There's a lot that can be said about families, a few are broken, others are functional, others are truly loving and supportive through everything. We all have a different experience when it comes to living with our family members and for I while I lived in a healthy environment.
Growing up my parents weren't around as much, they would work long hours to give me a home, toys, food and a decent nanny. We didn't have a lot of money, but more than enough. I was a happy kid, there are only a few memories that stick out from that time. It was the childhood every parent would dream to give their kid.
One of my oldest memories from my mum is from when I was about 5 or 6 years old, my nanny would pick me up from school every day, take me home, feed me and make me do my homework, nothing would change because everyone liked me in a schedule. That day everything was going just as planned, the only difference was my mum waiting for me at home.
I was so happy, I was so used to never seeing my mum during the day that it truly surprised me. We spent the day together and I'll always value those precious moments we got to spend together without the pressure of work. They remember me asking to earn less money just so they could spend more time with me.
As I grew I almost resented them, they were never around and just as I started to need help to figure myself out, they fizzled out and became more obsessed with work.  My teen years gave them true headaches from everything I did and how little I regretted of it. Neither of us measured how much all of this was going to break our relationship.
During those years my relationship with my mum broke, we didn't speak for over a year. Unfortunately this happened just as I started to deal with my eating disorder, a problem that would fuel our lack of understanding for each other. Nothing would help us, not even therapy after I tried to end my life, I stopped referring to her as mother and started calling her my dad's wife.
Something switched one day, I had switched disorders and my mum realised how broken I was. She made an effort for the first time that year to understand me. We went to a doctor, she was the one that open our eyes to anxiety, depression, binging and many copping mechanisms that would change the way I would see myself as a person.
We haven't fixed our relationship completely, but with my dad not being able to act as a referee, we've been making an effort for the first time in years to get along. She's my mum and there's no denying that almost everything comes from a good place, from her wanting me to be the best version of myself.
I just wished I'd learned my lesson with her a lot sooner. Being patient and letting her in, in what I'm doing isn't much to ask. There's no denying we'll keep fighting, but I least I know I can give in a little more and she does too.