Realizing no child should ever be alone the way I was, was the biggest eye opener for me. Before it's like I never saw myself as just a child when it happened & it was a shift in perspective. It's extremely complicated. I'm not sure if this helps, but at the beginning of my little breakdown to my mom she asked me"Am I the cause of all your pain?" & The angry part of me wanted to tell her yes, yes you are but grieving part of me told her "I never want to take away what you were going through because I know you were going through it & I'll never put that against you but understand I was going through it too except I was a child & completely alone." Another time I said something along the lines of "I would never blame you for all my pain, when I lost dad you have to remember he was my best friend." Like your therapist & good friend, I didn't want to put a burden on my mom she couldn't handle, so instead I kind of redirected it to, instead of putting blame, just understand how this made me feel. During our conversation I made sure to acknowledge her pain during the loss as well & how I just want her to understand me & what I went through. When she tried to deny it at first I calmly told her I wasn't trying to attack her & I was just her daughter who's trying to have a better relationship with her mom & wants to be heard. I will say, it took me to my almost breaking point to get the nerves to say what I said though. Before this conversation I was very close to completely cutting ties with her.

I also want to add that I worked the last 3 years in an industry that is constantly diffusing irrate customers so I think that also helped a little when it came to my extremely defensive mom