I feel I am in constant mourning

“Are you coming with us to get the tree?”

“Am I wanted?”

“What do you mean”

“Do you want me to come?”

“Oh I don’t care Jaelen”

I feel it is weird to be jealous of children and yet sometimes it just builds up inside of me. My own mom can’t say she wants me to be there to pick out our Christmas tree, the one that will be in my house and I will see every day. But I know she will ask me to fix the tree once they leave to make it look more presentable. But maybe picking out the tree and decorating is a kid job, okay, fine.

Right now she is sitting on the couch, getting ready to watch a Christmas movie with them. She’s never watched a Christmas movie with me, she doesn’t like Christmas movies, I always had to watch them alone.

She taught me how to cook, and wash my own clothes when I was 5, because at that age I was old enough to do it all myself. She still cooked for me don’t get me wrong, but they don’t get that treatment. They get to have whatever they want, even though she doesn’t have the money and they aren’t her kids, it’s her money. I would have to spend a day convincing her to buy me a magazine at the grocery check out line, and even then most of the time it was a no.

Maybe jealous is the wrong word — I’m envious, why are they getting a childhood I didn’t get to have? They’re getting the hugs, the attention, the bonding I didn’t get to have as a kid. I don’t expect it now at all, but why didn’t I get it then? Why am I mourning a childhood I didn’t get, one I didn’t even know I wanted until now.