Last Christmas
The last family (dys)function I will ever attend.
Last Christmas, I sat at the dinner table apologizing to my stepson’s girlfriend with that same desperate breath that a child uses when their dad is trying to look cool and says something utterly awkward. My eyes close and turn toward her with a breathy exhaustion, and I say, “I’m so sorry.” It wasn’t the first time my mother had embarrassed me at the dinner table, and I have had many opportunities for embarrassment throughout the years, but this time, I hoped it would be the last.
I am fifty-three years old, and I can’t imagine having to sit through another holiday, birthday, graduation, or another family dys-function with my mother ever again. But here I am with my mother, immature at any age but a very juvenile seventy-seven. Though it has been amusing to watch her put her foot in her mouth on many occasions over the years, I can’t seem to continue to watch these cringe-worthy moments with the same ability for “love and tolerance” that I once had.
It’s Christmas Day, 2024, and my mother has come bearing gifts with the same egotism I have come to sarcastically enjoy my entire life. I had just gotten off the phone earlier, where I was talking to my brother, whom I hadn’t spoken to in years, and my tongue already felt half chewed through from biting it excessively. I say something as I enter, like, “He (my brother) is so delusional!” and my mother responds with some defense that only reminds me why he is still the “hero” or “golden child.” I say, “He really needs help!” and she verbally jabs at me and says something along the lines that I need help, too. It’s the typical response my mom has when I point out these things.
It wouldn’t be that bad if it was just an isolated incident, but this is how I have been addressed my entire life. I wish I could tell you that it started when I did some horrible thing, like accidentally killing a beloved family pet or some freak accident, and that I was never forgiven since, but that’s just not the case. There are many varieties of being a scapegoat, each one dressed in a slightly different flavor of guilt or shame; it just depends on the chef preparing the dish. This is just how mine tastes.
I got sober in 2014, and in the process of doing that, I have tried many times to build a relationship with my mother and other family members over the last ten years. I have invited them to our family functions, kids’ water polo games, graduations, birthday parties, and other events. And each time, it has come with some form of embarrassment or regret. My mother has mocked me in front of my wife and kids. Tosses out insults, badmouths people, and plays to the room harder than Don Rickles or Jeff Ross. She was just here for Thanksgiving, and she ran around showing people pictures of my “idiot father” on her phone, exclaiming that I am “just like him!” and she kept repeating, “This is where he gets it from!” as she shows my oldest daughter’s boyfriend a picture of my father dressed in blackface on Halloween from the early 60s, looking for a laugh or a response from someone.
Nobody laughed.
Nobody commented, but that didn’t stop her.
She continued to find new pictures to show, and I couldn’t do it anymore. I slinked out of the kitchen to get some air at my desk and shook my head in private but familiar shame.
There is some much-needed background I need to insert here.
My father died of acute alcoholic hepatitis, and he could have lived if his heroin addiction hadn’t dulled the pain enough to continue drinking himself to death. You’d think that after ten years sober, hosting a podcast on sobriety for eight years, and writing a meditation book on the subject of better living through sobriety, I’d finally graduate from the herd of scapegoats.
But no — my mother still needs someone, anyone, to blame.
And I’ve always been within arm’s reach of her gnarled, judgmental finger. I am not dead. I don’t have alcoholic hepatitis, and I haven’t felt like an “idiot” in over ten years. Don’t get me wrong; I am not looking to lay my own blame on my mother or play the victim myself; my mother certainly has that position well covered. I simply see the roles more clearly now — and my mother is still committed to playing hers.
With a childhood of consistent neglect, scapegoating, being told that I would never amount to anything, ridiculed, called names, and always having to take a second seat to my siblings and/or stepfathers, I had all I could take. By the time I was 20, I’d done what I could to escape — ran away a few times, had a paper route, an arcade job, and a few bad decisions selling drugs — eventually, with a little help from my parents, I moved out. Since then, I haven’t depended on my mother for a thing. Not money, not food, not shelter — and especially not the maternal love I desired from my mother. It truly pains me to write that, but it’s true.
I started attending Adult Children of Alcoholics (ACA) at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. For the last five years, I have been able to navigate the causes and conditions of my childhood neglect, abandonment, and dysfunctional responses to the environment in which I was raised. It’s not an easy task to face and address. It takes practice and persistence. It has been very effective in helping me to overcome some of my deeper personal challenges.
But hear me out! I am imperfect, and we all have our weaknesses and responses to situations that are not always ideal. So, at Christmas, when my mother continued to make comments about me as we sat around the kitchen island, I snapped!
I felt my emotions rise. The lizard brain took over, and I said something like, “You want to go a couple of rounds? I’ll go a couple of rounds!” The next thing I knew, my mother grabbed her purse and headed for the door. My oldest daughter intervened as my wife wailed, “Can you guys just do this another day!” - I understood my wife’s desire to table the explosion, but the fuse was lit, and the series of events were in motion for the keg to explode right there, right now!
And the explosion was inevitable.
I settled in for the war as the battle had begun. My oldest daughter stepped in, reminding me this wasn’t the way to build the relationships I wanted. And I agreed. It wasn’t, and then it hit me…
It’s been ten years of trying—ten years of making the phone calls, trying to be a son, being kind, loving, and tolerant—and I wonder at what point one gives up? At what point does a person no longer take the abuse or cruelty? How many years? How many more cruel comments or dismissive statements? How many “idiots” are enough to justify giving up?
In my book, 366 F***ing Days Sober*, on February 14th’s entry (not ironically), I say, “The opposite of love is not hate. It’s indifference.” That’s the exact state I was feeling as I stepped outside at my daughter’s request. The pain and anger had subsided, and I immediately moved to a place of indifference.
Standing outside talking to my oldest daughter, I agreed to retract my claws and go back inside for Christmas dinner. Settling in for the rest of the evening, I withdrew my presence and anger as much as humanly possible, but you could tell I was still steaming from the recent interaction. My daughter also convinced my mother to stay for dinner while demanding that we all “get along,” and we both agreed as dinner was prepared.
Preparing for dinner, I try to apologize to my wife for not being able to control my response, but there is a part of me that is glad that I didn’t “control myself”. I am glad that I stood up for myself, and my wife and children saw me do it. I apologized to my mother, but I felt I also needed to clear the air as much as possible and apologize to my family for getting into an argument. As we sit down to eat, I say, “I just want to apologize for yelling earlier. I hope you can forgive my outburst.” Nobody responds, and there is a moment of awkward silence.
Nobody really wants to address the elephant. I think everyone just wants to go on without the need to address anything at all.
We should have continued with the wonderful meal my wife had prepared and continued to the end of the gathering. Of course, my mother did not apologize and probably didn’t even consider her role in any of what had just happened. And honestly, I didn’t expect her to. As we sit down, we chat and make small talk. My daughter talks about college, and my oldest daughter talks about work and other activities. It’s all a very “normal” and polite discussion that one should be having with their children at Christmas dinner. I get quiet. I eat, watch, and listen.
Something ignited my mother’s attention, and as I am deaf in my left ear, I missed exactly what it was. My mother says something like, “I have the word “Bitch” tattooed on my ass! You wanna see it?” Before anyone can even understand what is happening, she jumps up, pulls down her old lady sweatpants, and says, “See! “Bitch” right there!” She shows everyone at the Christmas dinner table her cheek, and this is where I said “I’m so sorry” to my stepson’s girlfriend.
I wanted to say, “While you’re up, why don’t you get your “bitch-ass” out of here!” But I don’t. That seems like something she would say.
After she’s done flashing the table, I shake my head in disbelief and disappointment, and we continue eating. I help clean up the dinner table, and my mother leaves early as usual. As she leaves, she says, “Be good.” Her usual sign-off, which indicates I am “always up to no good,” I say, “I always am!” I can’t tell you how long it’s been since I have done anything that would even be considered anything near “bad.” But we all need people to play their parts.
I’m not sure if she sees it. Hell, I wasn’t sure I saw it until I did the work to see it. What I do know is that sometimes I wish I didn’t see it the way I do now. Sometimes, I wish I still believed my mother was capable of love — that I was the one who needed to be “fixed.” It was easier when I had hope. But that’s not the case anymore.
The day after Christmas, I woke up and sent a text (chickenshit, I know.) I stated my case and grievances, citing years of the same behaviors and lack of consideration. I told her I was done. She was no longer welcome in my home, and I had no desire to continue the conversation. She initially fired off a text with a heavy dose of blame and accusations that I was a dry drunk and that I was worse now than when I was drinking. Typical. But I took it for what it was. Just another attempt to recreate reality.
It’s been six months.
No texts.
No likes on Facebook.
Not one message conveyed from a family member.
And if I am honest, which I most definitely am these days… I look forward to not seeing her bitch-ass for a while.
Carl Desmond is the author of 366 F**ing Days Sober and host of the podcast SoberPod, helping others navigate sobriety, family, and life’s messes — with a little humor along the way.*
