and how she would love me no matter what I chose. I chose to stay with my grandparents.
My mother lived in our front yard. It was only but a 100-yard distance from our front door to their back door. It was closer to walk between our house and her trailer than it was to walk from her trailer to the mailbox. The sad facts are that she never asked to see me; she ceased to take care of me. She would, at times, come up to my grandparents’ house, and threaten to take me away from them. When I would protest to her actions and words, she would normally reply, “I’m your mother; I can do whatever I want.” Still, I always wondered, I chose where I live, so why does the authority change now? Why was she suddenly taking an interest in me?
In December of 1998, the first of my half brothers was born. She had even less time for me. She still occasionally made threats of removing me from my grandparents’ house.
In January of 2000, my mother was at the house again. She wanted to know if I wanted to go with her and her “family” to a flea market. The only real reason she wanted this was because my maternal biological grandfather was going to be there and he wanted to see Crystal. Because I did not want to go, and because my nana and papa would not allow me to go, my mother got upset and started to yell. I have a habit of yelling back when she accosts me. I was so irked with her at that point, that there was no way I really wanted anything more to do with her. Anyway, the usual threats ensued. “I’m your mother, and I’ll take you if I want to!” “[Nana said,] NO! Paul said he would get a court order if he had to in order to stop [Crystal] and all this fussing. Samantha kept crying. [Crystal] went home. Samantha couldn’t get any school work done – has had a hard time all week” (Dyvig).
This is the point of my life that Pearson refers to as “the Fall” (Pearson 27). She states, “[the Fall] is so painful that people often escape from it using various opiates: drugs, alcohol, work, consumerism, mindless pleasure” (Pearson 27). My primary means of coping with my mother’s actions was and is my schoolwork. For me to have been struggling with school meant that this entire scenario truly traumatized me, even if it was temporary. Though there were many fights with my mother at my grandparents’ house, this is the one I remember most. I remember sitting at the kitchen table, eating dill-flavored potato chips, silent tears streaming down my cheeks, listening to these people who call themselves my family argue about me, where I was to live, and who actually cared about me and my well-being.
In May of 2000, I was in my last year at Victory Baptist Academy and I was eleven years old. My grandparents finally told my mother to put her money where her mouth was, and took her to court to fight her for custody of me. Crystal said she would fight them. Somehow Edwin made her believe that all my grandparents were after was money that would come from them having to pay child support that they would not have been able to pay. None of this was ever about money. My mother sat by my grandmother in the courtroom, and told the judge quite frankly that there was no reason for me to go to Webb. That’s one of the main reasons why I don’t like thinking about my mother, and why I don’t like to think about what life would have been like if I had to live with her and Ed. Soon after the court date, my mother bought a used van for her new family (Dyvig).
I went to school that day. It was my own choice to do so. I don’t think that I could have emotionally handled sitting in the courtroom with those people. I had to put up with them the night before; I didn’t want to have to deal with them the next morning. My grandmother related these events to me soon after, anyway. There’s no conveying what I felt when she told me about what my mother did. I was terribly saddened and disgusted by my mother’s actions. I felt unwanted. I felt worthless. I felt like a love child. I was a mistake.
These are some of the conditions that they agreed on:
3. That the Respondent, Crystal _____ ________, shall have the following visitation with the minor child:
(a) Every other weekend beginning on the first Friday following the entry of this Order. On said weekends, the Respondent shall have visitation privileges from Friday at 4:00 p.m. until Saturday at 7:00 p.m.
(b) Two non-consecutive weeks in the month of June and one week in August the exact times to be agreed upon by the parties.
(c) Christmas holiday visitation from December 22nd at 9:00 a.m. until December 24th at 7:00 p.m.
(d) The parties will alternate and/or divide the major holidays of Easter, Memorial Day, 4th of July, Labor Day, and Thanksgiving, as agreed by the parties.
(e) One-half of the minor child’s birthdays.
(f) Such other reasonable visitation privileges, as agreed upon by the parties” (Legal Case 22,880).
There were various instances after this when my mother attempted to take me shopping, and would ask me questions such as what I wanted for Christmas. The grandest place we ever went to was Wal-Mart. I remember riding with her once on one of these trips. She asked me specifically what I wanted for Christmas. I told her that all I wanted was a gift card from Target. She retorted with something like, “well, wouldn’t something from Wal-Mart be better? Besides, I don’t want to drive that far, and I don’t want to have to spend too much money. Also, gift certificates aren’t appropriate for Christmas” (Dyvig). Frankly, I think that if someone does not really know someone else as well as they should, gift certificates are perfect. She started yelling at me again. My mother quite enjoyed yelling. I told her I wanted her to turn the van around and drive me back home. She started ranting about I was ungrateful and how my stepfather would “bend over backwards for me,” that her home was my home, and so on. At first, she didn’t want to take me back home. She said something about me wasting her gas. She didn’t realize that I had read the custody papers, which say “[that] the minor child shall have the option of returning to the Petitioners’ home should she choose to do so” (Legal Case 22,880). She began to cry. She always cried like a small child who had gotten their feelings hurt whenever I yelled back. It’s only when she argues with me that she cries (Cochran). I wonder if she just wanted my sympathy. If I cried, it was always because I was frustrated with trying to figure out why she would be so selfish and narcissistic.
This was the pattern that we had established, and it lasted for at least a year: go see mother, mother refused to spend more than 5 minutes with me at a time, stepfather makes fun of me, I get upset, mother and I yell at each other, I leave and return to my grandparents’ house.
Whenever my mother and I were scheduled to have visitation, the Anderson’s were most often in Manchester, spending time with my stepfather’s mother, or I would simply not go. When I chose not to go to their trailer, my mother would never call. She never called period. Again, my mother was blatantly leaving me behind. She had no desire for me whatsoever. Later, I assumed that she felt guilty about what she did, and what she failed to do at times, hence the crying, but I really wonder which of her emotions were real, and which were superficial.
There are various rights and privileges in the custody papers as to what my mother is to do, and what she is not to do. She has never adhered to a single one of them.
Communication between Crystal and me gradually dwindled down to nothing more than speaking only at Christmas and birthdays from the end of 2000, and into 2001.
The Anderson’s moved to Manchester to live on my stepfather’s mother’s property some time in 2001. I do not recall the exact date.
Now, here’s the irony. A few years after their move, the bank used by the Anderson’s repossessed the van my mother had purchased on May 8th, 2000. My mother then bought a used Mercury. After that, she bought a red 1996 Ford Explorer. They have two small boys. Edwin no longer holds a job.
Expanding upon her original description, Pearson says that because of the Fall, people experiencing this stage “may addictively misuse relationships, work, and/or religion as means to dull the pain and provide a spurious sense of safety” (Pearson 28). Life moved on. Everything changed. Over time I learned to simply bury my emotions, and, as a result, I developed a habit of not talking much with people, except in class. Ever since the sequence of events between the end of 1998 and the time Crystal moved, I have separated myself even further from other people. I do not often converse casually with other people in my grade. If I have an opinion that pertains to one of my classes, however, I speak my mind quite freely. I do not speak of many personal things with many people, least of all this. Usually I have to know a person very well, and feel that they are trustworthy before I am emotionally able to relate my story to them. When I find someone around my own age that I feel comfortable with, and can talk with openly about anything, I either cling to them too much, or I find other ways of pushing them away.
The state that Pearson claims follows the Fall is called the Orphan. She says that “the Orphans’ story is about a felt powerlessness, about a yearning for a return to a primal kind of innocence, an innocence that is fully childlike, where their every need is cared for by an all-loving mother or father figure. This yearning is juxtaposed against a sense of abandonment” (Pearson 28). I may have felt this way at one point, but it is no longer an emotion that is a part of me. My story is depressing, but I warn you: do not pity me, do not tell me that you are sorry for me, and (most importantly) do not feel sorry for me. There is no reason to pity me for any reason. I am not a lesser person because of my mother’s actions, my childhood, or my memories. If anything, I am stronger. Perhaps most of what makes the person I am today is an attempt to please others, but I am certainly not deprived of a family, or a life. I hereby leave behind the woman who gave birth to me, and refuse to ever again call her my mother. That was never a part of who she was to me. May I be open to whatever awaits me in my future, and may I be able to
move on. I am most definitely ready for it.
Works Cited
Birns, Beverly, and Dale F. Hay, eds. The Different Faces of Motherhood. New York: Plenum Press, 1988.
Cochran, Sandra Lenore. Telephone interview. Winter 2006-2007.
Dyvig, Paul G. and Lenore S. Personal interview. 2001.
Dyvig, Lenore S. "Journal 2000." Unpublished diary, 2000-2001.
The Family: A Proclamation to the World. Salt Lake City: The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, 1995.
Paul Gerald Dyvig v. Crystal Candy Anderson. No. 22,880. Chancery Ct. for the Seventeenth Judicial District Shelbyville, Bedford Co., TN. 5 May 2000.
Pearson, Carol S., Dr. "From Innocent to Orphan." The Hero Within. 1986. San Fransisco: Harper, 1989. 25-28.
Ridley, Matt. "What Makes You Who You Are." The Family. Ed. Kathleen R. Gilbert. 33rd ed. Dubuque IA: McGraw, 2007. 27.
Weaver, Richard. Telephone interview. 11 December 2006.
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