A Stroke of Love /// Emotional Wellness

what drives a person’s behavior.

A sad truth is that it is hurt people, who hurt people. In learning to understand my mother’s behavior, I came to hold compassion for the things she experienced before I entered her life. I came to understand that she was a victim of circumstances beyond her control, thrown into a life not of her choosing at a time when cultural norms dictated that her wishes did not matter.

She was married at the age of 15, to someone she didn’t know. I appreciate now that she knew nothing of sex at the time. Child abuse? Rape? The words that aptly describe what she experienced are difficult for me to contemplate. She bore children whom she felt incapable of nurturing. I have come to hold compassion for her wish to abort me, the unknown daughter that would come to her after three boys. I have come to understand that motherhood is not something that could be thrust on a woman. A woman must be ready and willing to accept that role. I have come to appreciate that when my mother calls me “selfish” for not having children myself, she may in fact be masking an envy of my independence and freedom of choice — things that she never enjoyed.

I came to understand these things before my mother suffered her stroke. I see now that it was ample preparation for a further understanding — that I do in fact love this woman who could never give me love. I hold immense compassion for the things she endured, including the things that I may never know. I hold great admiration for her resilience, recuperating from her stroke much faster than her doctors anticipated. I wonder now at the many things that resilience may have helped her survive.

The journey to this understanding has been life-long and never easy. But it has been liberating. As our parents age we are forced to accept their, and indeed our own, mortality. I am grateful that I have come to this understanding and acceptance during my mother’s lifetime. I am grateful that I can accept that a mother’s love is something that I may never know. And I am grateful that through my mother’s stroke, I came to know that I am capable of the love for which I have always yearned.