The Hurt I Keep Forgetting

I always answer when it’s her.

Even when my voice shakes.

Even when I have nothing left to give.

She never says sorry.

But I forgive her anyway

not because she asks,

but because part of me still believes one day, she will.

I miss her.

Not the woman she is,

but the mother I wish she could be.

The best friend I see other girls post about.

The one you cry to without fear that your tears will be used against you later.

I want to tell her when I’m hurting.

I want to let her into my world.

I want to say, “Mum, I feel like I’m falling apart.”

But I can’t risk it.

Not if she might throw it back when I don’t clean the dishes fast enough.

Not if my pain becomes her proof that I’m too sensitive. Too lazy. Too much.

I love her.

God, I love her.

And maybe that’s the hardest part.

I love her so much I keep forgetting how much she hurts me.

I keep showing up with open hands, hoping this time they won’t come back empty.

Hoping this time, her voice will be soft and her silence won’t sting.

She doesn’t hit.

She doesn't scream.

But she slices in ways only daughters understand,

with disappointment, comparison, and withheld affection.

I forgive her like muscle memory.

Like breath.

Like prayer.

Like the only language I was ever taught.

I forget.

Not because it didn’t happen.

But because remembering feels like betrayal.

And still I miss her.

Still, I answer.

Still, I call her “home,” even when the walls echo with the ghosts of things I’ll never say.

I didn’t know I was carrying her pain

Until I heard her voice in mine.

Tight. Unyielding.

Afraid of softness.

I scold myself in her accent.

I shrink in the places she couldn’t grow.

I mother myself with her cold hands and wonder why it still aches.

But I am learning.

Learning that forgiveness doesn’t mean silence.

That loving her doesn’t mean losing myself.

That I can carry her in my blood without dragging her wounds through my future.

This wound — this open, aching wound — may never heal.

And maybe I don’t want it to.

Maybe it reminds me that I’m still hoping.

Still trying.

Still tender.

But I am not her silence.

I am not her storm.

I am the softness she buried to survive.

And I am blooming around the bruise.

Scarred.

Still standing.

Still loving.

Still waiting.