I just want to start this off by saying I hope I never forget about this post and accidentally give my family members this blog address. As of now I've only told a few friends. Anyway....
I'm going to vent about my family for a bit. My parents are the type that never really cared about having kids but did it because it was the next step in their lives. They had me when they were 25 and my brother almost 9 years later. My dad has told me on numerous occassions that the only reason they had me is because my Grandpa was dying and my mom wanted him to meet me before he did. Well, he didn't make it that long and I've always felt like they wished they would've waited. My parents loved me in the best way they knew how- considering they didn't enjoy being parents. Eventually they had my brother because my dad wanted a boy. He wasn't willing to have another child until he realized that I would be old enough to help out. (He's told both my brother and I-and strangers- this many times.) By the time I was 12 years old I was babysitting my brother for 10 hours every Saturday while my parents took a day to themselves. I was also the house gardener, grass cutter(by the age of 9!), and any other odd job you can think of. My Dad would call me upstairs from downstairs to bring me the remote that he'd left on top of the t.v. 5 feet from him. He has always been lazy and saw his children as a means of making his life easier.
I'm prefacing my story with all of this to give you some background on my past. In recent years things have gotten both better and worse with my parents (mostly my dad). We went an 8 month stretch with no communication at all after they kicked me out of their house when I was 17. Then another 4 month stretch during my sophmore year of college after I asked my dad to cosign on my student loan. (He told me that I was an adult and could figure it out myself and that he didn't need the extra debt weighing down his credit score.) We started talking after this incident only because my grandma called me in tears one day telling me my dad was in the hospital. The most recent stretch was a year and a half ago after I had Melanie. I was in labor and on my way to the hospital and it pissed my dad off that I didn't meet up with him on my way to the hospital and instead told him to meet us there. He was so enraged by this that he left town and flew to Antigua for 2 weeks, not even leaving a note behind to tell my mom where he'd gone. No one heard from him the entire 2 weeks. The last thing he said to my mom before he left was that she was a bitch and he wanted nothing to do with me. When he came back he was rude and never apologized for anything. He expected to see Melanie whenever he wanted and told me I was selfish for wanting an apology and said that I actually owed him one. I got over it because I wanted Melanie to know her grandpa. Lately, I've evidently been making choices that my parents don't agree with (the specific ones they listed were: getting married, having Melanie, having Deklan). They said that I was an idiot for getting pregnant and wanted to know why I ever thought I would be able to raise a child. Mind you, getting married and having children have been the best decisions I've ever made- in my opinion. Basically, any thing I do is never good enough. My parents and I got in a HUGE argument the other night that lasted about 3 hours. It was horrible and they said some things to me that I don't think I'll ever get over. My dad blamed me for ruining his marriage with my mom by all the stress I've brought them (wondering exactly how he came to that conclusion?... also wondering how my mom feels about that comment since she was in the room when he said it and they're still together...)... wondering alot of things.
Basically I'm at the point now where I dont know where to go with this. I've been putting up with their emotional (and physical) abuse for my whole life and it's destroying me. I've been in tears constantly since this latest run-in with them that occurred 5 days ago. I'm at the point where I think having them in my life is causing more harm than good. On the other hand, cutting them out of my life means not having communication with my younger brother who still lives with them and is in high school or with my gma or any of my cousins (I know how my parents are and cutting them off means no contact with anyone... remember- I've already done this 3 times)...It's a lose lose situation. I just don't know where to go from here.... All I know is I have to do something because this is eating me up inside... :-(
Two weeks of crazy!
10 years ago
(((hugs))) I'm so sorry that you're having to go through strife in your family. The good news is that you have John and Melanie and Deklan and that they will love you unconditionally. Yeah, the kids will be sassy and bratty at times and will backtalk you when they're older and probably have a rebellious streak at some point (don't we all??). But you'll have the chance to be the parent that you didn't have when you were growing up. You can give that to your kids. You can learn from their mistakes and not be bitter, but use it to your advantage, to know what to do and what not to based on a bad example. Just ride it out, momma. It'll be O.K.
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