It's just so easy to post on Facebook.
I kind of neglect this blog. FB is more interactive, but I'm less inclined to post serious stuff because so many of my relatives and friends of the family are linked to me there.
I don't know them.
I left home as a senior in high school, and was never very close to anyone since then. I stayed with my older brother and his wife during a transition period of my life, but I didn't stay close afterwards. I tried to be close to my sister and her family after her husband died, but I wasn't successful, so it was more or less on again, off again. (My brother-in-law said I wasn't welcome in their home after my parents outed me. Dear old mums and dadums.)
Today is my brother Tim's birthday, I haven't been in contact with him for years. When I left home, I said goodbye to him, and he cried. He was under the control of my parents and so it was difficult to be close. My older brother was a sort of mentor for Tim, as well as my sister's kids, and I couldn't compete. Not that it was a competition, but I always felt as if I couldn't measure up.
Hence my distancing myself.
It doesn't mean I don't love them.
They just don't know me.
Happy Birthday Timmy!
Terry, this post deeply moved me. Thank you for writing it. So many people have pain, or at least, deeply mixed feelings, about their families. I have both.
ReplyDeleteIn recent months, I have been dealing with an increasing amount of unresolved pain, regarding some of my family members (both ones deceased and ones here on earth), and also dealing with uncertainty, as to how to try to relate to some of the ones who are still here in this life.
I was born and raised in an extremely traumatic background. My mother was severely bipolar, and, at times, physically and verbally abusive to me. She committed suicide when I was nine (I'm now in my forties). My father was an alcoholic with an often-short temper. I was also born with the physical disability of Cerebral Palsy and had to use a wheelchair to get around (still do). To say the least, it wasn't an easy childhood, and in various ways, it hasn't been an easy life. God alone, really, has kept me from reaching the end that my mother reached.
When I went away to college at 21, I tried to escape the trauma of my past, and grade-wise, at least, I did well... but my emotional struggles, and lack of healing from the trauma, kept catching up with me in different ways. I have never been able to achieve the degree of success in life and career that my sister has, and because of that, I have often felt the disappointment, disapproval, and incomprehension, of some of my family members. To this day, some of them still seem to be utterly befuddled, and a bit contemptuous, as to why I seemingly haven't "fulfilled the promise that I showed in youth and young adulthood." I sometimes castigate myself over this too, though I know well that this is not helpful. I am seeing a Catholic therapist now, and that is helping. I still feel the disapproval of (some) family though and struggle with how to relate to them or with whether I should even try.
Thank you for being so transparent here. I'm praying for you.
Please pray for me.
This may seem way too forward, but perhaps a birthday text would be a way to reach out but not put yourself on the line--or make your brother Tim feel he has to take a big step to acknowledge or respond. I feel the emotion of the Lassie picture and its two boys, and my thought was, Baby Steps. That is, of course, if you even have a number to text him at.
ReplyDelete