It is HELL to feel terribly TORN in two directions! It was HELL to feel terribly TORN between two people I loved… One of the WORST days of my life—after Christmas 1981. I was 36. My mother was 74. Just the two of us in our Illinois farm house where she was born and I grew up. The phone rang—it was my beloved Don G. calling from New Mexico or Colorado. When my mother heard it was Don, she looked upset.
I felt terribly TORN between my mother who deeply loved and needed me and 17-year-old, very attractive Don.
After the call I went to my room, got the money she and my dad had given me for Christmas, I threw the money on the floor and told her, “To hell with you and your money. I am leaving.” I walked up the road. I turned around and walked back.
I stood outside. I saw and heard my mother inside crying desperately like an orphan in the universe! She was a very sick woman for many years. What if she had had a stroke or heart attack and died that day because of my leaving? Would my family have ever forgiven me? Would I have forgiven myself?
I went inside. She was so glad I came back. She reached out her dear arms to hug me, but SADLY I REFUSED her hugs that moment. One of MANY things I would aim to CHANGE if I had my life to live over. Now I would love to HUG her a million times if I could.
Heavy pressures on her and on me that day, weeks before she died February 22, 1982.
I was my mother’s closest friend. My mother and dad had a miserable marriage—very hard on both of them. She was passionate and young at heart, but trapped in her torture chamber—her very sick body. She had never met Don. She greatly feared she woul;d lose some of her closeness with me if Don or some other man became my lover. After my brother married many years before, he was no longer as close to our mother. She had invited her very special friend and his family to visit her during the Christmas season but they did not come. I took her to many doctors. I did many things for her she was not able to do for herself. Now she felt I was rejecting and abandoning her.
On my side, I hate the cold and snow of Illinois in the winters. I was homesick for my friends and life in Albuquerque. She and I had a huge argument months before about my human right to have a lover. My brother had his wife and children.
Don was my foster son Joe Villalobo’s half-brother. After Don and I met when he was 16, we BOTH wanted to have sex, but I turned him down because he was under 18—severe risks for both of us. Don wrote me his only HOSTILE letter because I refused to have sex with him due to his age. I do NOT agree with the law, but I take it seriously. When he was 19, we had sex. Never before his death at 25 in a car crash, had I suffered the death of a man I was so in love with.
My mother was my all-time closest friend. No one will ever love me as much as she did.
Our lives have many very painful precious lessons.
I want to be with her, my dad, Don and ALL my many loved ones beyond death, but I strongly DOUBT that happens…Wanting something strongly does NOT make it so.
Letters to the Editor: Feb. 28
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It is HELL to feel terribly TORN in two directions! It was HELL to feel terribly TORN between two people I loved… One of the WORST days of my life—after Christmas 1981. I was 36. My mother was 74. Just the two of us in our Illinois farm house where she was born and I grew up. The phone rang—it was my beloved Don G. calling from New Mexico or Colorado. When my mother heard it was Don, she looked upset.
I felt terribly TORN between my mother who deeply loved and needed me and 17-year-old, very attractive Don.
After the call I went to my room, got the money she and my dad had given me for Christmas, I threw the money on the floor and told her, “To hell with you and your money. I am leaving.” I walked up the road. I turned around and walked back.
I stood outside. I saw and heard my mother inside crying desperately like an orphan in the universe! She was a very sick woman for many years. What if she had had a stroke or heart attack and died that day because of my leaving? Would my family have ever forgiven me? Would I have forgiven myself?
I went inside. She was so glad I came back. She reached out her dear arms to hug me, but SADLY I REFUSED her hugs that moment. One of MANY things I would aim to CHANGE if I had my life to live over. Now I would love to HUG her a million times if I could.
Heavy pressures on her and on me that day, weeks before she died February 22, 1982.
I was my mother’s closest friend. My mother and dad had a miserable marriage—very hard on both of them. She was passionate and young at heart, but trapped in her torture chamber—her very sick body. She had never met Don. She greatly feared she woul;d lose some of her closeness with me if Don or some other man became my lover. After my brother married many years before, he was no longer as close to our mother. She had invited her very special friend and his family to visit her during the Christmas season but they did not come. I took her to many doctors. I did many things for her she was not able to do for herself. Now she felt I was rejecting and abandoning her.
On my side, I hate the cold and snow of Illinois in the winters. I was homesick for my friends and life in Albuquerque. She and I had a huge argument months before about my human right to have a lover. My brother had his wife and children.
Don was my foster son Joe Villalobo’s half-brother. After Don and I met when he was 16, we BOTH wanted to have sex, but I turned him down because he was under 18—severe risks for both of us. Don wrote me his only HOSTILE letter because I refused to have sex with him due to his age. I do NOT agree with the law, but I take it seriously. When he was 19, we had sex. Never before his death at 25 in a car crash, had I suffered the death of a man I was so in love with.
My mother was my all-time closest friend. No one will ever love me as much as she did.
Our lives have many very painful precious lessons.
I want to be with her, my dad, Don and ALL my many loved ones beyond death, but I strongly DOUBT that happens…Wanting something strongly does NOT make it so.
-Don Schrader
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