Susan's Place Transgender Resources

Or how close were you if she's no longer around?
I am very close to my mother. Sometimes I wonder if that's a good thing. I mean, she knows everything about me. Including all the sordid details. Some of which she knows because she was there and others I just ended up telling her for some ungodly reason. She knows a good number of my sexual exploits (not the play by play). She knows a good bit of my hopes and dreams. She's privy to most of my plans. Sometimes I feel weird and tell her I feel bad that I tell her everything! And my transitioning has only seemed to heighten the closeness because now she understands me and my actions a lot better. But she knows some of the uglier sides to me and I feel bad about that. 

How well should a mother know her son?

My mother was the one who did not tolerate any gender variance in me when I was a kid. She put me in the box so to speak. Worse, I'm the youngest so I'll never grow up in her eye, I'm her 43 year old baby. I visit her a few times a year but generally don't talk to her. I love my mother and worry about her but if I don't have to see her I won't.

My Mom is gone now.  And I miss her.  I think she knew something was up, because she always seem to treat me more like a daughter.

I have even been told I now look like her.  And that is strange because I was adopted.  But they do say that if you spent enough time with someone you will begin to look like them.

My mother, when I was real young was my best and only friend. She and I spent a lot of time together. After first grade we started to spend less time with each other and after third grade (during the time my parents started to work on their eventual divorce) she had closed herself completely off to me. It felt like she didn't want to be too close to me. I think she knew that she wouldn't get custody after the separation.

We've had a rough relationship after the separation, mostly during times when I would stay at her house for anything longer then over night. Over the last 15 years I've lived more than an hour drive from her and we don't spend much time on the phone. When we do talk the quality of our conversations are far better than they've been in a long time, but we need to take breaks from each other in order to have the desire to converse in a civil manor.

As mothers do, she constantly professes her love for me has said time and time again that she shouldn't have left us kids with our father after the separation and regrets ever closing herself off to me. And as any good son should do, I have forgiven her for all of the frustrations she has put me through while growing up.

But I still can't have the conversation with her telling her how I feel about myself.

I think it would break her heart to hear it and wonder if she should have seen the signs sooner.

I loved my mum. Sadly, for her, she was unable to show or give any affection. It made her incredably lonely and isolated.

She viewed any show of affection, even when she saw it, as distasteful. Though she tried very hard to pretend not to notice.

When she was older and living alone, I pestered the authorities to give her a sheltered flat, in a small area that was dedicated for older people. They had a warden on duty at all times and a community centre. She busied herself growing pot plants for the centre. But most of all, she found herself. Her last 4 years, she was relaxed, feeling more confident and didn't feel she needed to prove anything to anyone. She was very cold though, but that is what she always had been, Having children was a mistake for her.

My mom is my best friend. I don't know how in hell I would cope without her. Not just with trans stuff. With everything.

I guess i could get out the tape measure but i would say about 5 ft.  ;D

I must be close because when she messes herself i clean her up.. thankfully thats not too often unless i give her too much prunes.  hey she cleaned me

Yes i am her caregiver she is 88 and is almost like a child again. My siblings are very very happy someone in the family is doing it because they all have full lives..

She does do crosswords and likes to play with the kitty and a yardstick with a string and stick tied to it.

I had been doing some sort of help for her for 4 yrs now but i did have a break for 1 yr. However, now we are out in the country away from my siblings and living in my old mountain home near amish and farms and nature which we both love.

Yea i love her and well she was a head chemist of her hospital for 34 yrs and graduated in 1945 at an all womans college in Phila for chemistry which was all during the war years. She surely was ahead of her times.

but i would love a friend to move in here and share my farm and give me a break once in a while.

edited to add:  My mom knew all about my sexual / gender issues too ( i spent 4 months as a 12 yr old in a mental hospital for wearing womens clothes) and she never gave up on me when times were tough. She worked until she was 72 and then volunteered until 5 yrs ago and lost her drivers liscense about 13 months ago due to her kidney failing and her getting delierious and well she also went thru a divorce when i was 12 and she never dated again and has always been kind and giving to her 7 children who are all doing well. I am the middle child of 7 and of 11 due to miscarriages of two hermaphrodites twins and two others. Yes mom deserves anything she wants and i make sure i keep her butt clean and her clothes clean and she is warm at night even here with the wood stove which is actually warmer than her condo she has which sits empty but will soon be rented. I did run away at 13 to give her a break because she still had my 3 younger sisters to raise with dad gone.

We were very close, and we are incredibly alike, more so as I get older. I am now sadly coming to understand some aspects of her that I missed completely when she was alive.

My mother really understood my condition and paid for all my treatment.

My relationship with my mom is quite strange. I would say I am closer to her than my father only because I live with her, know her habits a bit more and also I have grown up being closer to my mom's side of the family a lot more than I am with my father's side. We don't get a long very well though; she's always trying to be happy go lucky yet I find it a bit childish of her so I get really serious.

I guess we don't get along very well not because I am her son but also because I'm very independent and my mom wants me to be dependent on her. Which is nice sometimes, however because I am the man of the house, I feel more like I have to take care of her and my younger sister than she does of me. My father even asked me to do this before a long time ago.

My mom and I fight/argue a lot over things however I wouldn't trade her for the world. I wish she would loosen up a bit though, sometimes. Overall she's very loving and have been pretty supportive of the choices I have made in life. (I would never tell her this to her face though, unfortunately)

My mom and I used to be pretty close, speaking at least twice a month, with me visiting her about every 6-8 weeks. She seemed very loving and interested in me up until I transitioned. Right about that same time, she fell into a debilitating depressive condition. I'm sure my gender issues played some part in it, but much of it was her inability to accept her aging.

Thankfully, she has at least partially recovered from the deepest part of her depression due to medications and therapy. Sadly, however, she still refuses to grapple with my "new" gender. It's been three long years since I've seen or have spoken to her. This has not been my choice. She's only this year sent a birthday and Christmas card.

Looking back now, I can see where she had very binary thinking when it came to gender expression. I also realize that she was always very socially conscious of other people's opinions of her. She once asked me, "what will your neighbors think?" She saw their opinion as more important than my mental health. Of course, I'm sure she must just see this as a ridiculous late lifestyle decision. I'm not sure.

Still, I hold out hope that we will someday reconcile. I only hope that it's not too late, being that she and my father are getting up there in age.  :'(

I'm raised by my grandparents, but I'm close to my bio mom too.

My mom is more liberal and easy to talk to about stuff then my grandparents. She's one of those "express yourself" type parents.

My mom and i are very close. I am the live in primary live in caregiver. She still can do some things for herself but she does not drive anymore and only does the laundry,cooking and dishes now. She can't bend down to much so i do most of the rest of the house work and some of the outside work. It's worked out well as neither one of us can really afford it by ourselves. We do get along fairly well but it's a little  disconcerting that we can finish each others sentences. We think wayyyyyy to much alike.  :laugh:
Both of us are very much alike so it makes life a bit interesting  :)

Quote from: SarahM777 on February 13, 2011, 05:03:12 PM
My mom and i are very close. I am the live in primary live in caregiver. She still can do some things for herself but she does not drive anymore and only does the laundry,cooking and dishes now. She can't bend down to much so i do most of the rest of the house work and some of the outside work. It's worked out well as neither one of us can really afford it by ourselves. We do get along fairly well but it's a little  disconcerting that we can finish each others sentences. We think wayyyyyy to much alike.  :laugh:
Both of us are very much alike so it makes life a bit interesting  :)

Thats sounds like my mom 4 to 5 yrs ago but now since my mom had a kidney failure in nov 2009 that made her lose a lot of her faculties.

Quote from: M2MtF2FtM on February 13, 2011, 05:13:54 PM
Thats sounds like my mom 4 to 5 yrs ago but now since my mom had a kidney failure in nov 2009 that made her lose a lot of her faculties.

Do you remember being a little kid and saying you were never going to be like your parents? I just had a scary thought I am becoming like my mom  :D

Suuuuper close! She has been my confidante and friend since I was young. She always encouraged me and was there to listen if I needed to talk.She has been very supportive of my transition and she was there when I had surgery, which meant the world to me :) I love her so much!

My mom and I aren't very close, despite living in the same house. She used to be like a friend to me when I was younger, but her business always kept her away from me a lot. 

Now in her life, she followed my great-grandfather and grandfather and has become extremely fundamentalist Christian. That has lead to some difficulties between us because she tries to force me to be as religious as she is. My mom is also pretty verbally hateful of my masculine appearance, and I can almost never tell her anything of my life because I know she'd instantly get angry or go into a lecture about how such-and-such is against her god's will.

She is able to get things done and stand up for people, which I admire, and she was able to life herself out of an extremely bad childhood, but I can't get close to her other than on so-called "neutral" subjects.

We used to be very close. Now Im almost never home and she always says that she misses me. I want to become closer again, because I feel bad. It just really aggrivates me because I had a talk with her before saying that I wanted to be a boy, and she just pretends like we never talked. I wish I could be more open with her.

Not very close. I spent years troubled by the thought I didn't love her. In my thirties I figured out that I do love her, I just don't like the woman. She is 79, I have no plans to tell her I crossdress, it would just be one more thing for her to criticize.

I've always been the duplicate of my mother having quite a likeness to her and also having a similar personality we are both good at hiding pain. we were pretty close especially compared to my sister who is my fathers duplicate. After I came out to her however she's been distant and gradually getting more so and dosen't want to talk to me.

She refuses to call me by my new name or use female pronouns in reference to me I only occasionally speak to her these days.

Very close. It started with me being autistic in my first years (later diagnosed with Asperger when I was 18), she was the only one who was there for me and she understood me when no one else did, so for many years she was my world. She knows way too much about me, but my GID? No. That part I left out, until I came out 8 months ago. Now she feels like she doesn't know me anymore. She's accepting, but she says she has to see me as a new person, which is sad.

I know what you mean though. I still tell her way too much stuff, feels like I probably shouldn't. Am I kind of troubling or weighing her down needlessly with everything I tell her? That's what I ask myself. I sometimes don't know what's appropriate and what isn't.
But then, she's gotten so used to me telling everything nowadays that if I seem to leave something out she insists to hear it anyway. Ah well :P

I used to be very close to my Mom but we had a hard time through high school.  My step father was abusive and she didn't help.  My GID kept me from getting too close to anyone.   Last year they divorced.

I wrote her a coming out letter yesterday.  I am anti-letter and have told most people in person but didn't have the guts to call my Mom.  Today has been a hard day as she hasn't responded to the email or answered her phone.  I don't know what's going on..maybe she went out of town for the day. 

I want to reconnect with and love and feel love from my Mom again.  We'll see.

Limbo.

I love my mom, I do, but she can be a bit much sometimes. She's a very lovey person and I like my personal space so she gets offended if I don't feel like hugging her. I don't know why but I've never been very big on letter her into my space. I want to, but something stops me inside.

I'm afraid she'll aways see me as her daughter. She doesn't like that I still wear men's clothes and she's always wanting me to wear dresses and girly things. I told her those things make me very uncomfortable so she stopped pushing as much. She does comment and I hear "pull up your pants, you're not a boy" very often. I don't like it.

I'm very close with my dad though but that is becoming off topic.

Ugh, that old bat is close minded and stuck in the past, she'll certainly freak out when she finds out about me. Hopefully she'll get over it, but she's a very stubborn woman. All my other relatives are in Thailand, so, she'll be the only family I'll have here.

I'm a momma's boy. My mom is my world to be honest. Before I came out to her I would have not transitioned if it would have meant loosing her if that says anything. She's my best friend and my protector. Thankfully she is because my dad really doesn't exist in my life even when he was still living with me.

My mother is very important to me, and I love her very much.  However, she and I have a very hard time understanding each other.  We think on different wavelengths and have different perspectives on life, which can create issues, but we generally get along.  Still, she's not the first person I would choose to discuss my life with.

My mom and I have a good relationship. She just did my T shot an hour ago :) She came out for me to all of her friends (We live in a neighborhood that resembles the Real Housewives of... series.) which meant possibly losing her friends, so that she could start using male pronouns full time. Even growing up, with all my social anxiety issues and dropping out of school every year until 8th grade, she went against everyone, even her husband and her parents, to do what she felt was right for me, which was therapists and homeschooling and medication.

My Mom homeschooled me for about six years, so we spent a lot of time together.  Living with my emotionally abusive sister and Dad was tough on both of us, and we seemed to be the only people who understood each other.  Being homeschooled also meant I didn't have a lot of friends growing up.  My Mom was the only friend I had during my childhood, pretty much.  So, several factors came together and resulted in us being very close.  We still get along great, although I won't be seeing her again until my birthday in June.  I feel like she knows and understands me better than almost anyone else, and she feels the same about me.
I must say, I am extremely proud of her right now.  She has allowed people to control and abuse her for her entire life, and finally stood up and said "no more."  She is experiencing ultimate freedom right now and I couldn't be happier for her.

Well lets see...in terms of character, incredibly close, but emotionally close...no not really. My mother has always had a certain aloofness in her character and as time has progressed we have drifted further and further apart...I used to worry that transitioning would mean i'd loose my familly, but then i realised that in a way, i already had. They brought me up to be independent and strong minded and it worked...i wonder sometimes if they regret how succesful they were.

I was never really close to her. I'm not sure she gets close to anybody. I think she lives in fear of having close relationships...fear of giving up a part of herself, that way.

Mind you, we used to talk shop all the time. She's the Head of Technology at the school district in her area and I used to work there as well ...... but we never had heart to heart talks. =(

I'm very close with my mother, I feel as though she is my best emotional support for everything, though it's not the perfect relationship because I feel like I get on her nerves at times because I can be a bit wanting of affection, like I will tell her I love her and miss her very often (since I don't really have any friends in person, most of my online contacts are 'aquantences', where they are kind of your friend but not really.)

My father on the other hand, for some reason I get the feeling he doesn't like me very much, he is very insensitive to me and my feelings, he NEVER thinks before he speaks and is very hesitant to apologize to me when he has offended me. Then he gets defensive and claims he's 'not perfect'. He treats me like I'm just some random person living in the same house as him. Combine all that with extreme bi-polar tendencies, possible aspergers, and a bad temper and you don't have that nice of a father. Infact my half-brother (father's son and another woman's before he married my mother) commited suicide a few years ago, and my father said that he would have done anything to help prevent it, but I tell him that I feel suicidal sometimes too (when my psychiatric medicine runs out of my system and I get very depressed) and he doesn't really care, I try to tell him how upset he makes me but he just seems to ignore me.

Sorry about talking about my mother and father, since this seems to be the 'mom' thread, but I just wanted to voice that.  :P

Laruza.

One of the most important things I learnt is that no-one has to like anyone. Sometimes, a parent, a family member, anyone, just doesn't like us and frequntly, we don't like them.

But it's never a reflection on you, me or anyone else. It's just chemistry.

@ spacial: Perfectly said.

I love my mom to death. Granted, we are not extremely close. I prefer not to discuss my personal life with her, but I'm not really the sharing type. She is sweet, caring, and one of the most understanding people I know. She creates the very definition of "Unconditional Love". She found out that I dated both women and men, and didn't bat an eyelash. I have a feeling she is even at least getting some hints regarding my ->-bleeped-<-. Nothing about who I am seems to disappoint her, and I love her for it.

Unfortunately not very close.  I think the only time I've ever seen the real person she is, was when she was separated from my dad for 6 months.  I would have liked to have gotten to know that person.
.
While she's nice and kind and I care about her a great deal...when living with my dad, she's completely under his thumb....and it's hard to tell where he ends and she begins.  I avoid my dad whenever humanly possible (even on the few occasions I do visit each year).   While I don't avoid my mom actively in the same way...because she gives up all sense of self when with him, I have to avoid telling her even the most mundane things, else deal with my dad's BS.  I suppose I consider my parents to be a lost cause.  Like Helena, I lost them long ago.  Coming out to them this year certainly won't improve matters between us.
.
I guess I've found that in the absence of healthy family relationships,
that it's better to focus on the people around you.  Those that know you
for who you are, and truly care about you.  Close friends that are there
for you, and you for them.  To me, that's my real family.  The one that matters.

I love my mom, but I don't like her.  Few people do.  She is trying, so I'm trying to be a bigger person and facilitate the relationship.  But that's mostly because she's still my mom and I love her, and it's just so damn sad to see a worn out, lost, lonely 61 year old women with no resources.  I really do feel for her, but she hurt me a lot, and I'm still healing from it.  She didn't mean to hurt me, but she let her own pain and fear guide her actions, so she did.  Without being a drug addict, sexually abusing me, or putting me around people who would do those things around/to me, she really couldn't have ->-bleeped-<-ed up more, which is sad to say (though am really grateful that she didn't also do those things- lots of kids have far worse mothers I know.) 

Maybe later she'll pull her head out of her ass, and stop playing the victim every moment.  Maybe then we could be close.  I can hope. :)

My mother and I were never very close but she has long since passed on, before I finally transitioned.

She knew about my gender issues and tried to ignore them. My father was more understanding.

Caroline

In the last week my mom said she can't do crosswords anymore. I wonder what that menas. Is she getting tired of living? What are the next steps to most at 88 who just can't use their minds anymore. She does love kitty cat and plays with a string and a stick with kitty but she seems to have given up on any real thinking stuff. I know i will surely be alone when she passes.  :'( :'(

I am very close to my mom, and she is supportive of my transition.

My mom is like my best friend, she tells me about her problems, and I tell her mine, I call her at least once a day.

I would be closer to my dad, but he lives in texas and I dont see him much anymore

I have noticed that I have become closer to my mom sence moving out and going to college, I think I have become more mature and her and I are less of child/mother and more of adult friends

she told me to do one......
going flip reverse and contrdictig .
i will live without her in my life now for ever.
my brothers and sisters are fine.
she has lost the title of mum and now miss .

As a kid, I was never close to my mum, but I was always over-protective of her (even if I was a kid and completely useless). Even though, we don't have much in common, I feel closer to her. She can be a bit annoying and weird, but I was really shocked about how supportive of me she is. It's wonderful.

Very close. She's just the greatest! ^-^

Very close, always have been. She's the only reason I lived through catholic school.

Throughout my childhood and teenage years, she was the closest person to me, the one I could always talk to and let down my walls partially.  She's a very caring and empathetic person.  For some reason, when I transitioned she thought she was losing the child she had and getting a 'replacement'.  I tried to convince I've always been the same person, but she just just refused to hear it.  These days, whenever I'm around she acts like I'm just some random acquaintance and acts politely neutral, until I try to speak to her as my mother like I did in the past.  Apparently this similarity between myself and... myself... is"disrespecting the memory of her son."  She literally feels that the child she had died and I'm some sort of personality that came to exist recently.  Oddly, she's not too homophobic or transphobic when it comes to others, she just cannot make the connection between who I am and who I was. 

In other words, she's grieving an imaginary person, which is just a little confusing for me since *I* don't remember being another person.  Sigh... wonderful, huh?  It's such a silly view I'm tempted to just laugh about it, except it cost me having a mother. 

Why can't people see the same person despite gender?  I mean, she has to know subconsciously that her view is pretty unrealistic.

I'm really close to my mum but i'm not sure that's a good thing. My mum does what she can to keep me close, she's always discouraged me from doing anything that would make me independant. She discouraged me from going out with mates, getting a job, learning life skills like cooking etc I resent her for it, don't think she knows that though. Still I love her and apart from her keeping me too close we do have a decent relationship.

Yah!! Great news and so happy for you Dee_Pntx

Congrats Dee!

Quote from: Dee_pntx on February 19, 2011, 05:57:22 AM
"How close are you to your Mom? "

Oh, about three feet. 

She's in the front seat of the car riding next to my dad, I'm in the back seat and we are on the way to San Mateo for my SRS on Tuesday.
So I would say about three feet..

;)

I'd say that's pretty darn close. Congrats Dee!

I was fairly close to mom. She raised 4 of us alone and she had enough love for us all. I did come out to her in the late '70s. She loved me just the same. She's been gone 20 years now. Luv you, Mom!
Joelene.

My mom just asked me "should we get a sex change for you? you act more like a guy then a girl." How should I have reacted to that?  :(

I'm very close to my mother. She is awesome people!

I truly believe she's a sociopath. She got full custody of me when I was 5 and I moved away from her as soon as I was able to at 18, in those 13 years we never struck up a relationship. I cut off all contact with her a little earlier than the rest of my family, I just couldn't deal with her without extreme stress and I feel guilty about it - knowing that as she has reached retirement age she has almost no friends and no partner - but I still just can't deal with her.

Nope.... my relationship with my Ma has/is always been v.difficult, prickly and just not a workable reality...

I was a true 'Daddy's' girl.... but he's no longer around, he died sadly almost a decade ago now.... and i will always miss him dreadfully....  :'(

Quote from: Brent123 on February 20, 2011, 03:57:06 PM
My mom just asked me "should we get a sex change for you? you act more like a guy then a girl." How should I have reacted to that?  :(

Bit late now, but you might have said YES!

There is no relationship between me and my mother.  At all.  And there ever will be one.  I consider her to be pure evil.  We haven't spoken in 2 years now since I left home.  and I never plan on speaking to her for the rest of my life.  and I don't feel guilty about it.

I'm sorry to hear that John. Everyone should have loving parents, I think.
I'm not close to my mother, although I suspect she doesn't know that. I just don't like how she reacts to things so I don't share much with her.

Sooner or later I will have to "talk" to her though...

I talk to my mom bout once a month sometimes more but usually i keep my distance. i love the woman But she is such a pain. I havent told her im transitioning yet but i have the letter ready Im waiting for after my birthday. the thing is we have had so many problems in the past its gonna be a while before its all better. however not living in her house really makes it easy. she was for the most part a single parent and raised me and my brothers. but she pretty much had a open door policy with her boyfriends. she would openly tell us not to tell Guy A about Guy B and never mention Guy C to guy A&B. It was horrible trying to keep up with her. I raised my brothers for the most part i was to keep them in line but never be their parent. my brother once called me mom and she jumped through the roof. She also has been trying to demolish my relationship with my girlfriend since it started. she has gotten better over the last 2 years tho. I started telling her what I was going to do for holidays and birthdays and what not and she doesnt try to control me as much. she is even paying for me to get my insurance sales agent licence and when i passed my first course she said she was proud of me. that is somthing that she hasnt said since I was in middle school and i made the best GPA jump in the school. Im 22 now and hopefully in another year or two we wil start to clear the air a bit more.

I am quite close to my mom. she is my only family in town. she has been thru a lot with my dealing with depression and such. I think my biggest fear now is coming out to her.

I've actually become closer to all my family members who know I'm trans and transitioning. My entire family doesn't know yet but the most important ones do.

It's completely opposite from what I excepted- I expected to lose everyone. I have lost some people but no blood relatives (yet anyway). My transition has actually brought the family a little closer together. I am blessed about that.

I got closer to my mum after I came out to her. Now i can confide in her about my feelings, not just about transition. It wasn't like that before.

Not.

I wasn't very close to my mother when I was a kid. In fact, I was afraid of her. She's bipolar and she hadn't any adequate medicines/help when I was little, so that might be why she was weird and scary. Nowadays she's a lot better, has gotten adequate help and is more like a normal human.

I'm a lot closer to my father, it's him I go to when I have problems in life.

How close am I to my Mom?  Not very.  We used to be pretty close.  We always got along well.  She often said I was the only one of her kids who never gave her any problems.  When I was in my early 20's I lived with her for a few months while trying to get myself established (the rest of my siblings were with my father).  We spent many an evening together sitting and talking.  She told me she always enjoyed that time.

My mom knew there was something about me that made me different.  While I was living with her she showed me an old playbill from The Baton Club.  She said my dad took her there one time.  I had never heard of it but when I saw these gorgeous "female impersonators" I was awestruck.  I never gave the playbill back to her.  I treasured it.

While I was there, my mom "had the talk" with me.  I didn't know much about it, just that I liked to dress in girl's clothes.  I never admitted to anyone I had been wishing I was a girl for as long as I could remember.  My mom suggested therapy.  She knew someone I could see for $15 per session.  That was in 1972 but it was doable.

I went to the first session and started off with "I like to dress in girl's clothes."  Within a few weeks the sessions were totally about my father, who, at the time, I hated.  So did my mom.  The therapy always made me feel better so I went for a couple of months until I no longer had anything to talk about.  I had moved out and left my mom with my sister, who had moved in shortly after me.

A few years later my mom joined a born again church called, "The Church."  They told their members that anyone outside the church could not be trusted and that they all needed to bring their family and friends in.  My mom was a recovering alcoholic and needed support.  She got sucked in, with the encouragement of my sister, and little by little withdrew from any of her children who were not church members.  "You're not saved," she would often say.  One day she called me and said, "I will not be able to call you anymore.  It's a toll call and I can't afford it."  She lived 20 miles away.  Our conversations cost her about two dollars.  I later found out the church demanded at least 10% of your income.  My mom gave them more.

She sort of turned into a zombie over the years.  All the sparkle in her eyes was gone as was her zest for life.  Me and a few of my siblings did our best to try to open her eyes and get her out of there but the church had her and my sister and her husband had become church elders and were in her ear constantly. 

A couple of years ago we took her out for a Mother's Day lunch.  She sat next to me.  She leaned over to me and quietly said in my ear, "I accept you."  That was nice and I thought it might lead to us getting closer again.  But she went back to her church.

My mom just turned 84.  We hardly ever talk.  There's just nothing to say.