Dear Mom: Too Mature

Dear Mom,

You once said you thought you should have held me back in school. Age-wise, I was a full year younger than my classmates - which I assume is what your concern was. It certainly couldn't have been my maturity. I was more mature than most of my classmates - more mature than I should have been at such a young age.

You knew - you had to know - that dad let me watch Revenge of the Nerds when I was 8; a rated R movie with obvious sex. I fully understood how sex worked by the time I was in 4th grade.

You also had to know that your discretion was non-existent. But...maybe not. Maybe I'm giving you too much credit. I mean, I did have the unfortunate task of lying to my little brother to comfort him when he overheard the sounds coming through your closed door (and the floor above his room). Then I had the additional discomfort of telling you and dad that your precious baby boy had overheard your exploits.

Exploits I'd been hearing almost my entire life.

I remember being woken up in the middle of the night (at least to my 6 year old brain) to the sound of you in what I though was distress - only to realize very quickly, once my sleepy stupor wore off, that you were not in distress. Our bedrooms were right next to each other, sharing a wall, our doors lined up side-by-side in an apartment with paper thin walls.

I remember being 9 years old, going to sleep with my window open and hearing what sounded like a baby crying outside. When I stood at my window, it sounded more like a cat yowling. Again, it didn't take long for me to realize what it really was - spilling loudly from your open bedroom window that hot summer night.

I remember coming home one day from a friend's house, unexpectedly apparently, and walking in on you. That image is burned in my brain - but you didn't even notice. To this day, I wonder where my infant brother (at the time) was while you were otherwise engaged. Was he in the room with you? Sleeping soundly while you did the deed? I can't remember.

My entire childhood is peppered with the sound of my parents' intimate interactions. Mother, I recall vividly how you would rush to the bathroom after each encounter and promptly throw up while dad vigorously washed his hands (at least, I assume it was his hands - now that I'm an adult with my own experiences, I'm considering that in a new light... one I don't want to even consider so I'll stop now).

I'm out of the house now, have been for years - but those sounds and images still haunt me. Recently, my brother - fully grown himself, but living at home - made a comment to the same affect, and I realized that after I left he had to live with the same discomfort that colored my childhood.

Now, there is absolutely nothing wrong with sex. I have no problem with sex. But, I have to wonder how much your choices impacted my life - how much did your lack of discretion affect me? Sex is fine, but a child should not have to be exposed constantly to their parents' intimate moments.

Honestly, the more I think about it, the more I realize that you didn't care about discretion. You didn't think it was necessary. Because I was just a child, what did I know? Surely your exploits wouldn't wake me, your sounds wouldn't concern me, the experience wouldn't scar me.

Maybe, if you had been a different parent, those things would be true. But we didn't talk about sex in our house. It was a taboo subject. In fact, I can count on one hand the number of times sex was discussed.

1. When you got pregnant with my brother - I was 7 and dad sat me down and asked me if I knew what sex was. (The look on his face was one of shock when I explained it to him - nothing like hearing those words come out of a child's mouth).

2. When I was in 8th grade and wanted to go to the school dance with my "boyfriend" - Dad spent over an hour giving me "the talk" because he was so concerned the reason I wanted to go to the dance was because I wanted to have sex. You followed up later with a simple "don't have sex right now, you're too young." (I didn't want to have sex, by the way. Wasn't even thinking about it. It was my first school dance ever and I had a boyfriend - every preteen girl's dream. It was honestly that simple.)

3. When I was 18 and told you I was moving out - you yelled at me that I was going on birth control if I was going to live with my boyfriend. I told you "no" and that I know how condoms work.

That's it. The entirety of our parent-led discussions about sex. In truth, everything I learned about sex came from school, media, and living through your not-so-discreet nighttime activities.

I honestly can't say how living through that impacted me - at least not the specific act itself. But as I write this and reflect on that, I realize that another aspect of that entire situation did impact me and it affects our relationship to this day.

Throughout all of that, you showed complete and utter disregard for me as an actual person. I was a child so I didn't matter. If I heard you, so what? You were never concerned about me unless I was making life difficult for you.

Disrespect, disregard, unconcerned, uncaring. Themes from my childhood.

And I know you'll read this and think I'm making a big deal out of nothing, that I'm being dramatic and bratty, that it didn't happen like that.

Because that's what you always do.

I was never too young to be in the grade I was in in school.

I was too young to be a part of your sex life.

And we'll never talk about it but it will always color our relationship - and it will have an affect on your relationship with your grandchild.

Because it's not just about the sex and my becoming way more mature than I should have been at a young age. It's about everything that came with, and will always come with, that experience - the disrespect, disregard, and so much more.

So much more.

Sincerely, Me.