My muse on film

Veronika

I hadn’t spoken with my mom on the phone for a while. No, we didn’t fight — it was just different time zones, different schedules, life happening. And then finally, we had a real conversation. A full two hours that could have easily stretched to three or four if it hadn’t been the middle of the night in Ukraine. Two hours without any lectures, without passing fears back and forth, without complaints or diminishing each other.

My path to building communication with my mom has been long and messy. There were times when I shared everything with her, then times when I hid things, or even lied… Later, I swung the other way — telling her too much truth she wasn’t ready to hear. And now, at last, we’re here: at a stage of accepting each other as adults. We share our thoughts, we give advice when asked — with tact, patience, and respect.

It feels so good to realize that I — the child — now have a mom who actually listens to my thoughts instead of dismissing them. In many Ukrainian families (I can’t speak for others), there’s a pattern: the child must obey, the child must submit, their thoughts are seen as naïve and “not real.” Only with age do you gain some kind of validity in society — but often still not in conversations with the older generation.

I remember how angry I felt as a teenager and student: reading books, expanding my worldview, but still being treated as “just a kid” who knows nothing and should listen to elders to survive. It was painful. I desperately wanted my thoughts, beliefs, and choices to be accepted — but instead I ran into dismissal. Only now I see that it was really a form of care, a way to protect me from bad experiences and disappointments. Still, how much time it takes for us to learn to accept each other’s choices, to allow each other our own paths and mistakes.

Some of my relatives still communicate with me this way. But now that I’m older, it doesn’t hurt as much. Instead, I just feel sad about their rigidity and closed mindset. I’m still learning how to accept that.

The real shift came when I started therapy — I changed, my reactions changed. And when my mom started therapy too, she changed. I see how her thinking moves now, how she’s become more open, more accepting, more curious about new things. She’s stepping out of her armor of old experiences and prejudices, cautiously but bravely trying new things, listening to others, letting herself do something for the first time.

Have you ever realized that sometimes children outgrow their parents first—and then watch their parents slowly catch up? Time is strange like that. We grow older in years, but maturity doesn’t always follow the same clock.

It’s incredible — to witness my mom growing up.