Happy Second Mother's Day

Yeah, we don’t celebrate Father’s Day. Fuck it.

I am a single, white female who didn’t grow up poor but we were definitely not rich either. I grew up in Southern California on 10 acres with extended family. I had a good upbringing and had nothing to complain about. However, I grew up without my biological father, and that was a fact that everyone enjoyed throwing in my face.

It didn’t matter how well-mannered, helpful, smart, or funny I was; once people heard I was being raised by a single mother, they looked at me differently.

My Ex once made this joke to me:

“Do you know why it’s hard for some kids to play with their dads?” He was grinning at this ‘new’ joke he heard from a friend at work.

“Why?” I mentally prepared myself for a punchline that I’d been a part of a million times already.

“Because when they throw the ball, it just rolls on the ground.” He laughed at his own joke for a second and then looked at my resting bitch face and gasped.

“Oh god, I’m so sorry.”

I wasn’t upset. But trust me, that was a defining moment that turned a boyfriend into an ex-boyfriend.

How could I be upset at the social norm where people typically make fun of the kid growing up with a dad?

I can’t fight the world. I fought several kids in elementary who would constantly make fun of me, and that didn’t do one damn bit of difference. Other parents would look at my mother like they pitied her or were completely confused by her.

Wanna know a secret?

We didn’t care.

It hurt, being defined by one fact that I could not change no matter how hard I tried to cover it up. My father wasn’t dead or fighting overseas; he was abusive and abandoned us.

Good. Fucking. Riddance.

The one negative effect that had though, was that it made me into a Grinch on Fathers Day.

I sat up on Mount Crumpit and watched all the other kids make cards and pictures and other plans with their fathers. Meanwhile, I’m sitting there every year, glaring at all the little Who’s of Whoville and emotionally eating my way through a platter of Chinese food.

Until today that is.

Today, my heart grew three sizes over this holiday that has previously stabbed me in the chest for 24 hours every year for the past 26 years.

For me, today is not Father's Day. It's the second Mother's Day of the year. I thought my mom was going to cry this morning when I brought her favorite coffee and pastry and took her out to dinner.

I may have taken a round-about way of saying this in this article but here’s my point: to all those who grew up with one parent, everything is about perspective.

Would things have been easier with two parents? Probably, if one wasn’t an abusive asshole.

I just want to be seen as myself, and why does it reflect badly on us that my abusive father left? IF he had stayed, everyone would have rooted for my mother to leave him; but the action of him leaving us, somehow made her look weak. Why? Why are we being punished for that?

It’s like he’s won, like everything that I’ve done or will do, people will judge me based solely on the fact that I was raised by a single mother.

My mother is and has always been my hero, my rock. I believed she was Wonder Woman as a kid, and to me she still is.

Throughout all those horrible Father’s Days and rants by horrible people (friends and family) about how I was going to grow up with deep-seeded psychologically charged daddy issues; I let everything go as best as I could. I would smile and power through it all. I didn’t care. I knew that I wasn’t going to put up with abuse of any kind because I was fortunate enough to not have that in my house growing up. My mom made it very clear when I was 8 that my life was going to be hard; she apologized for it almost monthly ever since then. She thought she was to blame for all the things that people said or thought about me. I never blamed her, I never even blamed my father, I blamed the general consensus of society for making it the social norm to degrade me for not being taught how to change a tire from my biological father.

Fuck the Patriarchy.

So, I’m sorry if this seems more like me venting than actually trying to be inspiring which was my initial point; but sometimes you just gotta say a general ‘fuck you’ to the universe and have another glass of wine.

So, Happy Second Mother’s Day to all the single moms out there. You go, girl!