This time last year things were the same, and different. I'm going to take 10 minutes and look back before I go get dressed.
It's almost too much to contemplate the animal gains/losses. In fact I think that I won't-10 minutes is not enough.
It was interesting to read about "wheeling through the airport" and realize I was still using a wheelchair for longer walks. Wow. Wow. Wow. That needs 10 minutes on it's own.
Ok, enough back looking, what I really wanted to write about today was how far Mom and Dad and I have come as a family-learning to work with each other not against each other. It amazes me how much effort and intention it takes on all our parts just to get along and treat each other decently. We are all decent people, but we had forgotten to be decent to each other.
I think that happens to a lot of families.
14 comments:
I think that IS what families are for..you know like in the BIG picture.
That makes a lot of sense....but in my typical backwards fashion, I have to go out into the world, learn how to get along without being stepped all over and still be friends, and then come home and learn it with my family.
here you are again with all that hard earned wisdom....
well at least you ended this on a positive note,we gotta just 'keep putting one foot in front of another, a step at a time' as they say...and 'they' are such f...idiots! what do 'they' know?
I'm beginning to think "they" don't really exist, just another boogy man to scare us.
Maybe "they" replaces God for some people-What Would Jesus Do, What Will They Think?
I never much cared for my family, I never asked to be in that family so didn't have much to do with them after becoming an adult. Especially my mother, what a retard. Her only skills were chain smoking, drinking like a fish and being a big pain in the butt. Most of my adult life I had little or nothing to do with her.
My sisters were sort of ok, I would visit them if I was in their areas. My brother was a complete fuck head and I started refusing to be around him at all. I didn't need to be in my 40's and still proving I could whip his stupid ass.
I've always much preferred 'extended family. Did love one grandmother and an uncle a lot though. Love is where you find it.
I'm a big believer in no contact if it is consistently bad for either person. But I also believe people can learn at any age and basically I am extending the same kindess towards my parents that I would to an abused animal. Just because they are human beings doesn't mean they didn't get hurt and knocked around by life and have problems of their own.
This involves a bit of uncomfortable knocking your parents off the pedestal we've placed them on, but it has been a rewarding exercise, at least for me and I think for them too.
A lot of our realizations have been lacking in all three of our lives-so it's definitely been a shared experience even though from this blog it sounds like something that happens to me and me alone.
The tricky part is knowing when to push an issue and when to let it go but that's tricky in all walks of life.
Well, I never put my parents on any pedestals in the first place. They didn't deserve that.
The betrayal in your statement "they didn't deserve that" makes me think that you did, and were disappointed by it, and became angry.
I just felt like digging a little deeper with my folks, understanding what made THEM tick etc. It's been very healing for me (although sometimes painful). Yeah, they made mistakes, but I do believe they always did the best they could. The world didn't begin with ME, and they had past hurts too.
I cannot take away the hard child hoods they had, but I can understand how it might color how they think, and try not to judge. I first learned to do this with agressive dogs, and only later came to realize it could work with people too.
I just finished watching "Animal Witness: The Michael Vick case" on Animal Planet. His dogs were misunderstood too, and luckily they were all given another chance because some kindhearted animal folks saw right through to their hearts. You've done that for your folks by realizing they did the best they could even if (at times) it wasn't the best for you. Someone finally treated these dogs with decency. That's all they needed to make it. Michael Vick had the world by the big ones and he threw it all away because of greed and cruelty. His dogs will live on to carry out their own legacy of forgiveness and second chances. Like you said, we just forget sometimes how to be decent to each other.
I'm happy for your breakthrough year. You done good :)
Family members working with instead of against each other...that should, it seems, be the easiest, most natural thing in the world, shouldn't it? But, somehow, it isn't. As you say, it happens to a lot of families....I remember once, when I was in grad. school and dreading a trip home to see the family, I said something along the lines of "shouldn't a family be where you get unconditional love and support" and someone replied "then you'd never have left." Maybe, or maybe I'd simply be able to go back and forth more easily.....
I was bawling like a big baby during the MV dog thing, especially when the big red dog went and put his head on an elderly person in a wheelchair. Hopefully there is some kind of redemption in that for him too. I thought the show did a great job of pointing out the very few of those dogs are true "fighters", most are loving loyal animals.
Dr J-I think that gets back to the whole pedestal thing-if they truly knew everything already they wouldn't need us to come back and show them what we have learned. With families scattered across the countries our seniors are not getting the bridges to the next generation that they used to, which is a shame, because they did their part.
'with' not 'against'
mirth... nor more angst
my family was so dysfunctional and when my parents died at 57 and 59 and only 17 months apart (I was early thirties) I didn't miss them! I was so angry with my mother for many years afterwards, but that is gone too (time does indeed heal everything). I think it must be truly hard to deal with aging folks when one is not young anymore either. i have always maintained that you are on an excellent 'mission' for yourself and them, and it must have its (albeit small) rewards, but hell i couldn't do what you do! respect i have for you debs!
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