Valley women weather ups and downs

By JOANN JONES

If Kathy Myers could tell her mom one thing this Mother’s Day, this would be it:

“I love you, Mom, and it makes me feel like a little girl again with you living here with me.”

Myers, of Alliance, moved her 88-year-old mother in with her family after her mother’s hip surgery last year.

That “little girl” feeling also comes with a little guilt that she doesn’t live up to her mother’s expectations, even though she insisted her mother never says anything to nag her.

“I think she would like me to move faster to get some of her belongings out of her house and into mine,” Myers said. “I also worry that there are times she really wants me to be doing something when all I want to do is take a nap.”

Sometimes a struggle

Jo Taylor of Brookfield said she and her mother also “struggle with expectations versus reality.”

“She wants to see me more, but my life often gets in the way of those visits,” Taylor said. “While she says she understands, I’m not convinced that’s perfectly true. The fact that I don’t get to see her as much as she would like has to be a big issue with her.”

Taylor said her mom, Mona Rosine, of Liberty, ran a beauty shop on the back porch of their home for many years and only worked briefly at another job outside the home. Taylor works as an instructional consultant at the Mahoning County Educational Service Center.

“It’s hard for her to put herself into my shoes,” Taylor said, adding that they deal with the reality of time constraints. Other than not seeing each other often enough, they have a wonderful relationship, Taylor said.

“Mom’s sense of humor is something I adore and emulate,” Taylor said. “She is one of the most balanced people I know. She surely isn’t full of herself, and I love that about her.”

Desirae Monaco of Liberty also said her mom has a great sense of humor and gives good advice. But other habits they both have need work, according to Monaco.

“I wake up early on the weekend, and I’m a morning person,” Monaco said. “I call my mom and want to talk.” Her mother doesn’t rise as early.

Her mother’s bad habit, Monaco said, is “she is always late.”

Monaco said she thinks they have learned that things will never change, but she tries to hold off on her calls while also telling her mother that dinner is an hour earlier when she is coming over so her mother arrives on time.

Isis Verdejo of Salem said phone calls cause some controversy with her daughter, who lives in New York.

“I call her all the time … too much,” she said. “But her independence sometimes drives me crazy.”

Sherry Young of Rogers, a bank teller in Salem, has three adult daughters with whom she said she has to “talk and keep communications open” to work on any conflicts in their relationships.

One of their biggest conflicts, Young said, concerns work habits.

“They say I’m obsessive/compulsive about how I want things done,” Young said. “But I can work circles around them.”

She feels their pain

Debbie Cotton, of Berlin Center, has two adult daughters who live in Canfield. Cotton said the “unconditional love” is the best part of their relationship, adding that when they’re upset, she feels their pain, too.

Yet, her “girls” have a holdover from their younger days that does cause some conflict.

“Sibling rivalry,” Cotton said. “As grown children, it still exists between them.”

Other mothers and daughters didn’t want their names mentioned, showing how the relationship is touchy for many women.

“My mother is very dramatic,” said one daughter. “We don’t see her very often, so when we do, she screams with joy and kisses and hugs all of us.”

“I think I tend to keep personal things to myself,” she added, “and she would probably want me to share more.”

Mothers with daughters still in their teens appear to really struggle to make their relationships work.

Distant relationship

“Our relationship is distant,” Joyce Covert said of her 19-year-old daughter, who attends college, and, as a result, wants to gain some independence. “Sometimes I think she doesn’t even like me.”

“I guess I’m constantly nagging her about responsibilities concerning money and her future,” she added, “and she drives me crazy when she acts as if she doesn’t care. But when she actually talks to me and we can laugh about things, that’s when our relationship is the best.”

Twelve-year-old Amy Jackson of Campbell struggles with her mom, saying she treats her “like a kid” and doesn’t let her do many of the things her friends do.

“We tend to fight because when I want to do something, and she won’t let me, I get really mad.”

“But she’s my mom,” Jackson said, “and I could tell her anything.”