Mary

“ACTING RESPONSIBLE FOR SOMEONE OFTEN LOOKS LIKE: Assuming you know what they think. Trying never to upset them. Instantly dropping everything to help them. Trying to manage their distress. Telling them how to function. Teaching others how to interact with them. Discouraging their independent functioning. BEING RESPONSIBLE TO SOMEONE COULD LOOK LIKE: Being curious about their thinking. Being honest about your interests, beliefs, and challenges. Showing up for important events. Letting them know when something isn’t okay. Respecting the boundaries they set. Being responsible for managing your own distress. Letting others be in charge of themselves. Promoting their independent functioning.”
― Kathleen Smith, True to You: A Therapist's Guide to Stop Pleasing Others and Start Being Yourself

“Sometimes I wonder what my adult children will tell their therapists, assuming they’ll have therapists. It’s all conjecture. Sometimes I want to tell them: I’ve tried to love you the right way. I’ve tried to love them as if there is a right way. No, I’ve loved them without having to try at all, because I’m their mother, and the love is not work. Parenting is work: the cooking of meals, the washing of clothes, the tending of wounds, the taming of cowlicks, the helping with homework, the driving to soccer, the packing of lunches, the finding of missing things (water bottle lids, baseballs, library books, mittens), the consoling to sleep. The love? It’s not work.”
― Maggie Smith, You Could Make This Place Beautiful

“Mom, try not to hurt your own feelings for no reason,” Willa says. This is sensible advice.”
― Catherine Newman, Sandwich

“How did I think for so long that the tidbits my mother shared didn’t contain lessons? I see in retrospect that they were nothing but lessons. As you make your way through the world, you will feel bewildered, appalled, and charmed by other people. In the real version of all our days, as opposed to the version we publicly present, there are many undignified moments. The circumstances that distress you and the circumstances that distress someone else might not overlap in the slightest. In situations that make you nervous, do your best and proceed; others before you have also been nervous.”
― Curtis Sittenfeld, Show Don't Tell