My Mum Said The 9 Words I Didn't Know I'd Been Aching To Hear. Would It Make Up For My Childhood?

It started with cilantro scissors.

We were in the kitchen, my mum freshly sober and beaming with Pinterest-level optimism, showing me how to mince herbs the “right” way. She’d never cooked for me growing up – never packed a lunch, never stirred soup.

But that week, she was in full redemption mode: shopping at Whole Foods, binge-watching feel-good movies and promising to be the mum I always needed.

Just six months earlier, she’d been living in Texas – trapped in a cycle of alcohol, drugs and eviction notices. She and her husband were broke, desperate and spiralling. Then their trailer caught fire, and they ended up at my grandmother’s in Louisiana.

Somewhere between rock bottom and a megachurch that specialised in redemption arcs, she found sobriety. And Jesus.

My grandmother called to say, “She’s really changed. You’re going to be so impressed. Just wait.”

“Are you sure?” I asked, still deciding whether to believe my grandmother or protect myself. After all, my mum was the same woman who once told me I was the source of her greatest pain. Who fidgeted and picked at the scabs on her chest at my wedding. Who cried herself to sleep after benders, while I, still a child, watched helplessly.

And yet, when she called to ask if she could visit – for the first time in years – something in her voice felt different.

At the pocket-sized airport, I saw her before she saw me. She was glowing. Steady. Her body didn’t flinch when she hugged me. Her eyes were bright, and her skin looked healthy. She talked about her new plant-based diet and offered to teach me how to cook.

“I know I never cooked you anything growing up,” she said. “But we can make up for it now. Is there a Whole Foods nearby?”

Whole Foods?

Who was this woman – and what had she done with my mum?

We spent the next few days immersed in low-key joy. No bars. No alcohol. Just T.J. Maxx, beauty aisles and grocery runs.

“Have you been to Costco?” she asked, eyes wide, then led me down every aisle like it was Disneyland for adults. She paid for everything: garlic grinders, glass Tupperware, bulk hummus. I didn’t ask where the money came from. Her husband – sober now, too – had gone back to work in the oil fields. She wanted to take care of me. And for the first time in a long time, I let her. 

Was this what regular mums did?

I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. But that week, it didn’t. The healing was real. The trust… still under construction.

It felt surreal – like I’d stepped into someone else’s life. She was soft, maternal, sober. And she said the thing I didn’t realise I’d been aching to hear:

“I want to be a better mum to you.”

Even in my 30s, there was nothing I wanted more.

But the moment that changed me didn’t come in a kitchen or a grocery store. It came in a car. We were driving down a quiet country road toward a fall festival – apple trees, hay bales, cider. She reached for my hand and said:

“Ri… I’m so sorry I hurt you. You were right. I had a drinking problem. I did drugs. I lied. I blamed you. You tried to help me, and I denied everything. I hurt you more than anyone. And I’m really sorry.”

Just having her sober was more than I ever dared to hope for. But this – an apology? An acknowledgment?

I hadn’t known how much I needed it – until I burst into tears.

I pulled the car over and took both of her hands in mine.

“Mum,” I said, “All I’ve ever wanted was to know you were OK. That you were safe.”

“I know, baby girl,” she said. “I can’t change the past. But I’ll be here now. I’ll be the mum you deserve.”

The ache in my chest – the one I hadn’t realised was always there – finally subsided.

Relief came in waves. Relief that she was alive. That she was choosing something new. That I hadn’t made it all up. That I hadn’t been too sensitive, too dramatic, too wrong.

I had seen clearly all along.

That truth felt like a lifeline thrown across time.

It wasn’t a perfect reunion. It isn’t perfect now.

But at the time, it was enough.

I had my mum back – maybe even for the first time.

And with that reconciliation came space – space to ask questions I hadn’t let myself consider. About having children. About my marriage. About whether the life I built out of survival had any meaning at all.

So I went to therapy.

“What’s the relationship you have with yourself?” the therapist asked, perched on a turquoise green couch.

I blinked.

“I have no idea what that even means,” I admitted.

She explained that the relationship we have with ourselves sets the tone for every other one.

“If you’re hard on yourself, you’ll be hard on others,” she said. “If you’re kind to yourself, you’ll be kind to others. If you’re unaware of yourself, you’re likely to self-abandon – and attract those who do the same.”

It was an awakening. 

Therapy hit me like water to a parched sponge. I devoured books: The Art of Stillness, The Shift, Co-Dependent No More. I took notes, googled “trauma bonding,” watched talks and lectures. I sat with my inner enabler.  

I didn’t just want to heal. I wanted to win therapy – gold star, extra credit, valedictorian of self-work.

But that’s not how healing works.

The truth doesn’t land all at once. It drips. Then pours. Then waits.

It comes in layers – one pattern, one revelation at a time.

Eventually, I’d see it: the overcompensating, the overachieving, the people-pleasing. How it all tied back to the generational trauma passed down from my mother and the mothers before her.

And when I think back to that dirt road, that grocery aisle, that unexpected apology, I see it for what it truly was: A permission slip. A release. The moment my self-trust returned. The moment I was set free.

It’s been almost a decade since that visit. My mum is still sober, and we stay in touch. There’s forgiveness now. Even laughter.

But trust? That’s still tender.

It may never feel effortless – and I’ve made peace with that.  

I’ve accepted her not as the mum I once longed for, but as the one who exists now – imperfect and still trying.  

I’ve learned that people can change. It takes hard work, dedication, a willingness to face the truth. But it can happen. It happened for my mum. It also happened for me.  

That week didn’t rewrite the past.  But it cracked a window open. And light – when it finds even the smallest opening – knows exactly how to pour in.

I’ll always think fondly of those cilantro scissors. I still have them, tucked in the back of a drawer. They’re a little rusted now, but I can’t throw them away. They remind me that healing doesn’t always look like a breakthrough. Sometimes, it just looks like trying again.

Sherí Kelsey is a writer, U.S. Army veteran and former executive turned truth-teller. Her work explores burnout, generational healing and the quiet, radical choices that break family cycles. She’s currently completing her first memoir/self-help hybrid, Adult Time-Out of a Cycle Breaker.

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