Many adult survivors of child abuse struggle with their relationships with their abuser.

This is her story:

I hate the word "Mum."

When others say or write the word, I cringe. I've never called my Mother, "Mum" - she would've mocked me. 

Ironically now, she sends me cheerful, kind text messages, as though she's now someone completely different, or let me put it this way - as though she's someone I haven't seen in years. 

Whenever she's lost control over me, she turns into this nice Mother, someone who'd send me gifts and thoughtful messages, behaves kindly toward me. Whenever I don't need her, she's nice to me. 

As if that's going to make up for the years of abuse and torture she's put me through, indirectly dragging my son through it. 

Now when I read her sweet messages; messages that appear almost copy/pasted, I want to SCREAM.

She says that despite our differences, I'm her daughter and she loves me.

To anyone with an untrained eye, this sounds almost believable. It's not. How many times did she sit down, look at me in the eye, and tell me that she hated me so much she couldn't stand to look at me? To get away from her before "something really bad happens to me?"

Countless.

That's not the reason why I want to scream, though.

The reason I want to scream is because she defines all the things she put me through, all of her abuse, as "our differences," a way to make the things that happened a minor offense, and somehow again, blame ME; force ME to carry at least half of the weight of our problems. 

I don't reply to her messages for a good reason.

I have so many things to tell her, to break this veil of "love" and "happiness" she tries to portray, as she whines to others about how bad of a daughter I am because I don't respond. Or worse, to lure me into being her "friend" so she can, once again, poison my life and decisions. THIS is how well I know her. Usually, I'm not wrong about her.

That usually leads to destruction. 

Does she really think she can evade an apology by defining her abuse as "our differences?" Does she think that her small evasive admissions of guilt will reconcile our differences? What for? 

So she can drag me across the hallway as my son screams in fear? So she can choke me, screaming while I gasp for air? So she can drive my head into a wall five times while my son watches frozen by fear? So she can beat me while I try to shield my son in my arms because I refused to over-medicate him? 

I bet she doesn't want to hear that. And that's why I refuse to accept her definition of WHAT SHE DID TO ME as "our differences."

We don't have "differences;" she was an abusive parent and she has to live with that.

I don't.

I only have to get over it, "Mum."