The Things I Never Said to My Mother

The Things I Never Said to My Mother

I’ve been thinking lately about all the words that never made it past my lips. The ones that hovered in my throat like a lump I couldn’t swallow, the ones I rehearsed in the shower but couldn’t perform in real life. This is for you, Mom — for the things I never said when you were looking, when I was silent, when I should’ve known better.

I never told you how much I noticed.

I noticed how your hands were always moving — folding laundry, scrubbing dishes, sewing buttons, rubbing your temples when the world was too loud. I noticed how your smile would twitch just a little when you were pretending to be okay. I saw you bite your tongue when you wanted to yell, walk away when you wanted to cry. I noticed the nights you didn’t eat until everyone else had, and the mornings you woke up before the sun just to make sure we had lunch packed and hair brushed.

You were the background music of my childhood, always playing, always there — but I treated you like wallpaper. Seen, but never really seen. I’m sorry for that.

I never told you I was angry, too.

Angry that you stayed in a marriage that made you shrink. Angry that you taught me silence was strength. Angry that you never said “I deserve better,” and so I didn’t learn to say it either. I didn’t know that love could come with apology or boundaries or choice. I thought endurance was the only way to prove it.

I resented how you always forgave everyone else before yourself. How you apologized for your feelings. How you said “I’m fine” with a cracked voice and bloodshot eyes. I thought you were weak — but I see now you were exhausted. There’s a difference.

I never said thank you, not really.

Not for the way you shielded us from chaos. Not for the way you made a home from very little — piecing together comfort like a patchwork quilt from whatever scraps you could find. You taught me how to stretch meals and stretch hope. You taught me that love can be quiet — a plate of warm food, a kiss on the forehead, a blanket pulled over me in the middle of the night.

You gave me everything — even when you had nothing left for yourself.

I never told you I inherited your sadness.

Not just your cheekbones or your stubbornness, but the ache in your chest you tried to pretend wasn’t there. The same melancholy that sat in your eyes when you thought no one was watching — I feel it in me, too. A loneliness that doesn’t always make sense, a need to be held and not spoken to.

Some days I move through life like a mirror of you — busying myself to avoid the weight of my own thoughts. You taught me how to survive, but I’m still learning how to feel.

I never told you I forgive you.

For the times you yelled. For the moments you weren’t patient. For the way you loved me so fiercely, it sometimes suffocated me. You were trying your best with the pieces you had. And I know — now — that being a mother doesn’t come with a manual, just a million tiny decisions made with trembling hands.

I forgive you for the silence between us. For the way you couldn’t always reach me, or understand me, or say the right thing. I know now that I didn’t make it easy. I carried my own sharp edges. We cut each other, sometimes. But love still lived in the wounds.

I never told you I was scared when you got sick.

You acted like it was nothing — just a cold, a flu, a bad season — but I saw the hospital bracelet stuffed in your purse. I saw the medicine bottles multiply. I heard the hesitation in your voice when you said, “It’s just stress.” I pretended to believe you, because that was the dance we knew best — pretending.

But inside, I was a child again, wanting to crawl into your lap and ask if you were going to leave me.

I still don’t know how to say goodbye, so I haven’t. I talk to you sometimes, in my head, like you’re still just a phone call away. I imagine you at the other end of the line, laughing softly, telling me to put on a sweater or asking if I’ve eaten. I still look for your face in crowds, still expect to hear your voice when I walk into the kitchen.

I never told you how much I miss you. How every time something good happens, I think of how proud you'd be. How every time something bad happens, I just want you to hold me the way only a mother can. How there are so many moments — big and small — that don’t feel quite real without you.

But I’m telling you now.

I love you.

I love you in the quiet, in the chaos, in the thousand versions of myself you helped shape. I love you in the echo of lullabies and the scent of your favorite lotion. I love you in every memory stitched to my skin like embroidery.

And I hope — wherever you are — you hear the words I never said.

Because they were always there. I just didn’t know how to let them out.