Just because I haven't been writing, doesn't mean I have been thinking about writing.
It is just that when all my posts seem to start with "I am a big dork", it is a little disheartening.
No, there isn't an interesting or comedic story to go with that "dork" statement - just my personal state of being.
I turned 41 this past Dec. 25th.
Nothing wrong with that, but like many, many other people I find this time of year HARD.
Having a birthday in the mix often doesn't help.
All that reflux of past years, all the reminders of what I wish could be, of what I don't have.
Don't I sound like someone you would want to hang out with by the lighted tree?
Now having said that, I must also say that this year has been possibly the one I have coped with the best in possibly all my adulthood.
I have done more actual thinking than wallowing.
And more thinking than being angry.
Both items to be marked down on the plus side of the ledger.
So although I am still sad and conflicted and wishful about:
-my dad and brothers having Christmas with their families, five miles from my house, as I gape in open mouthed wonder at how my Dad, the physically, mentally abusive alcoholic that he his, managed to pull off being the one who somehow managed to keep my brothers loyalty and affection and I didn't - despite feeling like I was the third parent.
-my Mom and her husband choosing to go to Las Vegas for Christmas, despite now actually living close enough to celebrate together for the first time in 23 years
-none of my family (of origin) phoning to wish me a Happy Birthday (or alternately, to beg my forgiveness for all they have ever done wrong (real or imaginary) and to throw themselves on the absolute heartbreaking beauty of my compassionate mercy (of which, need I even say it, I have copious amounts that I use generously)
-why do I even make myself nuts over this stuff, when I have a perfectly lovely family of my own to spend time with?
Wow.
The list is a little whiny but still I am glad to have put it down in writing, it makes it all feel a little clearer and less hidden away in the murk recesses.
It is what it is.
Wishing it would go away isn't going to work.
Shining a light on it might help though.
And it might help me with my big old New Year's Resolution too.
I want to stop yelling at my kids and my husband.
One of my natural gifts is a natural ability to PROJECT.
I am LOUD.
This does have certain uses in crowded situations and that kind of thing.
It is also absolutely something I use to express my anger.
I think I am a bit of a bully when it comes right down to it.
And I want that to stop.
So far this Christmas I have subjected each of the people in my house to my shrieking in rage or frustration.
Not proud of that, it embarrasses me and I want to stop.
I am thinking of using this blog as a tool to try and track it, when I do it, when I don't, why, that kind of thing.
We will see how it works out.
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5 comments:
I was also the parentified one -- and my father and younger sister stayed closer to my father too. I think that I protected from some of what he did, or rather didn't, do. He did not notice his neglect because I was picking up the slack and didn't feel his anger because she was shielded by me.
I think.
We should form our own little ACOA's Internet group.
it's hard, and I too know that feeling of trying to keep it all together.
but then people fall away, and you have to let it go; all the unmet expectations and hopes that everything would land in the correct place and those most guilty of unkindness would get theirs.
at the end of the day, we make our own beauty and ugliness. holding onto all that from the past is a weighty burden.
for me, forgiveness and wiping the slate clean brought peace... NOT easy to do. but possible.
love and belated birthday wishes to you... (I kept thinking it was the 26th) may 2008 give you much freedom from all that tugs at your heels....
I am also trying to make 2008 a non yelling year. I would not yell at anyone else the way I do at my dh and kids. So I have been whispering for a week. When I want to yell I whisper. I have had a few mistakes but it has dramatically helped me reduce the yelling in my house.
I think it's because you are the one the family most associates with breaking the vision of the beautiful family, i.e., the assumption is that everyone else would have gone on with the charade until you actually faced the conditions and dealt with them. (This has happened to me, too, for what its worth, and it does really hurt).
Me too.
Belated Birthday wishes. I should start keeping a calendar so I wouldn't always arrive a week late.
Ray's b'day is the day after Christmas and sometime I almost forget his.
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