How My Mother Murdered Our Family
by Denise Felt 1991 (revised 2009)
It all started when my baby brother Chris, the ninth child, went to kindergarten. After all those years, my mother was finally home alone. She didn’t handle it well, since she had no real identity or outside interests in such an overloaded home. But that really doesn’t excuse her. A more self-confident person would have found some activity to occupy the time.
Because she couldn’t handle the quiet, she began working part-time at the local drugstore. I remember how astonished we were that she was going to be gone during the day. But she assured us that she would only be working during Chris’ kindergarten session, which was a halfday, and that she would be home every afternoon before we were. We were relieved. However, an uncertain dread had entered our home.
She seemed happy during this time; at least, as far as I could tell. I think the contact with other adults satisfied her in a way that we could not. We didn’t mind, really, that she preferred their company to ours. But when Chris entered first grade and an all-day class, we were hurt to learn that she was going to work full-time. Apparently, she was much more fulfilled away from her family. She made concessions, however: she changed her job to one that allowed her to get home a few minutes before we did. But we knew that this problem would only worsen. Even as we made ourselves smile and agree, we were seeing the end. In small ways, we began to draw away from her, since we no longer could see her as a permanent fixture in our home. My sister and I started doing each other’s hair instead of asking Mom. My brothers began relying on the relative comforts of TV when they got home, their hurt much more obvious in their refusal to notice Mom.
With her rewarding friendships at work, Mom hardly paid attention to our withdrawal at home. Her newfound sense of confidence "in the real world" led her to the community college, where she not only got her GED, but took nurse’s training. We were happy for her, of course, when she did so well. But we were nonetheless rather bewildered by its importance to her. She already knew everything; she was Mom. The saddest part about this time period was that, unlike work outside the home, schooling allowed her to be home more often, without being available to us. The hours of study needed outside class kept her too busy to spend time with her family. It was as though our house was haunted: we knew she was there, but we couldn’t reach her. The uncertain dread we had begun with had crystallized into actual fear. Our family was disintegrating.
So excited was my mother with her nursing degree that she went out immediately and secured a position at the local nursing home. Full-time, of course. It wasn’t long before we only saw her in the evenings and every other weekend. The central core of our family had become a part-time Mom. The younger boys felt it the worst, since they were practically raised by my sister and I. We didn’t do a great job of it, either. Us older ones fended for ourselves as best we could, and longed for the time that we could leave home. My father never recovered from having a successful wife. In his shock and despair, he was quite incapable of holding us all together. Our family died.
Perhaps we took it too personally. Maybe we should have been glad that my mother "found herself." But our family was destroyed, and she was the one guilty of murdering us. It was difficult to be pleased with her success.
It all started when my baby brother Chris, the ninth child, went to kindergarten. After all those years, my mother was finally home alone. She didn’t handle it well, since she had no real identity or outside interests in such an overloaded home. But that really doesn’t excuse her. A more self-confident person would have found some activity to occupy the time.
Because she couldn’t handle the quiet, she began working part-time at the local drugstore. I remember how astonished we were that she was going to be gone during the day. But she assured us that she would only be working during Chris’ kindergarten session, which was a halfday, and that she would be home every afternoon before we were. We were relieved. However, an uncertain dread had entered our home.
She seemed happy during this time; at least, as far as I could tell. I think the contact with other adults satisfied her in a way that we could not. We didn’t mind, really, that she preferred their company to ours. But when Chris entered first grade and an all-day class, we were hurt to learn that she was going to work full-time. Apparently, she was much more fulfilled away from her family. She made concessions, however: she changed her job to one that allowed her to get home a few minutes before we did. But we knew that this problem would only worsen. Even as we made ourselves smile and agree, we were seeing the end. In small ways, we began to draw away from her, since we no longer could see her as a permanent fixture in our home. My sister and I started doing each other’s hair instead of asking Mom. My brothers began relying on the relative comforts of TV when they got home, their hurt much more obvious in their refusal to notice Mom.
With her rewarding friendships at work, Mom hardly paid attention to our withdrawal at home. Her newfound sense of confidence "in the real world" led her to the community college, where she not only got her GED, but took nurse’s training. We were happy for her, of course, when she did so well. But we were nonetheless rather bewildered by its importance to her. She already knew everything; she was Mom. The saddest part about this time period was that, unlike work outside the home, schooling allowed her to be home more often, without being available to us. The hours of study needed outside class kept her too busy to spend time with her family. It was as though our house was haunted: we knew she was there, but we couldn’t reach her. The uncertain dread we had begun with had crystallized into actual fear. Our family was disintegrating.
So excited was my mother with her nursing degree that she went out immediately and secured a position at the local nursing home. Full-time, of course. It wasn’t long before we only saw her in the evenings and every other weekend. The central core of our family had become a part-time Mom. The younger boys felt it the worst, since they were practically raised by my sister and I. We didn’t do a great job of it, either. Us older ones fended for ourselves as best we could, and longed for the time that we could leave home. My father never recovered from having a successful wife. In his shock and despair, he was quite incapable of holding us all together. Our family died.
Perhaps we took it too personally. Maybe we should have been glad that my mother "found herself." But our family was destroyed, and she was the one guilty of murdering us. It was difficult to be pleased with her success.