A Mom on Menopause is not a fun Mom

 I'm Rose and  my mom has menopause. I'm 16 years old and have never told my Mother I hate her but that's how i'm starting to feel. It came on gradually, she stopped smiling at little things, stopped praising and complimenting me and my siblings for the things in our lives we take pleasure in, stopped pretending. She used to be this amazingly bubbly person who was always there for me and everyone. We were never really close close but I knew she would help me and defend me in whatever I needed. Now she can barely get out of bed in the morning. She yells at me for the smallest things and I find it hard to sympathize or care about her plight anymore. I love her, but the easiest way to deal with this, i've been told by my older brother, is to emotionally detach myself. She's a stranger living in my house. She's my mother but with no strings attached... anymore anyways. 

   I'm the youngest in my family and I have 2 sisters and 2 brothers. The second youngest Clayton, is now 18 years old and he and I were kind of in it together but he went to college after Junior year and now it's been me stuck with her. My dad is here too of course but he doesn't tend to help the situation. 

   I was able to get through it with Clayton. With two kids in the house I wasn't under constant scrutiny, I didn't feel so alone. I was never really close close with anyone in my family but whenever my Mom would go crazy me and Clayton would share a saddened glance as we walked to our rooms, or outside, or to the car to get away and deal with the madness our own separate ways. We shared the burden of having a mother who had stopped caring and stopped loving. It was ours to face together. But since he's now at college I'm left to face it. 

   There are days where she seems normal again and she'll make me breakfast, or hum a song she liked and I  would get my hopes up thinking "This is it, it's finally stopped" then next morning i'll listen at her door only to hear her crumble back into the fits of depression, sobbing loudly into her pillow. 

   All the little everyday things seem to only add to her sadness and feelings of guilt and weakness. So when I go to tell her about my day or some new little discovery I had made I pull back, remembering how easy it is for her to connect my words to a painful memory or thought and quickly segway into anger and despondency. 

   To try and make herself feel better she tries to do things she used to enjoy such as riding a bike or sitting by a fountain where little children are playing. I remember one time I suggested she get out of the house she said through tears, "If I put on sunglasses no one will be able to see me crying" and then her shoulders slumped as she shut the door behind her. 

    When my mom gets sad and upset all I want her to be is gone. Sure I used to wish she was happy but after days and weeks and months of wishing, it gets old, and you realize its not going to happen. So instead I wish for peace. For the comfort of an empty room. As soon as she walks through the door the eggshells clear the floor and I can walk and skip and jump and not be afraid to play my music, or sing at the top of my lungs.