A letter to my mum... this is how you broke me

In Kenya, unloving mums is still a topic discussed in hushed tones, but many people are living with remnants of trauma inflicted during childhood.

 You made me grow up feeling replaceable

From when I was a tiny girl, I realised that you punished me differently. You’d beat me mercilessly as if you were beating up a thief.

I remember this one time when I was a teenager. You threw a wooden stool at me. I cried. You then followed with blows, kicks and bites. I still have a big scar, wearing it like a badge of honour, thanks to an awful mother.

I kept doubting if you were really my mother. Every time you beat me, and it was many, many times, you’d say, “Nakupiga nikuue. Kwani kuzaa mwingine ni kazi? Ni rahisi. Nakuvunjavunja nikupeleke hosi halafu nikupige tena.”

I was that replaceable. That is how I grew up feeling — very replaceable.

I saw other children love their families. I wondered what it really felt like to love and be loved by family members.

I saw how their parents were compassionate. I watched how they’d be hugged.

Do you know there is no single day you ever asked me about my day? Even when I got sick, my sickness never bothered you much, unless I looked like I was dying.

Now that I am grown up, I keep asking myself why I still come home.

The truth is I have no longing to see you, but being your firstborn, I try to show my siblings that you are still our mother.

So, we come home.

But do you know what pains me the most? I am sure you know. You cannot be that terrible of a mother.

Remember, your brother-in-law raped me.

When I told you, you listened but did nothing. You said he was your sister’s husband. Did you even tell her that her husband raped me?

I doubt it.

But you always choose the other person. You did when you sided with my ex-boyfriend. Not once.

Mum, I would like you to know that you failed as a mother.

You left me with trauma that I’m sceptical about having my own children.

Something else: stop treating me like some backup plan.

Mum, you have turned me into your husband, your bank account. I know this is the only reason you call me: I put food on the table, pay your rent and fees for my siblings, plus your maintenance.

If you died today, I would not grieve the same way a child would grieve for their mum.

You failed as a mum and as a woman.

You don’t even know who I truly am.

I wish you knew how smart I am.

I wish you would not stop feeling as though it is your right to be provided for.

Mum, sometimes I am broke or cannot afford to pay for your needs, but you never understand that I, too, need to use my money for my own things.

I’m certain that if I lose my job today, the next thing you will ask is, “How will we survive, pay bills, and chamas?”

It is because of you that I never grew up and became a normal woman.

 Signed by your wounded daughter

You hated me, and now you loathe my children

 Why does my relationship with my father make you uneasy? He is my father and he is your husband. What will it take for you to understand that those are two different relationships?

You once yelled at me that I was behaving like I was dating dad!

Then you told me that you’d denounce me as your child.

The first time you told me that, I was only nine years old.

I know housework is important but, surely, delaying washing utensils did not warrant the constant “I should know that this is the day you stop being my daughter” remarks.

I was gifted in poetry and dance. I know now because I have seen people making a living off their talents. But you never nurtured my talents.

Rather, you scolded and undermined me to the extent that I lost my confidence. You compared me to your favourite daughter.

I stopped coming home often because you had become my source of anxiety, heartbreak and emotional pain. But I miss home, I come only because dad asks me to.

What shocks me is that you were a difficult mother to me and you have become a horrible grandmother. But only to my children. Not my sister’s children.

I am an adult, also a parent. Why can’t you stop hurling insults and abusive words at me in front of my children? When I left my children with you, you favoured my sister’s. You beat up mine and abused them but treated my sister’s children better. What did they do to deserve such ill-treatment from their own grandmum?

I don’t want you to hurt my children like you hurt me.

When I went into business, I thought you’d give me tips. You never did yet you have run businesses for more than 40 years.

Maybe if you supported me, I would be a more confident person. I’d easily choose what is right for me. I’d also have more strength to deal with fears in business.

I remember you once told me that I should not be showing you my tears. To whom should I show my tears? Why is it so hard for you to love me like you love my sisters?

Mum, I am not and have never been your competitor. My dad is your husband and he is my father. As much as he loves me, I also need a mother’s love.

 Signed by your pained daughter

 I will hurt forever because you chased me away from home

 My pain stems from my name. You named me after someone that you and your relatives resented. But you blame the naming on culture. You are my mother. You had a choice.

I wish you had given me a different name.

People, I mean outsiders, say my name is beautiful, but it has brought immense pain not only to my siblings but also to our relatives.

Out of the many unspeakable names that you called me, I remember this one day that you called me a prostitute. You were angry then. It was about boys. But I wish you never called that. I wish you knew how to tame your anger.

The men you saw me hanging out with, promised they would give me a job. That job was to be an escape from you and dad.

You had absconded from your responsibilities as parents and I was just looking for ways to survive.

I may have seemed naïve but I was not getting intimate with those men. And I told you so.

But you did not believe me. It pains me. Who calls her daughter a prostitute?

All through primary and high school, I was the brightest child of all your children but, mum, you never told me how good I was. I wanted so badly to hear you say, “You are a brilliant girl, my daughter, and you will succeed.”

Another thing that you failed in was helping me understand my body.

I grew up knowing that having a big bosom was wrong. My siblings teased me, many times. I came to you crying but you never stopped them or made them understand that I was just different.

It pains me because I developed low self-esteem because of just having bigger boobs than an average teenager.

I grew up believing that I was beautiful.

Mum, I wish you supported me rather than demean and berate me.

I remember when I started a business, and you would use all my material for what you thought was good rather than what the client had ordered and try to bulldoze your way. I wish you never interfered with my business, going behind my back and changing prices for clients. I wish you would just let me grow my business the way I knew best.

I wish you never chased me from home. Of all the traumas, I’m yet to heal from this.

Mum, having different opinions on what time to do chores, and having a boyfriend who truly loves me, was really not a reason for chasing me from home.

You keep asking why I don’t come home often. But every time I do, the memories of you chasing me away make me want to turn back.

Mum, I wish you treated me the same as my siblings. They always had leeway but didn’t. I remember the day my brother got home past midnight and you did not throw a fit.

My sister, too, came home a bit tipsy from a nightclub and you were okay. However, when I came home at 10am from tutoring a relative’s child within the estate, you blew off.

“Sleep wherever you are. I’m tired of opening the door for you,” read your SMS. This tore me to pieces. But you didn’t notice.

Mum, you shouldn’t have shared your differences with Dad with us.

I wish you saw a therapist to help you deal with the pain you said he caused you instead of transferring it to us.

We are your children. We did not need to know the details of your affairs or his affairs. You got divorced, anyway, so why do you keep repeating the same, same story?

I wish you respected boundaries; the parent-child boundaries.

Can you imagine you have never, ever, called me “my daughter”?

Mum, you have never claimed me. I am an adult now but my inner child yearned for that word: “My daughter is brilliant. My daughter is beautiful.”

That would have made me walk around this world feeling like I belong.

Your actions have shown them that you didn’t really want me. I have a lot of resentment that I only hope I will heal.

When I told my partner that he was set to meet a toxic mother-in-law, he thought I was joking. In public, you are the model mum. Like a chameleon, you never show your true colours. But mum you are a narcissist, and in your world, you only care about your own selfish gains.

Signed by your heartbroken daughter

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