on reclaiming, not blaming

a trip with my mother

Grab a coffee, wine, or beer. I’m not judging.

This is going to be a long, bumpy essay. 😉

In Bolivia, between the mini-adventures I mention in my notes, there were long stretches of introspection and reflection. My mind kept going back to last year’s trip to Portugal, why we took it, and all the moments I wanted to pull my hair out.

The absurd conversations that played in my head felt like a sport I never asked to play. And yet it served as a way for me to finally clear out lingering residual energy from that experience.

As if I needed another reminder of the periods of darkness in my life, “The Sound of Silence” by Simon & Garfunkel would occasionally find its way into my head out of nowhere. If you are familiar with the lyrics, you understand why this song was kicking my ass: “Hello darkness my old friend” and “Silence like a cancer grows.”

My mother and I were estranged for five years before reconnecting in 2022. A secret I guarded closely. I carried the weight of guilt and shame for way too long. And yet distancing myself from my mother and extended family was necessary for my mental sanity at the time. Forgiving myself has never been a strength of mine.

If anyone asked me about her, I would answer, “She’s doing well.” My sister kept me informed. I suspect she secretly liked being the only daughter still on somewhat good terms with our mother at the time. But that is a story for another day.

I still remember the first time I saw her again. It’s amazing how our brains think time somehow stands still, and the next time we see someone, they will look exactly the same. As if no one ages.

I was stunned to see her with gray hair. My mother always had her hair beautifully done, but she had stopped dyeing it in the middle of the pandemic and decided to leave it natural. It looked good on her, but I had never seen her that way before.

As we reconnected, I noticed my mother’s behavior and lifestyle had changed. She would initiate outings and trips with friends, without her husband. I was oblivious to the state of their relationship. It became obvious something wasn’t right when she planned a family holiday trip in December of 2023, and he stayed in NY.

Later, I found out they didn’t even sleep in the same bedroom. I don’t know the details, but from where I stand, it has become a marriage of convenience. Two people who bicker about everything, which usually ends at an impasse.

So, when I mentioned that I was considering going to Portugal, she signed herself up for the trip. I didn’t want to say no to her for my own selfish reasons. We never know how much time we have with someone. And I thought it would also prepare her for what was coming. The possibility of a life outside the U.S. for me.

We boarded a plane for an eleven-day trip to Europe in April of 2025, with stops in Lisbon, Sevilla, and the Algarve. This was the first time she and I took a trip alone together. Part of me was excited, and the other part was thinking, “God, universe, or whatever is out there, please give me a shitload of patience.” Little did I know how much I was going to need it.

My mother can be very charming, generous, funny, the life of the party in her day, but she can also be extremely fucking cruel with her words. Words that often felt like pins running through my back with a lighter attached, leaving internal scars only visible to me. Hence, my hesitation traveling alone with her.

The trip was meant to be exploratory. See how locals live, check out the supermarkets, the quality of food, feel these areas out. But for a hot minute, I forgot I was traveling with the Energizer Bunny that needed every minute of the day to be filled with an activity. The woman is incapable of sitting alone with her own thoughts.

I booked a vintage tuk-tuk tour for the day we arrived, mostly to appease her. She loved the idea. The tour guide picked us up at the hotel and asked what kind of tour we wanted. Being the foodie that I am, I asked him to take us to places tourists wouldn’t normally go and include a couple of bakeries with the best desserts.

From day one, my mother turned into the puppeteer, trying to control what I ate and what time I ate. We walked into the first bakery and she says, “Don’t buy more than one so you have room for dinner later.” Because, apparently, in that moment I magically became twelve again, and my mother was treating me like a version of myself that hadn’t existed for decades.

So much for her letting me enjoy the moment. The poor tour guide had to deal with two women bickering over buying or not buying fucking pastries.

Ridiculous? Um, yes. And by the end of the day, I was too exhausted and jet-lagged to enjoy dinner.

This pattern continued on and off for the rest of the trip. And every day, I would get asked, “What are we doing tomorrow?” Fun.

During our day trip to Sintra, there was a moment when we were indecisive about where to sit to grab a drink or a quick bite to eat. I told her that I wasn’t that hungry, but I would keep her company. She turned around and said, “If you are not eating, then I’m not eating.”

I looked at her and said, “What is this?” But I knew. Here came the emotional blackmail. It was as if she had regressed into a petulant-child mode. By this point, I was pissed. It ended with me telling her to pick a place. We ordered sandwiches and ate quickly to not miss our tour bus. I left half of my sandwich on the plate.

By the time we arrived in Sevilla, Spain, I was emotionally and physically drained. We dropped our luggage at the hotel and then she said, “I need to go to El Corte Inglés because last time I was there, they had clothing I regret not buying.”

My sarcastic self checks out with a train of thought. We don’t need to do shit. You may want to, but we don’t have to.

I looked at her and asked, “Do you really need more clothes?”

For her, it was another important stop, so we went. But I mean come on. It’s not like we were some multi-millionaires on a shopping spree in Europe. Then again, my mother occasionally defaults to magical thinking. Nope. Not kidding.

She walks out with four clothing items, and I walk out with a tin of chocolate chip biscuits. They were damn good. Regret not buying two tins. And yes, I got a comment from her about not eating it all and getting full before dinner.

WTF! Here comes the cookie police.

Later that day, I tell her that I was going to stop at the hair salon next to the hotel and make an appointment to have my hair blown out. She tells me she wants to come with me in case I need help. So much for my alone time.

Now I’m angry again. “Help with what?” I responded. “It’s a real wonder how I’ve managed all these years.”

Listen, I try to control my sarcastic side, but around her it’s difficult. It was a shit show. She tells me that I need to change. I hadn’t heard that phrase in years. And for the first time, as opposed to staying quiet, I looked at her and asked, “Change what?”

“What is it that you think I need to change?” I was met with silence. No response. That was new. I said something she wasn’t expecting to hear and wasn’t prepared to answer.

Maybe her whole life, she’s been wanting her two daughters to be some mini version of her. As opposed to accepting and respecting us as we are. Suddenly, every moment growing up when I felt small, not good enough, or unworthy came rushing back. Every criticism, from the color of my hair, being too thin or not thin enough, and my personal favorite, her suggestion for me to remove my frown lines with Botox, was now swirling in my head. No, I’m not fucking putting poison in my face.

So I go into this long-ass speech about how disempowering it is for her to speak for me when someone asks me a question, how she infantilizes her two grown-ass daughters. Pretty much everything that I had been holding in for years came out. And then I felt bad about doing it. I can’t win with myself.

But at this stage in my life, I was not going to apologize for being who I am or put on a performance for anyone again. Those days were over.

Was it a wake-up call for my mother? Maybe. Then again, the woman suffers from selective memory.

We hop into one of those horse carriages, and neither of us utters a single word the entire ride.

By dinner time, we had, in our own way, moved on from the argument, and she was joking about the hot waiter. If only she were twenty years younger. Blah Blah. I chuckled. Yep. That’s my mother. The side of her that makes me laugh.

The next day, we were headed to the Algarve for the final leg of our trip. We hired a driver. It was easier, slightly cheaper than hopping back on another plane, and we got to enjoy the beautiful scenery between Spain and Portugal.

I can’t remember the name of the driver, but he was exceptional. We talked the entire ride, my mother more than me, as per usual. She asked if he was single, then about his life driving all over, and moved on to the tattoos on his arms. He handed us the phone so we could see photos of the ones on his back and other photos of different areas in Portugal.

And then she makes the conversation about me. Starts talking about how I need to get out more and date. That I’m not going to meet anyone if I lock myself away. This went on for what felt like a long-ass minute. I turned to her and said, “I can meet someone walking into a coffee shop, at the airport, on an airplane or wherever.” The driver smiled.

I think he could tell how frustrating this conversation was becoming. I could see him looking through the rearview mirror. He smiles and says, “I don’t think you need to worry about her. She’s going to be just fine. And she’s right, she can meet someone anywhere.”

A complete fucking stranger stepped in to defend me at the most awkward moment. And the harping about me finding a man finally came to an end.

We had a few more shit show moments during the trip, but that was to be expected. She’s messy, chatty, loud, and I’m reserved and a neat freak. So just imagine what else we bickered about towards the end.

Let’s just say I was ready for the trip to end and be back in my own space. On the flight back from Lisbon, my body was already fighting what I thought was a cold or some bug. One that lasted well over a week. My emotional body was drained.

We landed in JFK; my mother goes through Global Entry in like a minute, and I had to wait in the immigration line, regretting not having applied for Global Entry earlier that year, then had to catch my flight home.

What I expected from that trip and what I got were two completely different things. Yes, we argued, and I got sick, but I also felt liberated.

Reflecting back, I remembered a conversation I had with someone I confided in after the trip. She said that I was not here to live a small life to make others comfortable. That includes family members. And that this stage of my life was about reclaiming, not blaming. Those were some powerful words. Words nobody had ever told me.

Has the dynamic changed between us?

It has. It’s not perfect. Far from it. But I have noticed there is a lot less criticism coming out of her mouth.

Wish me luck. I will be spending her birthday week with her in Barranquilla, Colombia first week in November. My mother thinks her birthday is a national holiday. I can appease her and celebrate it for eight days.

She wanted us to share a hotel room. I said no fucking way. Two rooms work just fine, thanks.

And now I have met my writing quota with this long ass essay.

See you next year. 😉