I'm sorry mom...

When I was a kid, I would see my mom very angry. I never understood where all the anger came from. Some one or something would set her off into a tailspin. You could sit there with her at the kitchen table while she replayed a single event over and over again in her mind, each time building up more and more anger about the situation.

Others around her, including myself would try to console her, and if it did 'work' it could take hours. Even then, it was only a band-aid until the next situation would set that anger off again.

I remember telling my mom, how much energy it used to hold onto that anger all the time, how much time was being wasted playing it over and over again. It was bad enough to feel hurt / angry the one time, but to live it over and over again in your mind for days, weeks, months.

Mom would respond with "I know", but also that she couldn't 'do anything about it' it's just the way it was, just the way she felt.

One of the wisdoms we gain as we get older. Sometimes in life we are 'gifted' with the ability to hear our own mother's (or fathers) words come out of our mouth later in life. And until that very moment we never truly realize what it was like, we never could really understand.

It's true, reliving an event over and over is not healthy, or helpful, but when something really hurts you, digs down into your very soul, your mind races to try and rationalize it, to try and make yourself feel better, it does this by replaying the event, trying to figure out what 'went wrong', 'how it went wrong', trying to convince you that life is okay, that you are okay, but their is this conflict, this possibility that maybe I am wrong, maybe I am the 'bad person' maybe I really am the trouble maker, that others think I am

And the pain of it all can be so much to try and bear, and you feel trapped in a deep spiral loop falling deeper and deeper loosing your faith and hope in a better tomorrow.

And all of a sudden I hear the same words pour out of my own mouth, "I know" but "it's jut the way it is".

It must have been how my mom felt those many years ago sitting in her anger and my younger self full of self-righteousness and naivety to think it was her choice to spend so much time sitting in that anger. How hypocritical now that I should sit in my own despair and utter those same words today.

I'm sorry mom. I understand.