You have chosen a life without me. How long do you need? I have tried many forms of contact but you block me. Damn technology. It has been 10 months since that final day. Will this silence last for ever? I ought not to equate my agony to grieving for the dead: you are alive, so I hold on to hope with faltering fingertips.

I am happy that you are forging ahead with your passions and your friendships. I am pleased for you and I am proud of you whether you want that or not. All I want is for you to let me know if you intend this silence to last for ever? If so, then please help me to understand why. All of the anger, which has been building up in you since you were 17 – what is that fully about?

I have looked up estrangement on the internet and all I can find are examples of forced marriage or violent alcoholic parents, or similar. I can’t find anyone to relate to. I had thought that you and I were close. I miss you every 20 minutes until it makes me feel sick.

Rejection in a romantic love relationship is deeply painful, but from a son, the wound cannot heal over with time. I can’t replace you with a new beau. I know that you think that I should be happy, because I still have your sister at home to care for, but that is not how motherhood works. The wound is gaping and it is tender. It becomes reinfected daily.

I look out for you on every street corner. A tiny glimmer of hope briefly possesses me when I see someone who might be you. My vision cruelly morphs the most unlikely strangers in to your shape. Many times each day my brain plays tricks.

I have tried numerous forms of counsellor and you would be pleased to know that they all confirm that I have no choice but to give you space and to get on with my own life. This is what I do, but you are below the surface of everything. I am never truly laughing, never relaxed or content.

Tears burst out of me at the most inappropriate moments, at any reminder. It endangers my working life and my productivity.

Other people! I know you would think that I am shallow to care, but many of those who know us do judge me, and they gossip.

I resent what seems to be everyone else having children who enjoy their company, who talk things through with them

I avoid any conversation about you; I can’t stand questions about how you are doing. I deflect them and reverse them until I come across as being cold and closed up. I won’t be pitied, especially by those who will make judgments or will inevitably pat themselves on the back for their own parental success, in comparison with my shabby rejection. Yes, I have become paranoid – I resent what seems to be everyone else having children who enjoy their company, who have meals with them, and talk things through with them.

Anger. You are not the only one. I have that, too. Perhaps you are afraid of that and that is why you won’t come back? I am gut-wrenchingly upset that you think it is OK to do this to me: to your mum. Where is the love in that? Would your friends do it to their mums? Why are their mums superior and so much more deserving than I am?

I am so afraid that the longer this continues, the harder it will be for you to break it. I taught you “strength in silence” when there seemed to be no other choice, to help you through a tricky rejection, but I never expected you to use it against me. I used to believe that we were close; I always loved being your mother. It is not even half a life without you. Here is an opportunity for you to do something good. Please come back to me, or at least explain why, so that I may better understand. Please help me to find some peace from the tormenting questions in my head.

Anonymous