Happy Baggage

There’s nothing that reminds me of my childhood like my own children. In some ways, it’s scary. Their innocence makes me question how I ever survived the things I’ve been through. I can’t imagine my kids hearing me yell at their father, let alone watch us physically fight. I can’t imagine my kids without clean sheets, let alone sleeping outside. As a mother, my heart breaks for the younger me. It breaks for my mom, too, because I know she’ll forever feel a guilt I’ve never placed over her. There are some things you don’t come back from.

Having my own kids brings the memories. Their fragility reminds me of how many stomach aches I used to have. Everyday, I sat in the nurse’s office. I had switched schools so many times, my memory confuses the hallways, but I remember walking down the corridor, pass in hand, relieved to get away from the classroom. I think I faked many stomach aches just so I could leave. The idea of focusing of multiplication tables while my mother was off, doing who knows what, was impossible. My world was survival.

I didn’t understand addiction or why my mother stayed with her abusive boyfriend. I am not sure that any kid could. All I knew is that my mother made bad choices and sometimes it was better that I should be there just in case she made another one. And maybe, perhaps if I was with her, I wouldn’t have to worry if she would come pick me up. There were a few times she forgot, but friends, I was afraid for her life.

I know that feeling when my two year old screams as I leave the room. I know it well. Only I wasn’t two, I was probably around Aidan’s age, 8. I look at Aidan, who doesn’t even notice when I leave the house sometimes, and can’t  imagine a child feeling so helpless. But that was me, a lifetime ago. And now I’m here, always here for my kids, never wanting them to know what I have known.

School made me feel everything that was wrong with my life. The contrast between my friends with their new shoes, talking about their latest Goose Bumps book, while just the other day I had waited in a line at food pantry and ate bread straight out of the bag. The teacher, using good wholesome language, acting as if childhood was all unicorns and rainbows, oblivious that I was grown just like her. I had seen shit she’d probably only ever read about. Then there was the office, constantly calling me up to get the number to the phone I didn’t have. In every way it could, the system failed me.

Sigh.

I homeschool my kids. Bet you didn’t see that coming, did ya?

A lot of people ask me why. A lot of people think it’s ridiculous. I mean, people in my life, not just strangers. I can cite research all day long, and I can show them how much more socialization they get in the community. But what I really want to tell them is what I can’t possibly make them understand. They weren’t there. They had their new shoes and the focus to pay attention to multiplication tables. They bought the idea that childhood was all rainbows and unicorns. They recall their friends and how, at the end of the day, they didn’t want their parents to come pick them up.

It isn’t my reason for homeschooling, but it’s the fear that keeps me going.

I tell you that to tell you this: not all baggage is bad. My children have benefited from this the most. Whenever my 8 year old kid reminds me of the 8 year old me, I just do what should have been done. What the system should have done. What the adults should have done. Kids bring your memories with them and present them in a new light. It’s an opportunity to get a re-do. It’s an opportunity to grow.

It’s baggage I’m happy to keep.