It was supposed to be a two week holiday. Nothing more. Something that millions of people do with regularity every summer. No, that is not quite right, it was always going to be something 'more'. It was about my youngest child and me. About our relationship and finding space and time to repair something that I had sometimes thought was shattered beyond all fixing.
M is my second daughter and the baby of the family. As a small child she would cling to me. She was the centre around which the whole family revolved. Adored by all, parents, brother, sister, friends. Perhaps that is what went wrong.
She was the easiest of children. Until her 13th birthday, when, like Kevin, the tv character, she underwent a personality transplant. Overnight, my sweet, even tempered daughter turned into the teenager from hell. No matter how I tried, I could do nothing right. I still stand by decisions I took at the time. I took them for the right reasons and even with the benefit of hindsight believe that I would make the same ones if I had the time back. I did make mistakes in the way I handled our relationship. It was as if there was no common ground between us, no ability to understand or empathise with the other. Eventually she chose to live with her father and I thought I would die from the pain of loosing her.
For more than two years she barely spoke to me. Birthdays and mothers day would pass without so much as a few words. I learned to deal with not seeing her. I learned to stand back and bite my tongue, watching from a distance as she made mistakes that could have ruined her life. Mistakes that I longed to protect her from. The relationship between her and her siblings became equally frought.
Then a few months ago she began to visit. To come to my house each day after college. Initially, the attraction was new friends she had made that lived close by. But then slowly, almost imperceptibly, things began to change. M would choose to spend the evening with me rather than go out. Carefully, we began to talk to each other. Arguements still happened, but they were fewer and the lessons we had both learned meant that one or both of us would step back before things went too far.
By the time the summer began we were getting along pretty well. M had also begun to mend fences with her older sister, although her relationship with her brother was still fragile. It was at this point that my ex husband offered to pay for a holiday. He thought that if we had some time alone, away from the every day, we would, perhaps, finally put things right between us.
Looking back, I think that M and I were both aware of the risks. We were nervous. Aprehensive. Afraid to loose what had been gained. I remember the wary glances we occasionally gave each other on the aeroplane. The brittle brightness of conversation when we arrived at the hotel.
Somewhere during those two weeks we got to know each other all over again. To the bond of mother and daughter was added that of friendship. I learned that despite every thing, M has grown into a lovely young woman. At 16, she has more maturity than many an older teenager. She is funny, intelligent, stubborn and very good company. She knows, and admits that all that happened in the past is not something she can simply blame on me. We both made mistakes.
We talked constantly. About the past and about the future. We learned to compromise and to try to understand each other as the people we are. We learned that in many ways we are a lot alike. Which perhaps, was part of the problem in the first place.
When we returned to Kos, after the original two week holiday, my eldest daughter joined us -
We spent the most amazing week together. Me and both my girls.
