Hi, has my mom really changed? My dad died 3 years ago and my mom suffered a lot. We moved to another country then she stopped talking to me and my brother. And if it isn't enough she drinks every time her "boy friend" brings home some money. She used to talk with me all the days. Why does she avoid it now? Do I have to leave her forever?
The point is, there have been a lot of changes in your mother's life and some of them must have been very painful and difficult for her. Unfortunately, it sounds as though she is not reaching out for the right, healthy kind of help, comfort or support.
Are you able to tell us a little more about where she is living (what country, I mean, not her address) and how she came to be on her own?
If she has a boyfriend, she has obviously moved on from your dad in her life. But that does not mean that she doesn’t still grieve for him. There is no time limit on grieving and the pain of loss never really goes away. My own mother handled the loss of my dad by talking bad about him whenever she could. I finally had to tell her to stop because my family loved and missed my dad and we didn’t want to hear bad about him. She admitted this was her way to cope with losing him. Your mom’s drinking could be the same thing. It makes her feel good for a while. It’s hard to quit it if she’s been doing it for a long time. Her boyfriend is not helping her by giving her money to buy it even if he thinks he is.
You do not have to “leave her 4ever”. Believe it or not, she needs you more now than ever. You are all she has to remember your father by. Keep contacting her however you can. Send photos, small gifts, notes, whatever you think will make her happier. If you can speak with the boyfriend alone, you must try your best to convince him that keeping mom drunk is not a good idea for her body’s health or her mind’s health.
No, they won't. But they will make sure that you are not left vulnerable to abuse or exploitation; and they will help you access education, training and work opportunities so that you can build your own life and be free.
They might also be able to help your mother. I'm having to guess, it's fine if there are things you don't want to talk about, but this lady has had rough times and deserves better. Don't you think?
I should have known better than to call your mother "young" to you :) To me, an extremely old woman, about 1003 next birthday*, young means under fifty - but I realise it doesn't look the same when you're only 16.
Truly I don't mean to tease you, I'm just hoping to make you smile. You must feel very lost and alone at the moment, but I promise you you do not have to be.
If somebody has told you that speaking to social workers or teachers or counsellors will get you put into foster care then that IN ITSELF is a very, very good reason not to trust that person. It is not true, for one thing. And even more important, the kind of person who tells you that is often the kind of person who doesn't want other people to know what is going on.
So look up children and young people's services in your area and TALK TO SOMEONE. I wish you luck and hope you will find help very soon, but anyway please come back and tell us what's happening.
* This is just a little joke. I am not really 1002.
Look. You ARE being neglected. You ARE undergoing abuse, even if it is unintentional. Something has to change.
I don't know Poland well, obviously, I'm UK born and bred. But I do know that it is a well-established fully-developed Roman Catholic EU country, not some mediaeval backwater. You are an EU citizen. You have the rights and entitlements that that implies. Exercise them!
Among those entitlements is access to education and access to physical and mental health services and access to support for families when things have gone badly wrong, as they clearly have.
What definitely is not going to help is sitting there and blaming your mother for not coping better. Yes, it is wrong that she is drinking to escape. Maybe it isn't impressive that she isn't fighting harder for you and your brother. But have a heart! Everything you are going through, she is going through too - with the added pain and fear of knowing what impact it is having on her lovely sons. Poor lady, I feel very, very sorry for her.
I've tried to research young people's helplines and it's absolutely hopeless - Google knows I'm in the UK and just keeps sending me to UK sites for Polish people living here. But as a start, Caritas (it's a Catholic charity) has branches all over Poland and they may be able to give you ideas of who you can talk to.
But I say it again - TALK TO SOMEBODY. Do not just sit there waiting for things to change, because they won't, or at least not for the better.
Are you worried about your citizenship status? What does it say on your passport, assuming you have your own?
I can't ask for help, not now. I can just try to force my mom to wake up and to find a work.
There's no Caritas where I live, I can ask for food in the city hall, but they would give me nothing cause you need to be a resident and we are not.
She could have an heart bigger than the sun, but I've been waiting for her to change a lot of times, she don't want help, she says that no one can help us. She don't listen me, so it's even harder to change her point of view.
Thank for googling but I searched a lot of times and I did not found anything. I even tried to call them but they said that if my mom don't talk with someone then they can't do anything.
I wish I could stand up and go, but how I said, I don't speak very well and I can't just go to someone and tell them I need help because my mom is acting like she is the only one in this situation.
I lost 3 years of childhood because of her.
I mean, you can if you like blame your mother, and you can try to force her to wake up and get a job - how's that been working for you, by the way? - but neither of these things is likely to produce any good effect.
What schools are there in your area? Have you thought of going on your own to register with one?
1. I repeat. That is NOT TRUE. Social workers do not set out to break up families or punish anybody or make people unhappy. In any case, you are sixteen - you're not a small child in immediate danger, they're not going to take you away to a foster home. You are a young person, becoming an adult, who is entitled to advice, information and help.
2. Think this through. You say you wish you could leave. Then you recognise that you are afraid of being taken away from your mother. What does this mean? What does it add up to?
3. It means that you are in a situation where you are just *afraid* all the time. You are hating what is happening around you, but you are afraid of what might happen if you try to change it.
4. That leaves you completely frozen and stuck. It also means, when I look at it from the outside, that a young man of sixteen is living in fear and grief when what he needs is help and opportunities.
Your mother needs help too. I've already said that I can't blame her, I dread to think what she has been through. But the one thing that will definitely NOT help any of you is to sit there and do nothing.
Your English is extremely good. Are you a native Italian speaker? But how do you get on with Polish, are you bi-lingual or is it difficult for you?
I just need to think about that, in order to find an answer to my question, anyway thanks for your help, it means a lot to me.
And if nobody knows that you want to go to school...
They can't very well help you get a place at school, can they?
You can ring social services and check before you say anything that the call will be confidential. After all, you don't have to give your name until you're sure about that. If you know enough Polish to ask if they can offer you an Italian interpreter, do that.
Are you near any big towns or cities?
Your mother may be afraid that she will be in serious trouble for not placing your brother and you in schools over the last years. Normally, I'd say so she should be! But given that she was widowed, made homeless, and everything else that has happened then no. She won't be in trouble. They may shake their heads and say she should have got help earlier, but they're not going to make things worse for her now. Anyway - how much worse could they be?
If my mom don't go with me then they won't help us. They can't just let me go to school knowing that my mom is drinking and keeping me in a house where you can't even live. They would probably say to go in some family house, and, that's fine I can go, but only if my mom comes with me. As I said she don't care about me, never happened to see some of my old friends in this situation. What I will do is to wait until things changes, seems to be a bad idea but like I said, if my mom don't do something then nothing will ever change.
But in any case, even if it is full-time for the next couple of years or nothing, it's not like they wouldn't let you see or speak to your mother. Again, you're sixteen - you know how to use phones and the internet, you're not helpless. If it didn't work, you're old enough to leave and return to your mother's home if you want to. They couldn't stop you if they wanted to (and they wouldn't want to!).
You need some structure to your life, some training, some progress, a chance to make friends and gain qualifications. This is crazy!
Besides. Maybe the prospect that things are happening and change is going to come whether she takes charge or not might wake your mother up a bit, no?
It's even funny to be in this situation, I mean it's hard to believe that such things happens in a country like Poland.