Dear Martha,
You once asked me why our relationship has turned so sour and how did we go wrong. I feel that I have a halfway decent answer to that, and frankly, it’s the best answer we have right now. I feel that throughout the years, a process has developed inside me and you cannot take it: growing up. I know growing up is hard, especially when you have to see your child, the one you cared for for a majority of her life, grow up and spread her wings. But you have to let her go sometime. If not the time when she goes to college, then when? Although I appreciate all that you have done, I feel like a great dane stuffed inside a crate fit for our beloved toy fox terrier Rosie (may she rest in peace). If you actually sit back and listen to our conversations, I think you will find that we argue so much because we are often on different pages. If not pages, then books. Sometimes I just take a step back and look at the big picture and ask myself, “Is this really worth arguing about? What are we fighting for?” At that point in time, I assess the situation and realize that this is really not worth my time. These are the moments when I say, “Okay whatever” which cascades into another argument. I feel that we argue over the pettiest things and worse, you hold grudges. You hold grudges until your grave and that will not get you much farther in life. You must learn something we like to call forgiveness. You grew up in a Catholic environment as a young adult, when you are most influenced. It’s a thing called letting it go. Letting all your past drama go. Do not take out whatever anger you may feel on those around you. Because most likely those people around you are the only ones who care. Take out your anger on them and what do you get? You end up alone. Take a step back, look at the situation you are in now. Are you surrounded by anyone? Why are you alone? I assure you that it is not because you aren’t a charming person. Believe me, I love most of the qualities about you, if I didn’t love them, I doubt I would have stuck around for long. I think your biggest fear is letting people who previously hurt you into your life again. You’re afraid of being fooled twice. You’re afraid of looking weak, insecure, and well, human. When was the last time you cried? Over what? The last time I recalled you cried was over money. Which brings me to my next topic. Everything about you is money. I can practically see the dollar signs in your eyes. And yes, I know that money is needed to survive in this capitalistic world of ours, but if the world was just about money, why are we human? What is the point of feeling emotions if all we need to do to survive is to make money? I know you say you love me, and I really want to believe its true. You say that the way a person can show they love you is by what they do for you. But what if I don’t have any money to take them on vacations here and there? Does this mean I don’t love them? What if I myself can barely survive on what little money I may make in the future? Does this mean I am destined to not love for the rest of my life because I cannot do anything for my lover? What I really think is that you’re afraid of failure. Failure in surviving, failure in relationships, failure in life. I am pretty sure I got that gene from you because I am afraid of failing too. Why do you think college is my biggest fear right now? I am afraid. I’m afraid of failing, of being a nobody in life. Of becoming an accountant, or a receptionist. I feel that if I worked so hard for the first 17 years of my life, I deserve to have success for the rest of it right? While this may make my life so much easier, it simply is not true. Life makes you work hard forever until you die. Sometimes I wonder what the point in living is. You work work work and only enjoy a tiny bit of it. And then you’re gone. So what was the point of working all these years? Maybe it’s because I haven’t found my true purpose in life. I mean yes, science is my passion, but is it really? What I just molded into believing that science was my calling? Was it environmental conditions that made me this way? What if my whole academic life has been a lie? A joke? What has all this work been for then? For nothing? For something? Anything. I’m afraid of becoming another dropout of college, to work on the nearest fast-food restaurant. But I fear that I am getting off topic here. This isn’t about me or you. It’s about us, together.
So to make things a bit easier, I will map out the reasons why our relationship has failed.
1) Ever wonder why our conversations have started out fine and turned increasingly bitter? I wonder about that all the time. And finally I have come up with the answer. You just never bothered to notice. That was it. You don’t listen to me. And I know countless other children have pleaded this with their parents, but this time around, it’s legitimately true. I cannot tell you how many times I have told you, “You never listen to me!”. What do you do? You go right on and continue as if you were talking to the wall on the other line. Am I not a person? Do I not have a right to say what is on my mind? Do I not count as a human being? Do I not have emotions and feeling? To you, I feel that I am nothing. I am a product of your hard work. What about my hard work? Which brings me to my next topic.
2) Success. Everytime I succeed in something, academically, physically, anything, I feel that it is you who basks in the glory of it all. You never fail to mention that without you, I would have never succeeded. And while this may be true (I do account most of success to your aid), I cannot help but be slightly annoyed. Most of the time, I feel like I did none of the work, and was a puppet obeying your every word. Last time I checked, you weren’t the one staying up studying for that test, or swimming that race, or achieving that club officer position. Last time I checked, my name was every single one of those feats. Do I not get any credit for doing any of this? Do I not get any credit for being, well, successful? Or are you the one who has done it all, the perfect, untainted one? Am I really not worth anything to you? What have I done to contribute to my success? Have I really done nothing? I feel that you take away all of my pride and glory. What am I left with? How does this affect my self-esteem? And you wonder why I am bitter all the time.
3) I am not fat. I do not care what you say or what you do to make me feel low and depressed. I have learned to love myself and not make silly comparisons with others. I am not fat. Have you seen me lately? Weighing 135 pounds is not fat. Not for an athlete. And not for a college athlete. I feel that a person’s weight shouldn’t be determined by how much they weigh, but rather how they look and how they fit into their clothing. Does it look good? If so, then they should be deemed fit. I believe that you are the only person who thinks I am fat. And I know you would say that other people don’t love you enough to tell you the truth. They do love me enough. They are telling the truth. Do you love me enough to lie to me like that? If I ever get fat, I will know. But just know this: there is no way I will get down to 120 pounds in the next 4 years. And I will gain weight in college. That is a fact. I will gain muscle because I will be weight training at Rice. And that is something you have to come to terms with. Or else our relationship will never work out. I am tired of you telling me all the things that are wrong about me. Do you never notice anything good? Or am I completely made of flaws? Is there nothing I can do right? I feel like you answer no to all of these questions. But this is how I feel. So maybe we both need to change a little to make our relationship healthy once more. I have changed. Have you?
What needs to happen in our lives is change. I need you to be able to let me go on some things, and still hold my hand on others. This is a very crucial moment in my life and I do want you to be there. But if you continue to act the way you do, I would rather you weren’t in my life. I will be handed much more stress than I have ever encountered and frankly, I do not need you as another stress factor. These next 8 years will be very important to me. Are you willing to change for your child’s sake? Or will you watch her fail as she crumbles under the perfectionist’s stress that you pin so harshly on her? I am not a perfectionist nor will I ever be one. But I will try as best as I can to please you. I always have. All I need you to do is acknowledge it. It’s not much, I just want you to know that I am trying my best, and I am giving 100% of my effort in everything that I do. I am not lazy, and sometimes I run out of time on some things, but so does everyone. I am only human. I will make mistakes. I am asking you to learn to forgive. I am asking you to be, for once in your life, a human being. Not a half-functioning one who only uses her brain to make money. I mean a full-on human. With emotion. And morals. And feelings. I think that as I have grown up and you have dealt me more responsibilities, you feel less and less compelled to be aroud me. To nurture me. Well in case you haven’t noticed, I am still a minor. While I am aware that you do need to work hard to make money to survive, I need to know that you know I am working hard too. And although you can’t see the physical results from that, know that it will come if you continue to be a positive force in my life. Right now I feel that you are more of a negative part of me. And I want to cut all negatives out of my life. Do you want to be cut out? If so, continue with what you are doing. You find us talking less and less until we no longer have a relationship anymore. Is this what you want? Do you ever wonder why I am out of the house so much this year as opposed to last year? It is because I want to escape. Escape from my house. My own house. A place that is supposed to be a sanctuary and peaceful. Why do I want to escape it? Because our relationship has turned it rotten. It’s to the point that I do not want to be at home anymore. I am willing to change, but I need to know if you are too. I need to know if you are willing to compromise or else we will never, ever, be the same again. And although I am saddened at that thought, if you continue to be the way you are right now, I will cut you out of my life. I have, over the months, developed a feeling of apathy towards our relationship. But I am willing to change. This one last time, I am willing to put in effort for our relationship to work. If we fail, well at least I tried. I can say I gave it my best. Can you say the same? Maybe it is my inherent personality. Maybe I was born with the characteristic of realizing that some things are not worth fighting for. I want to believe our relationship is worth fighting for, but over this past year, I have begun to doubt myself. Is it worth it? Why should I want to have a relationship with someone who does not treat me with the same respect? The same care? I am not a little child anymore and I deserve to be treated better. You cook meals for me yes. You clean my room occasionally yes. But when it comes to emotions, I feel that there are too many problems and you keep returning to the same ones and hammering them down on me. I feel that I am not treated with respect in our household. And that is a problem. If you wonder why I treat you “like trash” all the time, maybe you should analyze the way you treat me. And I am not talking about physical treatment. I am talking about emotional attacks. If you haven’t noticed, I have cried more this year than ever. And it is not because of stress of college applications.
I cannot force you to change. I can only hope that you will try. Trying is the best anyone can ask for because after all, we are only human. Trying is the best we’ve got. I honestly hope that we will work once more like we used to, together and peacefully. But we need to work at it. We need to put in the same energy we channel into our daily work into our relationship. If we don’t, it will fail. There’s no other way of putting it. We will fail. And aren’t we afraid of failure? I hope and pray that we will survive this test, but if we don’t, well we’ve had many great memories. I am not afraid of the unknown, of survival without you. Not anymore. If you do not change right now, and we do not come together, all will be lost. I will not look back and regret anything I have said or done. I will move forward into the future with new knowledge and be better prepared for life’s obstacles. The question is, are you willing to stick by my side until the end?
Love,
Krystal Lau 7/2/09
