Family Secret: Willful Blindness And A Great Pretender

In some ways, I understand and sometimes even empathize with my mother’s willful blindness. She loves love. A hopeless romantic, the idea of a great marriage appeals to her very much, and it is something she would go great lengths to achieve, including lying to herself. I think she craves the marriage and companionship so much because she once had it with my father, and then she lost him, but that is a story for another day.

My stepfather, the slime ball my mother is married to is a master manipulator and a liar. I have always known he was no good since the day I met him, ten years ago. I was only twelve years old but I sensed his disingenuity. My mother decided my dislike for her new man was my jealousy of him replacing my father, and that has been that. I cannot tell her anything about her man. No matter how I try to point out her willful blindness, she turns around and blames it on me; her husband is perfect, I am the problem. There is none so blind as those who will not see.

Misskorang my mother is an HR director for a fortune 500 company. She is very hardworking and makes a lot of money. I think that is why the slime ball has stuck around for so long. He is just mooching off of her, and using her for her kind heart and her money. Not long after he married my mother, he sold his small real estate company and has not worked a day since! He retired, claiming to have invested his money and could live off the returns. But I see my mother pay all the bills in the household, while he plays golf and do God knows whatever else.

I do not like the guy, at all. But I love my mother to death, so for her sake I try to get along with him. Willfully blind or not, I will do anything for my mom.

About three years ago, my mom and the Great Pretender attended my college football tryouts. After the game, he was going to bring the car around to pick my mother, when a drunk driver hit him in the parking lot. It was not a pretty accident, he was quite badly injured, he suffered some broken bones, a broken skull, loss of use of his legs and a short term memory loss.

The doctors said it would take time but he would completely recover. They expected his legs to heal in six months. He regained his memory, the bones healed but his legs remained crippled. I was in the hospital with them one day when the doctor said it was strange he wasn’t walking, because everything indicated he should walk. Baffled by his inability to use his legs, doctors chalked it up to a psychological issue, and said it will resolve with time, physical therapy and lots of family support.

And support him, my mother has! She never stopped blaming herself for his accident. After all it was at my event that this happened to him. And he misses no opportunity to remind her of the ‘sacrifice’ he has made for us! And so has it been for the last three years, my poor crippled Stepdad and my doting, loving, supportive Mama. She works hard, earns good money to provide his every need, pay for his therapy and worships her poor crippled husband. This pretender has even learned to play golf in his wheelchair, believe it or not.

About four months ago, a week before thanksgiving, I decided to leave college for home a week earlier since all my classes that week were online accessible. I guess my mother forgot to inform him I’ll be home because, he let his guard down.

When I arrived home that day, he was out on a doctor’s appointment. The moment I heard the special van-accessible truck come to the driveway to drop him, I went inside my room, because I was in no mood to speak with him that afternoon. I watched him the entire time through my bedroom windows. They wheeled him out of the van, arranged his legs so he’d be comfortable, pushed him up the ramp and into the house. The van driver and his assistant came inside the house to ensure all was well with him, he even sent one of them to get him a bottle of water. He locked the front door behind them when they left, his poor crippled self.

What he did next had my jaw on the floor! When he was sure he was alone, the cripple stood up and did a happy waltz. Misskorang the man, crippled a few seconds prior, needing to be wheeled around, arose and danced. I watched him for a while, and then made some noise. He immediately sat back in his wheelchair.

“Who is that?” he asked.

“Its me, I’m back from school,” I said

“Oh I guess your mom forgot to tell me. Did you hear me come in?” he asked, fishing to see if I’d seen him.

“I was in my bathroom so I didn’t,” I lied.

I could see the relief spread across his lying face. Misskorang, I’ve always known this guy to be a great pretender, but I never imagined it was to this level of wickedness. I haven’t said a word to anyone about what I saw. In the beginning, I reasoned he was waiting to surprise my mother, but after months of him still pretending, I’m beginning to think this whole cripple thing has been a ruse from the onset.

And this brings me to another conclusion, a few months prior, there was a breaking and entering in a house in our neighborhood. At the time of the crime, an eighty something woman was at home and she called the police. She told police it was my Stepdad that broke into the home but no one believed her, because of course he was a cripple. They said she was suffering the onset of dementia, they were wrong, she was right, it was him.

Dude isn’t crippled, he can walk! And if he’s pretending to be crippled, is breaking into homes, either to steal or just for the thrill of it, I wonder what else he’s up to. I need to protect my mother from him and from herself. But her willful blindness has me treading very cautiously. So I have put a private investigator on him, very soon he will know he messed with the wrong woman, because she has a son who will do anything for her.

So yep. I have a family secret; my mother is willfully blind and my stepdad is willfully crippled. Willful blindness and a willful cripple, that’s my family secret.