Family relationships are rarely straightforward, and some carry complexities that feel like walking a tightrope. Loving someone who has caused you deep pain can feel contradictory, even impossible. Yet, there are moments in life when you pause and realise that your story, though marked by wounds, doesn’t have to be defined by bitterness.
For me, that realisation came when I recently visited my mother after the passing of our family dog. My mother and I share a history riddled with trauma—physical, verbal, and emotional. My childhood and adolescence were shaped by her sharp words and actions, leaving me with scars I still tend to. For years, I carried a love-hate dynamic in my heart. Love, because she’s my mother, and hate, because her actions deeply hurt me. I even planned to cut her off once I had “paid my debt of gratitude.”
But that visit changed everything.
When I stepped into the house in my hometown, it felt different. The house was quieter than ever, each year marked by the passing of another beloved pet. My mother, now older, still tends to the house and its remaining animals—two dogs and three cats. She runs a small sari-sari store and does her chores, asking for help with the more physically demanding tasks from tricycle drivers she befriended. While she keeps herself busy, the silence of that home spoke volumes.
In that moment, I realised something: my mother is alone. For all her imperfections—and yes, they are many—she is still human. And like all humans, she longs for connection, even if she doesn’t express it in ways that are easy to see.
My thoughts began to shift. I started to see her not just as my mother but as a woman who has endured her own life, her own struggles. I don’t know the full extent of her pain or why she was the way she was, but I could no longer ignore her loneliness.
I’ve decided not to cut her off. I won’t erase the boundaries I’ve built to protect myself from reliving old wounds, but I will keep a connection alive. For me, this means chatting with her more often and perhaps sharing a meal together now and then. I can’t give her the luxurious life she might dream of, but I can give her a little more of my time—a gift that costs nothing but means everything.
This isn’t about excusing or forgetting the pain she caused me. It’s about choosing to see her humanity despite it. She’s not a perfect mother, but I know I’m the only child she has. And in some ways, I understand her loneliness because I’ve been abandoned, too—by my biological parents. I know how heavy that emptiness can feel, and I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, not even her.
She may never know the depth of the pain I’ve carried, just as I may never fully understand hers. But I can live with that. I can choose to see her as a flawed human, not just the source of my childhood trauma. I’ll show her that while I’m still healing from my past, I haven’t completely turned away.
Life is messy, relationships even more so. But in choosing compassion while maintaining boundaries, I feel like I’ve carved out a path that honours both my pain and my capacity to heal. It’s not a grand reconciliation or a return to the closeness we never really had. It’s simply a quiet acknowledgment that while the past may have shaped us, it doesn’t have to define the future.