Not sure what to do ....
Hello American friends,
Bit of a dilemna, and I think I know what you will all say. As I have posted recently, my stepdaughter took the brave decision to write to her mum telling her she doesn't want to see her or speak to her. A very angry letter was written from a very angry 13 year old girl. That was just over a week ago now, and mum would have received the letter a week ago. We have heard absolutely nothing from her, neither has my SD. If mum were to phone her she wouldn't answer her call, and if she were to phone my husband's phone to speak to her daughter, she still wouldn't speak to her because she doesn't want to. Fair enough. But, every day she's asked if her mum has mailed anything to her, and yesterday there was a handwritten envelope in the mail, which she saw, and said 'is that from my mum?'. It wasn't. I asked her if she was upset by this, and she said 'not really, but I wish she would respond, just so I know she cares'.
The dilemna we're in is this - do we text mum to suggest she writes to her daughter? Part of me wants to text her and shout at her for being so damned cold and ask her who the hell she thinks she is, but another part just thinks 'if she cared she'd get in touch', and just leave it and let her dig the hole she's in even further. She is an alcoholic after all. On my last thread someone (sorry can't remember who) said that she would be throwing a 'pity party', which I would imagine she has. She is very much 'woe is me', and nothing, of course, is ever her fault. But we are all very surprised and somewhat shocked that she hasn't even attempted to contact her child, to say sorry, beg for forgiveness, beg her daughter not to abandon her. I would imagine she's feeling pretty crap right now (deservedly so), and I know her mind doesn't work like normal people's. We just want to do what's best for this child, and thinking about it, prompting her mum to write to her isn't what's best for her because mum needs to do it off her own back.
God she's so damned selfish.
One good thing though, which is interesting actually is this. My stepdaughter, since the age of about 6, has cleared her throat constantly, and I mean constantly, like every couple of minutes or so. She has always described the feeling of a lump in her throat, and we always put it down to anxiety (globus). A little while ago we took her to our GP about it because it was getting worse, and sure enough the GP agreed it could be anxiety but wanted her to have tests for asthma to make sure it wasn't that. It wasn't. So, we were going to see if counselling lessened it, and if it didn't, help her with some behavioural therapies to improve it. Anyway, after she wrote that letter to her mum last week it has suddenly improved, and she hardly does it now!! Just the odd one, occasionally. She says she doesn't feel like she has a lump in her throat anymore!! What's sad about that of course, is that poor kid has been made to feel anxious by her mother for the past 8 years, and the fact that it's near enough stopped since she told her mum to 'do one' shows that this woman is detrimental and toxic in her life. What kind of a position will that put us in should she ever resume contact with her mum and the throat clearing problem starts again! A bridge to cross if and when we get to it I guess.