The THON sounds amazing. I'm not surprised your kid made it. I knew she would. The family support was great. You didn't learn that from the Delanas!! As I was reading your account and feeling your love and joy stream through, I realized the THON was all about connections. I started seeing connections on so many levels. So it was the opposite of violence, but more - it was human. It was community and vulnerability. I think that is why you are feeling so much. Why your family will float for awhile - until real life mundanely saps the joy - because we don't have enough community or community events to sustain us on this level. And to sustain it, we need each other and we need events and shared purposes.
I think you may remember my post where I was wishing I could be violent to a woman who allowed her daughter to be molested, raped. I had a long talk with this young woman today. Her mother has a new boyfriend, who is trying to step between mother and daughter and protect his lover without really knowing the history. It is bringing some issues to a head. So we talked...
What she wants is for her mom to apologize. I told her I recognized that. But her mother so strongly identifies as a victim she can't possibly apologize without threatening her own sanity which revolves around her self identity- she is the victim. If she apologizes, admits that she did something wrong, her safe place inside is gone. In speculating, we assume she was probably sexually abused when a child, also. It makes sense, but we'll never know.
I ended up telling my young friend that she will never have a mommy. What she really wants is a mommy, but it will be an unmet need in this lifetime. Her best bet for experiencing mommy is to mother her children, and learn from that side of the relationship. She has to decide if what she has is enough. If not - break off the relationship. If it is, the veneer of a grandmother, the appearance of family, then she has to accept what her mom can offer and not expect/demand/long for anything else. Because she is wasting all of that time focused on her mom that she could be spending with her children - with adoring them and being fascinated by their development and personality.
It was a hard talk, because I had to ask myself all of the same questions. I looked at some of the photos of the 9 of us together last summer, and realized I simply have no connection to some of my sibs. It is weird to look at us all together - physically together...
But I also had to wonder what my kids have to settle with from me...
Well, questions like that mean I no longer see myself as victim!!
Love and hugs...sleep well little sister,
Clare
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