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Your Mother's Daughter

By Jazmyn Mitchell -

 

When you were a girl, your dad was a broken record when he was angry with you: “You’re just like your mom.” He only ever said this with disdain.


The husband in your dad’s favorite TV show pleaded with his wife to never become her mother. He did so whenever she showed signs of her encroaching age. These pleas, “jokes,” always made an audience laugh.


You grew up doing everything differently from your mother. You tried desperately to dodge this transformation. It seemed to be the worst thing that could happen to a young girl.


When you turned thirty-five, your boyfriend compared your laughter to your mother’s. He did so with worry hiding behind his eyes and in the cracks of his voice. When you turned thirty-six, the worry unveiled itself when he said he wanted you to stop plucking the hairs on your chin because “that’s what your mom does.” You got scared, maybe you couldn’t avoid the evolution.


But one day, you realized your boyfriend, in every way, was his father. And your boyfriend knew this, and his father knew this. But for some reason, your boyfriend wasn’t ashamed. He proudly walked in the footsteps of the embodiment of masculinity.


And so, with a hopeful fatalism, you aspired to be like your mom because you would be your mom. Now, you’re grateful you were afforded the opportunity to perpetuate your mother and her mother and her mother’s mother. You, like them, are the divine feminine.


You understand your feminine energy to have been robbed from you since you were a little girl. Instead of running from your mother, you run towards her, you run into her. Not entirely too late is the woman cycle to continue.

 

Jazmyn Mitchell is a senior at Kennesaw State University, receiving her Bachelor of Arts in English this summer. A shy writer, Jazmyn is previously unpublished but excited to share her work. She currently lives with her miniature pinscher/chihuahua mix, Xzya. Her Instagram is @jazmynmitchelll.

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