Doormat

"You can't lay down like a doormat and get mad when someone steps on you." Said the person who made me lay down like a doormat to survive.

My mom had many of these sayings, always delivered the same way, never out of love. She didn't want me to stop being a pushover, she wanted me to stop being angry about it. She wasn't encouraging me to stand up for myself more she wanted me to do it in silence.

As a kid I got what I needed by being useful, the world's most convenient doormat. My mother taught me that the only way to get what you needed was a very transactional one, where I provide a service and I get what I need in return and the market was very unstable. The same item may double in price for no obvious reason, where doing chores might have been enough before, today may involve that plus emotional support and 3 or 4 insults without rebuff. I remember even as a tiny kid my mom ripping at my hair every morning like it owed her money, rats nest, rats nest. I learned so eary how to bargain for care, getting ready for preschool and emotional manipulation at the same time. Learning how to tie my shoes and also convince someone to tuck me in.

And the thing is, if you understand, you already know this. You may be nodding along, or feeling the pressure behind your eyes build with memory. It's so funny they always use the same playbook, we can match up our lives like offset maps.

Yestwrday, I reset the repeated narrative. No longer ignoring or taking it on the chin. As a full blown adult I finally was able to stop her. She said that you couldn't be mad when you're doormat.

"Yes you can. Because they decided to step on you when they can just go around."

Not that it swayed or changed her, she was already on autopilot. But I did. I changed.