The earliest time I remember her talking about it, I think I was like 8 or 9 years old…
She kept talking about that when she had my older brother, and later me, and she told me being pregnant was hurting her back. And when she had me, whe told me about being worried about the authorities finding out about the 2nd pregnancy and lived those like 9 months in fear.
And she told me about about the C-Section that she had twice for both of me and my older brother, and that she said it hurts a lot.
And like, then she literally lift up her shirt and showed me where she was cut open and like… idk showing scars feel so weird… but I guess she treated it like a battle scar or something… idk…
I remember feeling so bad about it and I felt like I loved her more as a mother.
Then she kept like repeating it every so often and I’m just thinking like: hmm… is this some weird emotional manipulation thing? and it just gets very weird every time she talks about it, and it always ends with something like “I suffered so much for you, you need to ‘behave’ and listen to me” and “if I didn’t have you, I’d be much healthier”
Like I lost count how many times she’ve retold the story, like 20 times at least. I remember being told of it at least once a year. Like I’d talk about my birthday and talk and she’s like: “Oh yea that’s the day I went through so much pain to have you” and “you should take me to have tea/dimsum” (okay this part, it was sometimes said as a “joke”, I was a dependent, of course I couldn’t buy her anything lol)
So I felt so guilty every time I talk about birthday celebrations… cuz like I feel like I owe her or something.
Has your mother been a single mother? I mean do you and your brother are from the same father and they are still together?
Lmfao “mgtow” instance
But okay I’ll give the benefit of doubt and just assume this isn’t malicious.
Anyways:
My parents are in an arranged marriage from China. They have been married since like the mid 1990s and never been divorced.
There have never been any issues of alcoholish, drugs, or gambling.
My brother and I are 100% blood related.
But parents had arguments and mom threatened to divorce a few times, but it never happened. And they never separated either. They both work. But in China, dad had a bit of trouble with finding a stable job.
I hear a lot of arguments at home… kinda scary ngl.
But y’all can probabably guess what China was like back then… lots of uncertainty around food. So that’s could be a source of stress and hardship if that’s what you’re wondering, but nothing too serious like mind-altering substances or anything like that.
We’re in the US right now where it has been, relatively speaking, more stable than life in China. Still living in the same house… I looked online and apparantly that it’s common in Asian families (I mean in this current economy, its probably common in the west too).