Celebrating Unconventional Families

Sorted under random acts of activism on May 10, 2009

If you have read this website long enough or happen to talk to me on a personal level, you will know that Mother’s Day is not a very good day for me. In fact, it is one of the most loathed days of the year for me right up there with spending Christmas surrounded by devoted religious people who all believe that they were put on this Earth merely to convert as many people as they can while asking me repeatedly if I’m sure I don’t want to attend mass with them. For about a week leading up to Mother’s Day every year I keep my mind busy with whatever I can while successfully avoiding stores and many websites because of the Mother’s Day shopping craze just merely knowing that the day will arrive and without even thinking, when that day comes I will wake up and live the day in a sort of haze; as if I am having a “dark day.”

This happens for a myriad of reasons. Through the years, while I have built up a tremendous wall that I have honed to impenetrable, this is the one day where I have given myself the permission to feel however the hell I want to feel. No wall. No censoring. No excuses. Last year I wrote a post all about my relationship with my mother. How my mother has never in her life been a mother. I have not seen her in about 11 years and as far as I’m concerned, I will not see her at any point in the future because the difference between now and when I was a child is that now, no one can tell me that my mother really does love me and I’m the one who is crazy. No one can tell me that I am the reason why my mother is unstable because I “act out” too much. No one can tell me that I have been court ordered to see her.

Last Mother’s Day I wrote a post about my mother and the life I had lead when I was in her custody. I also wrote about the release of my first short film, No Trespassing, a vignette I had written a few years earlier that has been picked up by social issues filmmaker Dany Nieves, so today is the one year anniversary of my biggest creative accomplishment thus far.

I called my grandmother and my father to wish them both a happy Mother’s Day today. While my grandmother is a mother, one might raise an eyebrow at the fact that I call my father on Mother’s Day, but when you come from an unconventional family, this is not the least bit odd. While the blogosphere and mainstream media as a whole jumps on the ‘your mother is so important and loves you unconditionally no matter what’ bandwagon, it is normal people from motherless families to feel outcast. That is why it is so important to not think of days like today like a tribute to a mother, specifically, but a tribute and a time to thank the people who raised you and instilled the values in you that you still hold in your life. These people include anyone who was a real and amazing parent to you, whether it be a father (yes, you can call your father on Mother’s Day if he was a single parent and fulfilled both roles), grandparent, aunt, uncle, distant relative, and etcetra.

While in most cases, mothers do fulfill their roles and responsibilities as mothers, it is extremely important to also recognize and celebrate unconventional families.



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  • antiagingwrinklecream
    Hi, I'm sorry about your past. Mine is a bit the opposite, my dad took his life at a young age, he loved christmas and tended to 'overdo' it so my brother and i could have the kind of christmas that he never did. That is always a difficult time of year.
  • Sorry to hear that you didn't have a good relationship with your mother. While I do have an unconventional family, I love both of my parents, no matter how many times I've been hurt because of what they did (which I'd rather not mention). I don't blame them for that, rather I blame the people who influenced them to do so.
  • Book Girl
    A very necessary post. Thank you for writing it. Mother's Day (and Father's Day, and Christmas, etc) is a very painful one for me too, being physically and emotionally neglected and abused in a very dysfunctional family that also allowed outsiders to abuse me too.
  • Wow, Holly. I read the interview--was blown away by your poetry. I read the post from a year ago. I looked at the trailer. How do I get a copy of the film?
  • I agree too. Its a great idea to someone who has no mother because of any reason. I think its nice to thank the person who care and love you and stand as your mom when you dont have. great Post.
  • Yeah, I agree too. I think mothers' day is a celebration of thanking the person who made you who you are and saying how grateful you are. Nice post!
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