Every Time I Reread The First Book Im Always In Tears - Blog Posts

This sentence haunts me a bit.

Because after everything that Sally has sacrificed to ensure Percy’s safety, after suffering physical, emotional and psychological abuse from Gabe for years, sending Percy to probably very expensive private schools, and still managing to remain kind, baking him cookies, and giving him blue candies whenever he felt bad, and never raising her voice at him, she was still doomed to fail at fully protecting him.

Because to save Percy from getting killed by gods, and monsters, she had to invite a monster into their very home. She had to “condemn” Percy to receive physical and emotional abuse during crucial stages of his life, resulting in dangerously low self-esteem, self-hatred and even suicidal tendencies; issues which follow him throughout every single book.

By the time he was twelve, his self-esteem was so low that Percy even believed Sally didn’t want him around at the start of The Lightning Thief.

Sally, whom he thought the world of. Sally, who is, in his eyes, the kindest, most loving person in the world.

I can’t even begin to imagine how much that thought would mess with a twelve-year-old boy’s mind.

Like, I know we as a fandom see them as the most healthy and best possible mother-son bond ever, and I’m not denying that they absolutely love one another, would do anything for each other or that Sally did not do her absolute best to protect him, but their relationship is in actuality way more nuanced and heartbreaking than we tend to acknowledge most of the time.