M A R I A M C K E N T Y
My mother had her share of life’s challenges, and though she was often absent, I never questioned her unconditional love. It was powerful. It wasn’t until I got sober myself that I was able to truly understand the “why” of her drinking. She was addicted to an addictive substance. She was not flawed, or disordered. She had pain and burden and she turned to alcohol to cope. Then alcohol turned on her. That’s the way it works. I remember when my Mom passed away, having the thought, “Who will ever love me the way she did?”. The immediate reply was, “You will.”. Love is powerful. My second experience with love came from Jerry, my first husband. Our love grew slowly. It was deep and abiding.
I met him (literally) the day I got sober, so I didn’t know myself yet. I got to know me and love me through the experience of him getting to know me and love me. His love was healing. Our love sustained us through a very long challenge with Parkinson’s Disease. It wasn’t our vows, or the children, or money that sustained us, it was our love. The kind of love that doesn’t feel like love everyday, but it is. I can remember feeling so frustrated with him sometimes and very much like I wanted to escape, but I knew the only thing I would be thinking of was him and his well being, so It made sense to stay. Love is messy. Next I was met with the love in recovery rooms. It was the love of strangers who embraced me because of our common experience with addiction to alcohol.
I am a blessed woman to have known love my whole life. It has come in many forms and through many faces. I first knew love as a young child from my parents. My mother used to quote my father, who said to the nurse when I was born, “God gave us our sixth little girl and we couldn’t be happier.” I thought it very sweet that she repeated that to me throughout her life because my father died when I was four years old, leaving my mother with eight children. I often say I lost both my parents when I was four because my mother was consumed by grief and responsibility. To survive, she put her nose down and did what she needed to do to care for us. And she drank. My mother had her share of life’s challenges, and though she was often absent, I never questioned her unconditional love.
Made with FlippingBook - Online magazine maker