Desperately Seeking My Mother’s Approval.

My writing ego is fragile.

I am finally going to admit to what has been the biggest block to me writing again, to me approaching those agents I need to approach. It is that my mother told me my book was “fine”. For some reason, that carried more weight than all the other people telling me it was fun and enjoyable. Even my father loved it.

Although I am fully aware that my mother is hypercritical of some of the best writers of our day and that she has very high expectations of a novel and its worth. Despite the fact that I am her only child and I know that she would love me to write a literary masterpiece. I still took her “fine” and ran myself into the ground with it. Admittedly my mother has no idea how complicated my relationship with her is. She doesn’t understand that although I know that she loves me, I often don’t feel like she likes me, I should probably explore that another time.
A few years ago, she told me, once again, how selfish I was as a teenager. Why would you tell anyone this? Let alone your grown daughter, who has spent her life battling depression and suicidal ideation and anxiety? Why tell her that she was a selfish teenager? I get that my mum has only ever had one teenager in her care. But isn’t it common knowledge that that is one of the distinguishing features of teenagers?
Personally looking at my letters…