The thing that we love the most is ourself.
We love stories about other people and getting to know their story because either we can relate to it or it makes us feel something within ourselves. Something good, something that makes us laugh, comforted, scared, more knowledgable, entitled, depraved....
We love us very so much, we cannot see past our own hunger for ourselves sometimes or even at all.
I could not see past myself as a young adult but how could I have seen my mom? Felt her pain? I was so full of my own ego. How can I get back into the mind of my 20 something self? I want to know what was going on in my head.
I had no relationship with her. I could have, she asked me over to make cookies once, she asked me to go to the mother/daughter mothers day breakfast once. She showed up at my house and asked if we could go antiquing once. She begged me to take her and my dad to her favorite restaraunt once, she asked me to take her to the ballet once.
Not one of those things did I do, not once.
Ridded with the disease of my own selfishness and self centered behavior
I did not see past my own feelings and what I thought I could have, should have had in this life.
I did not see past those things to see that what I did have I didn't deserve.
We do not "deserve" anything.
Entitled, selfish children.
Friday, June 22, 2018
Monday, June 18, 2018
Come back for me
Nothing has been easy, no, no it hasn't. My father was not in the picture my whole life until I went looking for him. My mom left him when I was 6 months old and he never even tried to look for me.
When I was 23 I went looking for him and found him. We had a very good relationship until his passing 9 years after.
Over the years I have connected with family that I personally sourced and sought after. The same goes for long lost friends.
I have no issue finding people and forgiving them for whatever caused them to split. Maybe it is something I did, maybe their life got hard. I know we as humans suffer, we are good and we are bad. When that reconnection occurs I decide if the relationship is worth pursuing based on how genuine they are about why they disappeared or avoided me. Pushing a relationship on someone is not my style. Forgiveness and moving forward is.
However, I also find that no one comes to me. No one comes looking for me.
Am I not a long lost treasure like I treat them to be?
I pursue and search for what was lost and have not been disappointed yet, I will not accept that stupid mantra about if it wonders away from you then let it go, it wasn't meant to be. That is crap.
That mantra kept me from my father for most of my life and from the blessing of the rest of my family I met through him.
Yes, he was wrong in not looking for me, no he probably did not deserve forgiveness. But he asked for it when I found him. The forgiveness was like a blanket and a shield and a comfort for us both.
Going back for someone does not always end up in the best possible scenario but it could.
One day, I hope to be that treasure worth being retrieved.
May no one think that I was a window that was closed or any of those lies.
Do not believe in stupid mantras with no logical grounds of origin.
When I was 23 I went looking for him and found him. We had a very good relationship until his passing 9 years after.
Over the years I have connected with family that I personally sourced and sought after. The same goes for long lost friends.
I have no issue finding people and forgiving them for whatever caused them to split. Maybe it is something I did, maybe their life got hard. I know we as humans suffer, we are good and we are bad. When that reconnection occurs I decide if the relationship is worth pursuing based on how genuine they are about why they disappeared or avoided me. Pushing a relationship on someone is not my style. Forgiveness and moving forward is.
However, I also find that no one comes to me. No one comes looking for me.
Am I not a long lost treasure like I treat them to be?
I pursue and search for what was lost and have not been disappointed yet, I will not accept that stupid mantra about if it wonders away from you then let it go, it wasn't meant to be. That is crap.
That mantra kept me from my father for most of my life and from the blessing of the rest of my family I met through him.
Yes, he was wrong in not looking for me, no he probably did not deserve forgiveness. But he asked for it when I found him. The forgiveness was like a blanket and a shield and a comfort for us both.
Going back for someone does not always end up in the best possible scenario but it could.
One day, I hope to be that treasure worth being retrieved.
May no one think that I was a window that was closed or any of those lies.
Do not believe in stupid mantras with no logical grounds of origin.
Wednesday, June 6, 2018
Move on
Forget about the past and move on they say. Well that sounds easy, I wish it were.
My past, my life, the regrets the sadness.
I was an only child, my mother was mentally ill. She did not have stable income and we had no supportive family.
Handouts from the church she begged for, money, food. I was always so embarrassed. Sometimes she would take me with her so she could be sure to play on the sympathies of the pastor.
Embarrassed, I have been embarrassed most of my life. Because of my inept mother who tried the best she could with what little we had to give me what she never had.
I was sad, so sad most of my life with no other family or anyone who cared for me other than her, and she was crazy. Always in and out of the hospital every year, I had to ask my friends parents to let me stay with them so I did not get sent back to foster care.
You see, kids without any family to care for them end up in "the system" in that system there is most always abuse.
I was abused, and I was embarrassed about it, I did not want to talk about it because nothing could be done. I was forced to eat things I did not normally eat and it made me sick. Sticking the food up my sleeves to go to the bathroom to flush it so I could get some sleep. If I did not finish it I would be woken up in the middle of the night to finish that food or my homework.
Forced to bathe in front of the husband in boiling hot water so hot my skin turned bright red. I told the social work what happened and I was punished by the fosters, they screamed at me and said if I think this was bad then I had no idea how much worse it could get.
But why did it have to be bad at all?
Why cant I move on
My past, my life, the regrets the sadness.
I was an only child, my mother was mentally ill. She did not have stable income and we had no supportive family.
Handouts from the church she begged for, money, food. I was always so embarrassed. Sometimes she would take me with her so she could be sure to play on the sympathies of the pastor.
Embarrassed, I have been embarrassed most of my life. Because of my inept mother who tried the best she could with what little we had to give me what she never had.
I was sad, so sad most of my life with no other family or anyone who cared for me other than her, and she was crazy. Always in and out of the hospital every year, I had to ask my friends parents to let me stay with them so I did not get sent back to foster care.
You see, kids without any family to care for them end up in "the system" in that system there is most always abuse.
I was abused, and I was embarrassed about it, I did not want to talk about it because nothing could be done. I was forced to eat things I did not normally eat and it made me sick. Sticking the food up my sleeves to go to the bathroom to flush it so I could get some sleep. If I did not finish it I would be woken up in the middle of the night to finish that food or my homework.
Forced to bathe in front of the husband in boiling hot water so hot my skin turned bright red. I told the social work what happened and I was punished by the fosters, they screamed at me and said if I think this was bad then I had no idea how much worse it could get.
But why did it have to be bad at all?
Why cant I move on
Friday, January 12, 2018
She wanted to go to the beach...
My mother has dementia, she is only 63 years old. She was diagnosed with it roughly 5 years ago. I miss my mother. I miss her calling me, I miss our arguments, I miss her being so excited to go anywhere with me even if it was just to get coffee.
I was everything to her, I was her whole world and I did not even realize it.
Now she is slowly leaving me.
It felt like the reality of her disease came on all of a sudden. Out of no where and with no warning.
She wanted to go to the beach, and every year I always said "we will go this summer I promise" and every summer that went thereafter, I said those same words.
After my dad passed away, that following summer, my boyfriend and I took her to the beach. It was a difficult day.
She was afraid of the water, but not afraid of strangers. She walked up to everyone, some people were receptive and others were very bothered. It was exhausting on a hot summer day to chase around my mother who wanted to personally greet every person and she would not listen to me one little bit.
It was then my boyfriend said to me, "there is something seriously wrong with your mother."
I was so exhausted I couldn't even bear the thought of this not being just a temporary thing, like maybe belabored grief from recently losing my dad. However, that is not what it was, it was something so much worse. It was early onset of dementia.
The dementia has progressed to the point that she can't say my name anymore. I never ever thought I would miss her voice so much. It is amazing the guilt I feel for the life I could have lived with her.
A person that raised me and taught me how to take care of myself and wanted nothing more but the simple things in life is not able to enjoy any of it anymore. Not a trip to the store, not a food that she enjoys, NOTHING.
Had I known what LITTLE amount of time I had left with her I assure you things would have been VERY different. I would have done so much more to make her happy and make her feel loved. I regret that I was a selfish woman. We would have done so many fun things, and we definitely would have gone to the beach.
I was everything to her, I was her whole world and I did not even realize it.
Now she is slowly leaving me.
It felt like the reality of her disease came on all of a sudden. Out of no where and with no warning.
She wanted to go to the beach, and every year I always said "we will go this summer I promise" and every summer that went thereafter, I said those same words.
After my dad passed away, that following summer, my boyfriend and I took her to the beach. It was a difficult day.
She was afraid of the water, but not afraid of strangers. She walked up to everyone, some people were receptive and others were very bothered. It was exhausting on a hot summer day to chase around my mother who wanted to personally greet every person and she would not listen to me one little bit.
It was then my boyfriend said to me, "there is something seriously wrong with your mother."
I was so exhausted I couldn't even bear the thought of this not being just a temporary thing, like maybe belabored grief from recently losing my dad. However, that is not what it was, it was something so much worse. It was early onset of dementia.
The dementia has progressed to the point that she can't say my name anymore. I never ever thought I would miss her voice so much. It is amazing the guilt I feel for the life I could have lived with her.
A person that raised me and taught me how to take care of myself and wanted nothing more but the simple things in life is not able to enjoy any of it anymore. Not a trip to the store, not a food that she enjoys, NOTHING.
Had I known what LITTLE amount of time I had left with her I assure you things would have been VERY different. I would have done so much more to make her happy and make her feel loved. I regret that I was a selfish woman. We would have done so many fun things, and we definitely would have gone to the beach.
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