~Althia's POV~

"You can go first" My mom told me

I took a peak at Mrs June who sat across from us, she caught my eye and gave me a small reassuring nod. One that went unnoticed by my mother since she had kept her eyes on me.

After 3 more months of not talking with my mom, 2 of those being spent back at my home after spending a month with Jessica and her parents, my dad decided that we should go to therapy together. This was our last session together after going to see Mrs June twice a week for a whole month. For our last session Mrs June decided that we should do an exercise where we write down our problems with one and other to talk it out in a civil matter but also to figure out a solution to that problem together.

"Okay well the first thing that I wrote down that I think is a problem is how you treat me" I start off. "You always freak out over the smallest things and you never miss an opportunity to throw in my face that we moved away because of me, even though I know that the move isn't entirely all of my fault and I just wish that you would admit that. I feel guilty enough about the way we had to move and after everything that built up for us to move, it would be nice to have my mom on my side. You know you never even properly asked me what happened at school? You just went and had a meeting with my principal where you then decided to believe lies and blame your own daughter" I continued. "With all of this being said I think you should allow me to fully explain to you what happened at my old school and you should listen to it with an open mind. If at the end of my explanations you still choose to not believe, I'll understand but I really do hope you hear me out" I finished

I finally looked up from my page to see my mom with glossy eyes, I bit my lip and looked back at Mrs June who sat with a small smile on her face.

"Very good Althia, good job at letting your feelings out in a mature way and coming up with a good solution" She told me. "Lydia, do you have anything to say about this before we hear your first problem?" She asked my mom, making her nod.

"Oh Althia" Mom took a deep breath. "I am so sorry I made you feel like I wasn't on your side, I can see now how my actions and words could have led you to believe that. I wasn't happy with the way that we had to move and I was foolishly only thinking about myself and my reputation when my friends brought what they heard about you to my attention. I turned my back on my own daughter in her worst time and I just hope that one day you can forgive me for that. I would love for you to tell me everything from your point of view and I swear that I will not only keep an open mind when I listen to you but I will also take your side because that's what a mother should do. I promise you that in the near future whatever problems occur with you, I will always listen to your side of the story and I will help you out of it from here on now" She looked at me, blinking her tears away.

I sniffed a little to stop me from crying and I gave her a small smile.

"Good Lydia, Althia needs to know that from now on you will be there for her and you will hear her out first above anyone else" Mrs June encouraged. "You can go ahead and list off your first problem" She added

I watched my mom unfold her piece of paper and let out a shaky breath

"I want us to work on our communication. I feel like I don't know anything that goes on in your life unless I pry it out of you and when I do that it doesn't do anything but to frustrate you. I don't want to know every single detail in your life but it would be nice for us to have chats like you have with your father. You have always been so open with him and you go to him first with everything. I guess a part of me was jealous of that and that's why I wouldn't leave you alone until I got the answers that I wanted. I know now that that wasn't the best way to get you to talk to me and I think a solution to this problem would be to have me sit back and let you come to me" Mom said

"Althia in return to this, what will you be doing?" Mrs June asked me

"If you respect my privacy and trust that I will share with you what I want to share with you, mom, I promise to talk to you more openly about what happens in my life. I would like us to have the same kind of relationship that I have with dad" I told my mom

Mom and I kept going back and forth for the rest of our session. Once we left and thanked Mrs June for all of her help, I knew that we were both feeling the same thing. It was like weight was lifted off of our shoulders. We both knew we had a lot more work to do to get ourselves to have a healthy mother-daughter relationship but this session helped us a lot. I learned a lot about how my mom felt about me and I'm sure she felt the same way. This was only the beginning but I knew we were both going to make the efforts to move forward. For the first time in a long while, it felt like I had my mother back and it felt great.