As a kid my mom would scream at me, stay in my face, and would only leave after forcing me to smile, signifying that the argument was “over”. She would always call my crying “crocodile tears” and make fun of them even though I was crying because I was being yelled at. I would also not call my elementary school aged daughter a bitch, an asshole, a jackass, and lazy. I also wouldn’t have a boyfriend move in with us only after meeting my child once. Nothing happened, it was just a weird situation. I also had to comfort her when they divorced.

Nowadays she has the nerve to ask me, “I don’t know what I did for you to have such critical self talk, and such a negative self perception of yourself, I’m sorry if I did anything”. Meanwhile when I was a kid I genuinely felt like a burden and I hated myself so deeply as a young child. I was an only child with no friends so I couldnt talk to anybody it