The hairs on the back of my neck tingle and for a moment, I am frozen. For a moment, just a flicker of a moment, the face in the mirror was not my own. For that moment, time and space crossed paths and in an instant, I was looking into the face of my mother.

It happens more often since she’s died and it never gets less jarring to expect to see your own tired face, and instead recognize the face of a monster. It’s silly of course. I know logically that I am not my mother, and every day I thank God for that. But when I see her face reflected in my own features, I can’t help but feel a terrible sense of foreboding.

My mother was not always a heinous monster. For times in my life, she was actually quite pleasant. But when that switch flipped and the demon inside reared it’s ugly head… you wanted her to forget you existed. When the switch was flipped she was evil, and when she was using… her passing out was a blessing.

Knowing the juxtaposition of the good and the bad within her has always terrified me. When I was 16, I used to have panic attacks so badly that I felt I was floating away into the ceiling and didn’t trust if I was real or not. I spent hours furiously scouring the internet: “do crazy people know that they’re crazy” and “how do I know if I have schizophrenia.” I was scared that I had her genes or something and that there was a switch inside me too.

Rubbing my eyes I open them again and my mother is gone. The way my hair curled loose from the braid in my sleep opened the gate for her to come in. But she’s gone, and I’m okay (I think? But how do I know?).

I see her within me in the face in the mirror, but I am not my mother, only my mothers child.

At least that’s the hope.