Such Sharp Teeth

by Rachel Harrison

Before I knew it, I was telling her about my past, about my mother, about how I had been raised. When I started saying these things out loud, that’s when I realized how fucked-up it all was. She recommended books. Books about being the child of immature parents, about healing from trauma. It gave me all this perspective I didn’t know what to do with. And it hatched this anger. There was suddenly so much of it. Too much. I didn’t know how to experience it. I didn’t know how to hold it, where to put it. When you’re sad, you cry. When you’re happy, you smile, you laugh. But what do you do when you’re angry? Not just mad, but filled with this ugly, consuming rage? And the thing is, women aren’t allowed to be angry. Nobody likes a mad woman. They’re crazy, irrational, obnoxious, shrill. I did what I could to control it. After about six months, I stopped going to therapy and stopped answering my mother’s phone calls, her texts. I’ve done my best to avoid her the past two years, because she sets me off.