“I don’t have no more fight in me. Before, I felt like I was going to die. I was running after this child, sometimes late in the night, going to the authorities, trying everything but now it is like there is not much I can do. I just give up. It is not like I don’t love her and still don’t wish for the best, but what more can I do but pray?”
Those are the words of a mother whose teenage daughter now no longer lives with her. She is a young adult and legally there is nothing her mother can do to have her returned home. The pain of the mother is evident, and she blames herself, maybe with cause, for what has happened.
“How can my only daughter just don’t want to live with me anymore? Why does she think the best thing to do is ‘live home?’ Yes that is what she is doing. I am pleading with her to at least finish secondary school and give herself a chance, but she is not listening.
“I try not to quarrel with her. I beg, and I plead but she will not budge. She would call and come and see me sometimes. I tell her that her bed is here, but she does not sleep in it she just goes back to wherever she comes from. I am not even sure where she lives. People would call me and tell me, but it is like I don’t even want to know because there is nothing I can do.”
Her journey to where she is today has been long and filled with potholes, some of which she fell into. The unplanned pregnancy of her daughter saw them both facing many difficult years as she struggled to provide for them.
“I would admit that a lot of days we didn’t have enough food to eat. It is not like I was a dunce, and sometimes I had a job, but it was like the money was not enough. I leave the formal work system and try to make my hand at other things but still like it was not working.
“So I know we had difficult days but through it all I try to love her as much as I could. But maybe it was not enough. Maybe she had to grow up too fast because some days it was like she was taking care of me…,” she said, tears streaming down her face.
“And that is one of my biggest regrets, not allowing her to be a child at times. She had to cook and wash and keep the place tidy some days when I just couldn’t do it because of everything that was happening. It was no fault of hers, but I know how it affected her and now maybe that is why she want to start life early,” she continued.
I have known this sister for many years, and I have seen the struggles she has endured with her children over the years. I have also attempted to assist her in whatever way I could as she attempted to seek help for her daughter.
I asked her if she did not have siblings or even her mother to assist her during those years when her daughter was forced to take charge.
“I would not say they didn’t try, but they had their own lives to tend. No one was prepared to really stop what they were doing and help me. I don’t blame them. Maybe they just could not afford to because things were happening with them too. So it was me trying to fend for myself and not really making it sometimes and I was close to getting a nervous breakdown. I should say I had a nervous breakdown, it is just that I never get any professional help for it.
“So you see sometimes I understand why my daughter is the way she is but then I tried to get my life together and I thought, you know, we were going somewhere. But then she started sleeping out and just disappearing. I used to walk the streets looking for her. I got her counselling. I bring in the authorities, but is like the more I tried, the more she was slipping away.
“Now it is just that I weary, it is not that I don’t love my baby anymore but unless I maybe take her and tie her at home that is the only way she would stay. It is not like I beating this girl or anything. I trying to provide for her, and I want she to finish school but she have other things on she mind.
“I know she living with somebody or by somebody, but I don’t know is who and to be honest like I don’t even want to know. If she come today and say ‘mommy a come back home’ I would accept she with no questions. I just want she to understand that the world out there has nothing for her. Boyfriend and husband does come with age, don’t push it,” she said sadly.
“You know I just want to say to mothers that no matter what you are going through, try as much as you can not to let your children bear the burden. We bring them into the world, and it is for us to take care of them not the other way around.
“That is my biggest regret and now it is not only me paying for it but my daughter. It is like she is taking the same path I took, not realizing that it is a hard road. I want her to enjoy her young days not having to take on the responsibility of maybe a wife and just now it might be a mother. I am praying and I will continue to talk to her, but I can’t even cry anymore. I just have to pray and hope.”
I understood where the sister was coming from and I hope it is not too late for her daughter. There is still time and I told her not to give up and if she can get persons to speak to her daughter, there is never too much talking. The advice she gave is very apt; parents have to do everything they can to ensure that their children enjoy their childhood and not force them into adulthood. Let’s allow our children to be children.
