A Mother's Struggle

Chapter 56

"Lesedi! Sedi!" I knock on his bedroom door.
He did not lock but he is leaning against the door and blocking my attempt to open it. Surprisingly, he is too strong for me. He is too skinny to be this strong.

"Leave me alone," he whines.

Now I see the juvenile part that Naledi was talking about. It is worse than I thought. I am getting annoyed by it but I have no choice but to go after him, at least try to understand why he is acting this way. I guess that is what mothers are for. He is acting too unreasonable. I was the one who got her heart broken that night but you do not see me throwing tantrums everywhere I go. An eye roll follows that thought.

"Lesedi, stop this madness and open the door, you misunderstood everything."

He gives in and I finally go into the bedroom. He is curled up behind the door and I have to squeeze myself to fit through the door. I think I gained a few kilos. What? I have been jogging though.

His face is buried in his knees and I hear him sniffle.

"You misunderstood me." I calmly say.

"I totally heard right, Naledi is your favorite child. How unfortunate for me, that nobody, not even you mom cares about how I feel." His sobs always break something inside of me.

Oh my gosh! I cannot deal with this child anymore. Thabo should be handling this, now unfortunately for me, Lesedi does not get along with him.

Is this adolescence having the best of my child?
Seriously, when a lot of parents said that raising a teenager would be hard, I did not think it would be this hard. This is worse than I thought. Actually, I thought girls are the ones that give parents a headache. I thought the boy would have to come home late, or I am supposed to get called at school because he would be involved in a physical fight. Isn't that what typical teenage boys do? This, this is not what I had expected at all; a boy crying because he thinks I have favorites? What madness is this?

He infuriates me, I have no time nor the patience for this. Why the heck is he making this such a big deal? Actually, he has been making everything a big deal lately. I honestly did not expect such behavior from him, not at all.

"Lesedi, why are you acting this way? I obviously do not have favorites."

"She is your favorite because she agrees with you in everything you say, even the unreasonable and stupidest decisions you make. I am sorry for the way I said it, but there is no better way to put it."

"She is not my favorite. You are just mad that I got back together with your father."

"Why would you get back to him after everything he has done? And that is one of the stupid decisions that I was talking about." He says.

"Don't you remember what he did to you? When he beat you up whenever he came home drunk, ignoring the fact that you were pregnant with his child? Don't you remember that night when he kicked us out? Why are you acting like those times never happened?" He balls his fists besides him.
He is too young for all this anger. His words sting my heart, this hurts coming from my son.

"Your father beat me up twice and it was my fault, you would not understand, you are just a kid. Plus, he is a changed man." Like always, I am making excuses for him and his actions.
It's true though, he is a changed man.

He mumbles something and I cannot really make out what he said. I just heard the word 'excuses.'

"Changed man? He is using you to console himself momma, he just got dumped and you made yourself available for consolation. In fact, both of you are using each other as rebounds. I mean, you both just got your hearts broken or whatever. So it isn't weird that you are going back and forth between friends? Is that normal for you?"