What steadied me was remembering, each time, who the door was actually for.

It was not for me, to resolve my complicated feelings about my mother.

It was not for her, to relieve her loneliness or her guilt.

It was for Mason and Lucas, and the only question that had any standing to decide it was whether opening it was good for them — not whether it was kind to her, not whether it was expected of me, but whether two specific children were safe and ready.

That reframing changed everything.

It let me hold forgiveness and boundary in the same hand without contradiction: I could work, privately, toward releasing my own anger, for the sake of my own peace, and at the very same time keep the gate to my sons firmly shut until people whose entire job is the welfare of children judged it right to open.