posted December 13, 2009 12:56 AM         

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it seems a lot of us (30s - 40s) have problems with our parents acting out. I hear it everywhere, all the time.

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The first thing I thought of when I read this was baby boomers. And don't worry about generalising. They are so huge in numbers that any legislation passed is usually voted in by them so they benefit.

It is the younger generations that will pay high taxes and run after them when retired - so I wouldn't be too sorry for generalising. It's the kids born in the 70s-90s that will do it tough. I may write about this in Global Unity if I have time.

posted December 14, 2009 07:56 AM         

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I'm sorry you were hurt, wheels.

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Thanks Valus. I sort of wasn't though. I find comments about personal appearance quite strange and they glance off me. Mostly because I am old enough not to care about what I look like anymore and I know that it's not something I can change anyway. Beauty is within, and that's a fact. I think I was more amused as the comment was so clearly meant to sting and it didn't. If she'd picked me up on something I'd said or done I would have given it some thought and maybe worried.

But having said that....

posted December 21, 2009 12:56 AM         

We're silently munching when my mom says, directed towards her sister but loud enough so we all can hear, "Jane certainly doesn't get her breasts from you or me! She's already bigger than either one of us."

I was stunned. At the time, I usually wore a jacket if I had on a formfitting top. The agreement was - world, I won't show you my body and you won't comment on it. It was more than just a typical bout of early teenage shyness. I had body issues. Specifically, I didn't want one. Except with a boyfriend, I wanted my physical self to be invisible to everyone.

During dinner, I didn't have on a jacket and was wearing a tightish sweater. I guess it was the first time in a while that my mom was getting a glimpse of me, and her Sag self blurted out what she was thinking. (And for the record, my breasts aren't the orcas my mom's comment depicted them as. They're about average. This is getting weird... )

Everyone looked at me. I told my mom to stop hitting on me. It was the first comeback I thought of. Everyone laughed and the convo moved on.

I'm certain she had no idea how uncomfortable her comment made me. I never told her. And a couple years later, she commented about my body again. (Except that time, she'd moved on to my @ss! ) That time, I started crying. She looked dumbfounded! It was a ridiculous situation - me crying, and my dad came over to comfort me. My dad, who had caused me tremendous amounts of pain. And he's seeing an opportunity where he could finally help me, so he's saying sweetly, "Don't cry. You have a nice butt." That did the trick - because it sounded absurd from my dad and was not why I was crying - so the crying instantly stopped and gave way to laughter.

My mom was supportive. Even when she touched a nerve, she didn't do it in a critical way. I can't think of a time that she ripped into me. Not that she never hurt me, but that was in a whole different way.

She also said something a couple of years ago that haunts me. We were in her room and the radio was on. The program was about infidelity. I think I made a disgusted sound as someone was talking about cheating. My mom said, "You take that too seriously. Every man cheats. You can't end a good relationship over that." Say wha?! This Sco Asc can most certainly end a good relationship over that. Then I got paranoid and asked her if there was something she wasn't telling me, if she had reason to suspect my SO. I think my interrogation terrified her. Come to think of it, that convo probably scarred her just as much, if not more, than it did me. But I do still think of that sometimes, and wonder if she was right.

posted December 21, 2009 09:10 PM         

(*I call my mamie "Granny" because that's what she prefers, unlike many others in my family. But I still call my paternal grandmother "Mamaw," as traditional, since that's what she expects.)

Ah well...having so many relatives mean I could share many stories, both good & bad. But I'll share one about my mom.

I'd basically been forced to live with mom when I wanted to stay with Granny by the courts so that Mom could collect child support. So when my best friend, who was being abused and her attempt to get help was almost disastrous, she decided to runaway, and I did with her. We were gone for about 6 months, and she didn't survive. After a guy who was protecting me (after most in a krew of other kids I'd joined had mostly left Houston, many going to Los Angeles) disappeared and I suspected the violent guy stalking me in an obsessed way being involved, I finally went home. It was a little after my birthday (where I turned 16), but still before Halloween. When I showed up I knew I was bedraggled and bruised with clothes that really needed to be tossed rather than merely washed.

She never asked me what happened or why I ran or why I came back. To this day I haven't told her. When I asked her how Dad & the others took my running off, she said they didn't know because she never told them as (she openly stated this) "I was scared of losing my child support."

I'm not sure which hurt more, her saying that, or the fact that no one figured it out on their own, and that no one insisted on talking to me on my birthday (I found out years later that Granny sent me a b-day card for that birthday and Mom never told me, apparently pocketing the money in it for me). I did find out that Granny WAS worried, but Mom simply told her that I didn't want to talk to her, and given the courts and the distance between us, there was nothing she could do but accept that, but I wouldn't find that out until I was almost 22.

posted April 08, 2010 05:58 AM         

I will always remember the wisdom from Kahlil Gibran, always remember that I don't own my daughter, that I was a vessel she chose to enter this world and let her be her own beautiful person, and I will be her friend, if she wants it, place no expectations and demands on her, ect.. ect..

As for my own mother- I refuse to play out the script- sometimes things come up and we play out a certain script- but I now refuse to play it out- and I think she is over it too, so it's kind of good now. I have changed the path of our future.

As for her mum, well they're playing out their drama script and I don't see one of them stepping out any time soon, my mum has admitted she would like to continue it when she is on her death bed. geez