TRUE LOVE

Being a mother and raising our two beautiful children is the purest form of unconditional love and the most rewarding experience I have ever had. Even before our kids were born and decades later into their 20’s and 30’s, I created detailed scrapbooks filled with photos, mementos and sentiments to capture their special moments, milestones, accomplishments, interests, feelings and experiences to preserve and cherish their memories. Memories play a role in our overall well-being. Memories strengthen our sense of identity and purpose. In lovingly creating scrapbooks and photo albums for our son and daughter, my goal was to safeguard their memories, wanting our children’s recollections to reflect the many positive moments in their wonderful lives. I didn’t foresee that there would be a future time when these memories would be all that I had left, because I did not anticipate that I would ever experience or endure the significant losses that come with being a targeted mom as a result of severe Parental Alienation. It’s important for me to stay positive, remain honest and continue to act as a loving role model for our son and daughter, even from afar. Our kids are doing the best they can to survive. My wish is that the many memorable moments that I have included, along with the colorful photo collages I created, will help our children remember the many magnificent experiences they had in their childhood and positive times they shared with me. I decided that this volume would be the 8th and final book in the series. Just like I chose to step back and put a deadline end date on my outreach efforts with TV/podcast interviews, magazine articles, speaking engagements and book signings, I also felt I needed to have some closure with this very personal book of memories. For my own well-being, although I will always remain open and hopeful, I am choosing to step back now, accept our reality and put our situation in God’s hands. There is really no end to the memories. Just when I think I’ve listed them all, many more pop into my head that I feel should be included that would jog our kids’ recollections, encourage them to critically think, pull on their heartstrings and remind them of the love shared between us. The same is true with images of things we did, places we went and experiences we shared. So, since this book of memories could potentially go on “to infinity and beyond,” I chose to put my pen down on our daughter’s 29th birthday. I haven’t been able to wish our daughter a “Happy Birthday” for over a decade. I remember her as intelligent, worthy, capable, lovable, funny, loving, kind, happy, hard-working, creative, morally ethical and empathetic. I pray that her heart, mind and soul will awaken to the truth. I hope she will someday realize that her mom loves her and has always loved her unconditionally. This book of memories is also for our wonderful son. I sincerely want him to feel good about himself, be emotionally and financially independent, be physically and mentally healthy, surround himself with positive people, follow his dreams and his passions and make it on his own. He is intelligent, worthy, capable, lovable, funny, loving, kind, happy, hard-working, creative, morally ethical and empathetic. I believe he does know that his mom loves him and has always loved him unconditionally. Memories and feelings of certain events are unique for each person, even though they may be experienced simultaneously with two or more people. So even though I have conveyed events and experiences that I, as a mom, deem significant and positive, that may or may not hold true and be the same for our children. To complicate matters, our kids can be influenced by others to alter the way they view things. A well-known alienating strategy is to “rewrite our children’s memories.” False Memories are a common factor of attachment-based Parental Alienation where there are shared delusions with the aligned parent against the targeted parent. Our unique brain encodes, saves, retrieves information and connects that information to our past experiences and present feelings or state of being, which then impact our future responses, thoughts and actions. Psychologists and scientists break down memory into various types, with each kind of memory having unique attributes and uses dependent on our age, development, maturity, experiences, senses and cognitive abilities. Experiencing trauma, chemical imbalances, drug use and/or emotional, physical, sexual and narcissistic abuse can interfere with and have a negative impact on someone’s ability to remember or the qualities of those thoughts. Memories can also be covertly manipulated by a pathogenic, character-disordered parent who uses conditioning, has a malevolent agenda and is skilled at gaslighting, blame shifting and projection while using repetition to encourage their aligned children to believe a negative, false narrative, while suppressing the truth or the positives. Stockholm Syndrome, Independent Thinker Phenomenon, Psychological Splitting and Black-and-White Thinking also can contribute to what a young/adult child remembers and how they view these memories. No matter what the reasons, the bottom line is that our memories differ, are imperfect, can be altered and can fade over time. While this topic can be deep and has been analyzed in academic/ psychological circles, that was not my intent in writing this book. I simply wanted to recount my perspectives of the many memorable moments that I shared with our children while I was raising them, when they were in my life and part of my every day. My heart is and has always been filled with love, compassion, truth, light and goodness. In making the effort to convey my memories and sharing these moments of this mother’s TRUE LOVE for her children, it is my hope that our son and daughter will know the truth, critically think and remember the many happy times we experienced together. I love both of our children with all my heart.