I’ve started working at an elderly living home, just in the dining room.
So far, it’s been going well, fingers crossed it stays that way. The residents like me, and my co-workers aren’t nightmares.
One thing I’ve realized, and this isn’t a new thought for m,e but it’s always reinforced by new experiences: People are the same.
Doesn’t matter how old you are, or how young.
People just want to be treated like they’re important, like they matter.
Elderly people are often crabby and unhappy… it can be annoying, but I can see why. They’re losing mobility, mental clarity, health… and friends and family.
It must be hard to be cheerful knowing that your usefulness in life is coming to a close, and much fewer people care about you when you’re not useful anymore.
I also work with children and youth often, and just last night I was having a conversation with some teens at my youth group.
I won’t go into the details, but they actually were listening to me, not because I was smart, but because I spoke to them like they were real people, like I could see theirs die, even though I didn’t always agree.
I personally hate getting written off as “too young” by people, though now that I’m getting close to 30, it won’t be a problem for much longer.
Yet, I’m mostly the same person I was at 15 that I am now, I’ve refined my style, and become more patient, more experienced with some things, but my values are the same, and so are my interests. My beliefs haven’t changed.
Essentially, I was who I was at 15, just as much as I would be at 30.
Things aren’t so complicated as we make them out to be.
I’ve never met any kid who totally changed as they aged, they might become more shy, or more bold, but part of who they are is always the same. They still wanted to be cared about.
My dad’s mom just passed away, and she was the same person, in many ways, at 90 that she was at 30.
When you work with people, you realize the key to service is caring about everyone, not to the point where you’re obsessed with people pleasing, but to see them as people with needs and wants and who could use a little more happiness in their day to day lives.
No matter who we are, we can provide that for someone else. It’s what makes the world run… All the cruel people who run our systems, and exploit everyone under them, they don’t hold the world up. They could never keep it going if not for the kind people who still go out of their way to do good.
Which is why every culture that eliminates good people collapses within 50 years. usually less.
The world will deny it, but, kind people are essential.
And if we treated each other like other people who have problems, just like we do in our own lives, and thought about that instead of brushing it off as unimportant when we’re in pain… well, we’d be a lot kinder.
It’s not a new thought. It’s not really a profound thought. It’s just true.
I can’t say anything new, as the quote goes, everything worth saying has been said (or something like that)
But I also think you can never hear (or read) this too many times. We all need the reminder everyday to focus on being kind and compassionate.
So that’s all I got today, folks, stay honest– Natasha.
So I’ve analyzed movies and songs on this blog, but surprisingly, I rarely ever talk about books, and I grew up being more of a reader than a watcher, we didn’t even have TV for years. [Honestly, I don’t watch TV itself now, I stream so I can pick the shows, but, who doesn’t now?]
Anyway, I still read, I try to read at least one book a month if I can, and I log the books to keep track.
And one I read every year usually, is my all time favorite book “Till We Have Faces” by C. S. Lewis.
Lewis is my favorite author anyway, but this book is his best work of fiction in my opinion, and some other critics agree.
It’s not as novel as his space trilogy, but it’s far easier to read and had much deeper themes that are not as…theoretical as those books, (if you read them you’ll get what I mean, but I’m not talking about those ones.)
But you’re not here for me to just talk about Lewis, let’s dive into the book itself:
Plot and Concept:
In brief terms, “Till We Have Faces” is a re-telling of the myth, my favorite myth as it happens, of Psyche and Cupid, or Eros, if you prefer the correct name.
The myth itself has strong Christian undertones, considering it’s a pagan myth, as the symbolism of it is basically that our soul (which is what psyche means) must be united with Love (Cupid) to become immortal. There also a part when Cupid raises Psyche from the dead after she descends into the underworld to bring beauty to Aphrodite, the goddess who represents lustful love instead of true romantic love, or perhaps superficial love to be more accurate.
Psyche and Eros have a divine child whose name means ‘joy’ which shows how the product of the soul meeting love is Joy.
The story features two jealous sisters, so it is like a tweaked Cinderella story, but also a tweaked Beauty and the Beast. These kinds of stories run all over myths and legends across the world, makes me wonder if there was a common root that did actually happen.
Psyche is alone and unable to marry because people treat her as goddess instead of a person, so an oracle prophecies that she will marry a monster feared by both gods and man, but this turns out to be a riddle that means Cupid, since love is powerful enough to make both gods and humans do things they would normally do (and Greek myths are full of the God doing dumb things because of ‘love’).
A pretty cool story on its own, really, but Lewis’ retelling is masterful.
In Lewis’ retelling, Psyche is instead sacrificed to Ungit, the name he gives Aphrodite, the goddess who represents animal, profane love that only takes and takes and gives nothing back.
But Psyche is rescued by The West Wind god, and taken to the god of the grey mountain, who is Eros in this story.
They are wed, and she lives happy but Orual, her older sister who is uglier than any other woman in the world, finds out about it and is jealous of her, though she thinks it is not jealous.
To make a very complex story short, Orual forces Psyche, by her love, to betray the god of the mountain, and Psyche is sent into exile as punishment, while Orual is told that she “will know herself and her work, and she also shall be psyche.”
Orual is not sure what this means, and instead of being doomed, she becomes the Queen of her country, Glome, in the next week, and rules for many years, trying to bury the pain of the memories of Psyche and what the God told her.
The Conflict:
Finally, Orual hears the story of Psyche and herself retold, but in the original fashion of the real myth and it infuriates her, so she writes a book, which is the book we the audience are reading, of a complaint against the gods, putting it to us like a case to be heard, hoping that some Greek, who speak more freely of the gods that her own people, I’ll read it and judge.
After she writes the book, she begins to have mysterious visions from the gods of things happen to her, that also happen to Psyche, in the myth, only for her they are much harder and more painful.
She begins to also learn from the people around her that she’s lived her life devouring the lives of others, as she was always bitter that she was ugly and could never marry or have children, so she obsesses over a married man who she loved, and she kept her adopted father, the Fox, in Glome with her isn’t sending him home, and she abandoned her other sister Redival, in order to have Psyche all to herself. And she wanted Psyche to love her just as obsessively, instead of in a normal, healthy way.
One of the most striking moments of the book, early on, before all this, in which Psyche says to her
“You are indeed teaching me about kinds of love I did not know. It is like looking into a deep pit. I am not sure whether I like your kind better than hatred.” [Chapter 14]
Later, after seeing the visions, Orual is taken to the court of the gods and her case is read.
As she hears her own voice saying the true words of her soul, she realizes that she only ever wanted to devour Pschye’s love, to possess it all for herself, she never truly loved her unselfishly. The gods gave her chances to do so, but she rejected them all and instead blames the gods for luring Psyche away by their beauty and their goodness that she didn’t understand.
After this, she is shown all the thing Psyche suffered for her sake and then, she is taken to meet the god of the grey mountain, and Psyche also meets her and forgives her, and give her the beauty of death (but death to the profane love of Ungit, not literal death) and Orual sees her reflection changed to be beautiful, and then she hears the words: “You also are psyche.”
She then wakes up and writes in the book that she knows why the gods don’t speak to us face to face, because they can’t ’till we have faces?’ (A line that always gives me chills).
Meaning that, until we know what we really mean, and not just what we think we mean, they cannot be open with us, since we cannot be open with them.
She also writes that she knows now that the god of the mountain did not give her an answer, because he is the answer.
Christians will spot the characteristic that we assign to Jesus here, as that is the metaphor of the god.
Context:
I think you could understand this book without knowing anything about Lewis, if you have a good understanding of the idea of love, and real love versus selfish or toxic love.
However, I’ve seen many people review the book who said they did not fully understand the ending, or all the themes.
When I read it the first time, I understood it by the time I got to the end, and every time after that, when I read it, I understood it better. Especially after I read “The Four Loves” by Lewis also.
Lewis has a fictional version of pretty much all of his non-fiction books of theology and philosophy, which not a lot of people know. This book is his fictional version of “The Four Loves”, as well as some parts of “The Weight of Glory” and “Mere Christianity.”
You can find some of this in his fictional book “The Great Divorce,” but this book is his magnum opus of writing about love, so I always refer back to it the most.
To understand the ending of the book, as well as the conflict you need to know the Lewis believed that true love, charity or agape, as he called it (the Greek word for unselfish, unconditional love is agape) was the holy kind that has to come into every other kind of love to make it good.
And the human love, which is ‘need’ love’, he says, will become devilish, if left to itself.
He give examples of such, how things like affection (family love, also called storge), can keep people under the control of their family if they are left to themselves; how friendship love (phileo) can be snobbish and exclusive and also corrupt people because it puts the friendship above doing the right thing; and how romantic love (eros) can corrupt people even more by being so exciting that it makes them do things like cheat, lie, and steal, all in the name of love.
And some people are even cruel to the one they love, because they think love makes it okay.
In each case, he points out that the love doesn’t have to be evil, but when all other things are put aside, all moral and rational limitations to it, then all loves becomes evil.
Agape love can’t be evil because the basis of it is that it loves you freely, it doesn’t ask for anything back, it doesn’t need anything from you, and it doesn’t demand you do what it wants. It’s love free from the temptation to be possessive.
Obviously, he points out, no human being can perfectly live in that state of love at all times.
It’s not necessarily bad, to need each other. As in this life, we will need each other, and most people like to feel needed. Being completely independent of people is more selfish than needing them a little bit is.
But when that need becomes all we can think of, and we can never put it aside even if it’s hurting the other person, then the love is demonic. Or profane, as some people put it.
Now we usually say toxic. I like profane better.
Toxic love can be negligent in a relationship, if it’s not too big a part of it. We like to joke these days about toxic traits, but most toxic traits, in small amounts, won’t ruin a relationship. If the other person understands you and is willing to overlook, and you do the same for them, then it won’t really matter in the long run, though you should definitely still try to improve.
But profane love is where there is nothing but that. Toxic love that has poisoned the entire relationship, the kind narcissistic people have. They cannot ever love you with anything but that kind of love.
Even when they act like they’re doing something unselfish, they expect you to pay them back for it in some way.
To me, this book was life changing. I read “The Four Loves” I think after I had read this book, but when I went back and re-read it, I saw how brilliantly Lewis wove the themes of those principles in the story.
Orual, once you know how to look for it, is a huge example of profane love. Yet she’s not hateable. She had good points– he still made her believably human.
Her ugliness, which I saw complained about by some readers, is symbolic. It’s meant to show how her love is ugly and profane as her face is, and when she is freed from that love, she is freed form her ugliness also, at least, spiritually.
There are also other favorite themes of Lewis in the book, such as how important reason is, represented by the Fox’s character who is a Greek Philosophy lover.
Also some very sharp insights into how cruel men are often hiding insecurities, and bitter women are hiding jealously.
Not that it can’t go both ways, it can, and it does, sometimes.
There are also ideas of sin, and repentance in there. As Orual must die before she dies to escape Ungit, who represents carnal sin and love, and it’s said that even Psyche, who was a nearly perfect human, had to die and escape her as well. How they have to gather the beauty of the gods without effort, because no effort of theirs could get it, and how we have to resist temptation to give into the pressures other people put on us, even when we love them, if it means disobeying God, because God comes first.
Lewis goes into more detail on these themes in “The Four Loves”, but the book portrays this so poignantly, that it’s impossible not to see yourself in some of what Orual says and does.
Personal Impact:
I’m not kidding when I say that this book changed my life. I read it maybe a few months to a year after I became a Christian, and my relationship with my family was still a wreck at that point.
A lot of that was my dad’s fault, I certainly saw him in the abusive father in the book, but, the book showed me the things that I did and said that were like my dad, and things that weren’t like him, but they were still wrong. It made me see my relationship with God differently also.
C. S Lewis believed that we can never see ourselves clearly, or our sin, that we can never be fully aware of how bad it is, or how good God is, but only see dimly. This is probably true, as the Bible says similar things.
That idea helped me to be more humble when I prayed, not always, and I’m not always now, but at least I had the concept fully rooted in my mind that I could never fully know myself enough to know if God was wrong to do as He did. Also to question my motives for things whenever I started whining about not being treated fairly; sure sometimes, it’s valid to say you deserve better; but you have to watch to make sure yours not demanding something just because you want it, and not because it would be best.
The book didn’t make me neglect my own well being, as some people say Christianity teaches people to do, if anything I think it helps me understand why my father was wrong and I needed to cut ties with him as an adult. Other teachings I heard sometimes made me think I needed to put up with his abuse, but not this book.
It also always reminded me that the answers in God are often found more just by knowing him more than by mere logic. Not that logic isn’t good, Lewis loved logic and reason, but often we find it’s limited, since we are humans, and everything we do is limited. Sometimes you have to go beyond just pure reason to understand things.
Criticisms:
People have accused this book of being sexist because of the many things Orual says against women and as an ugly woman.
I think that’s because they don’t read Lewis’ other books. Lewis was not sexist (at least not for his era) and he had many women students and married a woman who he admitted often won arguments with him very easily. He actually liked that about her (and he dedicated this book to her, in fact, since she held him come up with concept).
He puts himself into the mindset of a bitter woman so well I’m often shocked when I read it, as mostly when male authors try to write how women feel, they fail miserably, in my experience, because they think of it as a woman instead of person.
As a woman, I could relate to Orual, though I’m not ugly, but as someone with a bad father, and who’s been rejected often for reasons beyond my control, I could still identify with her bitterness and sadness.
As well as her wish to assuage that by grabbing at whatever she could.
I don’t find this sexist. Men do it as well, and men can see themselves in this book just as easily as a woman can. The remarks Orual makes about women are from her own bitterness, and made because the character narrates the book, they are not Lewis’ actual opinion on things.
He was very good at making even characters who disagreed with him feel real and if you read his other books all of his characters feel like real people you could meet, except the ones who are sometimes wiser and more noble than humans usually are.
The other complaint is the themes are hard to understand.
Well, they can be. They were not as hard when he wrote it, more people had read the myth, and more people were writing other works with similar themes at the time.
I think it was still very complex, even then, but to our barely literate culture now, it is hard to understand.
That said, it’s still an easy read, full of fun language that’s not too old fashioned for most fantasy lovers to read, and fun characters.
I don’t recommend letting a child read it since it talks about sex more openly than his other books do, but he didn’t write it to be a children’s book.
I would say though, any child 12 and up could probably handle this book, since it’s not too explicit and that’s the age most kids start being more self aware about how they act, so that’s when it would help to read books like this.
I was about 14 when I read it the first time, and I understood it, but I was very literate for my age, so if parents are going to let their child read this, I’d say to use your own discretion.
Closing thoughts:
There are not many books like “Till We Have Faces” anymore. It’s a level of parody and fantasy writing that most authors just can’t achieve in the modern era, because they haven’t read enough books like it.
Its deep themes are timeless, and everyday problems, not ones that only intellectuals would care about.
The ideas of love within family and romantic relationships are ones we all can learn from, as well as how we isolate ourselves in our own minds, when we’re bitter and angry about our lot in life.
So I recommend reading it even if it’s not your usual thing.
You can find an audio book version if reading isn’t your thing, and I recommend doing that, because this book is too good to miss if you like fiction and especially if you like myths and symbolism.
I’d like to close with a few more memorable quotes:
“Don’t you think the things people are most ashamed of are the things they can’t help.”– Psyche.
“You must die before you die,”– the god.
“Who can feel ugly when the heart meets delight?”– Orual
“And in that far distant day when the gods become wholly beautiful, or we at last are shown how beautiful they always were, this will happen more and more. For mortals, you see, will become more and more jealous. And mother and wife and child and friend will all be in league to keep a soul from being united with the Divine Nature.”– The Fox
I know I’ve been MIA for a while. Life got crazy, and often this blog ends up on the back burner.
But I’ve been happy to see a lot of people are still visiting it anyway. Thank you all for your support.
This year has been one of the hardest I’ve gone through since before my dad moved out.
Just a list of things that have happened:
I went to the ER while on vacation.
My new (used) car needed two major repairs within the same year and a few smaller ones.
I lost one job and wasn’t able to continue the other because of school work being too much.
I had an ear infection that cost me some of my hearing in one ear.
I had my laptop break down and it took three tries to find a replacement.
I cut off my dad again.
My cat disappeared for 4-5 days straight (luckily someone found her).
Debit card got hacked and I had to freeze it.
Honestly, there was more, I just can’t remember it all at once.
At the same time, I did accomplish some cool things this year.
I had three yard sales that raised near to $1000 in total that helped me repay my car debt.
I had friends who contributed to a GoFundMe for another $600.
I was able to finish some stories and start a podcast.
I organized almost my entire house, cleared out the garage, got rid of unnecessary things, sold others, and fumigated our shed for termites (all with my families help).
We cleared out our storage unit also so we don’t have to pay for that anymore.
Despite all the setbacks, I was able to set aside some money.
Thankfully, I caught the debit card fraud before anyone used it to buy something.
A friend of ours at church actually gave my sisters and I each $100 to start investing with, just out of a wish to help us out.
Somehow, though I’ve been wrecked financially, I’ve still had enough to cover my basic needs. I cut down on spending, but was able to find other methods to get stuff, and my family has been nice about paying for things when I can’t.
Through all this, I admit, it’s been hard to feel like God is really helping me. Not because I haven’t had blessings, but because they have not been what I wanted.
I really wish to be more financial stable, even if I can’t be fully independent. I wish to have a different job in childcare, one I could actually grow in.
I wish to have accomplished more in my life than I have.
I wish I wasn’t single still at 27.
The fact is, I wanted a family by this age, I wanted a better job. I never imagined I’d still be in nearly the same financial place now as I was when I was 20.
“Try everything” like the Shakira song says has been my motto this year.
I have learned a lot, I admit.
I’ve heard that if you end up in the same place over and over again, it’s because you haven’t yet learned what God wants you to learn from it.
The truth is, my idea of success is too important to me.
Blame it on my dad for beating into my head (against my will, really), that jobs were all important. He criticized me so much for not having one, and not looking for one once I’d realized my methods didn’t wokr in the modern job market (once I switched to online job sites, I had success finally, but he never told me to do that). He also used to say he wanted to kill himself when work was bad.
He and my mother also made some poor financial choices and didn’t always think ahead, though they had some back ups, but we had to file for bankruptcy when I was 9-11. And we moved, not for the last time.
I had a life coach briefly also who blamed me for not having a job when I told her the same thing I told my dad… she wan’s my life coach after that point. The 30 minute long lecture I don’t ask for just killed it for me.
My dad also encouraged me to put up with toxic bosses which led to my first several jobs being very unhealthy ones.
So yeah, I wasn’t set up to take this job thing lightly. Even when I know it’s not my fault and the market is bad, I find it hard not to take it personally.
When work is going well, I tend to feel good about everything else, and when it’s not…I feel depresesed.
Funny, I always thought my dad’s attitude towards it was stupid, but now I’ve found it hard not to adopt it.
So, maybe, God has allowed this reoccurring joblessness in my life to teach me both how ot rely on other people (as I’ve had no choice but to do), and to not make jobs all important.
I can’t say I’m happy about it, but I’ve gone on with my life, chosen to pursue hobbies, home organizing, doing what I can when I can’t work, to keep busy and productive and not to see it as only worth doing if I’m making money.
I have many days where I still feel stressed about it, and I’ve had dozens, if not hundreds of set backs on this journey.
Still, I know that many people wish they could have what I have. I don’t have to pay rent since I live with my grandma still. I have support. I’ve been able to pursue my interests because of free time.
Is it really so bad?
The truth is, I know it’s not as bad as it feels.
I wish, honestly, that I could be as grateful all the time, and as joyful, as I think I should be, conciser how much worse it could be.
Sometimes, I do find it funny, the struggles I have, since they are almost cartoonishly numerous this year, but most of them were small, compared to some.
My nature is to worry, really. To let the problems I have steal my joy. I’ve been that way since I was 5 or 6. The same time my anxiety disorder started.
I used to think if I looked forward to things, they were more likely not to happen. I’d try to trick fate by thinking against things happening…which we know now, actually makes it more likely they won’t. Positive thinking makes success more likely.
I still sometimes feel jinxed, and I hear the same things in my head that I heard my dad say, over and over again.
As if God is testing me, as if He has abandoned me. As if he will keep me afloat, but not let me do anymore than survive, which is stressful.
And that that is not fair.
Yet… do I really know best?
Perhaps, like my father, I’ve not been responsible enough with money to really warrant making more of it.
I’ve learned a lot more this year, and I do feel more ready to make wise choices financially once I go back to work.
Perhaps it’s that simple, God didn’t want to give me more when I wouldn’t be a good steward of it.
One thing He’s put in my head, many times in the last two years, is “he who is faithful with little will be faithful with much’ and “I have better things for you.”
Better than to settle for the same crap as before, I hope.
But have I been faithful?
I hope so. I try to be.
When I do have money, I do try to give and be generous with it. Not always maybe as much as I should, I’m never sure how much we should, but, I try.
Yet, the thing I keep thinking is, maybe God is not doing this to punish me.
My dad would say that, but I never believed it in his case.
He thought job success was proof God was pleased with Him, and anything less meant he was failing.
Well, he was failing, but not at working. He failed us at being a good father and husband. The areas he needed to grow.
I have learned more about stewarding my home and family this year, as I’ve had time to make improvements around my house and rally my family to do so also.
I got us all to start taking more notice of our grandma’s health, and to start thinking of saving money together as well, and I got us all to sell and get rid of the unneeded stuff so we had room for our things and don’t need the storage unit anymore.
I’ve cleaned more, rearranging more, and gotten more cost effective lighting options even for our rooms.
All in all, I’m proud of it. The house is almost a different place than it was last year.
All this is stuff my dad never did, and to be honest, I never used to do either. I might never have bothered to try if I was working more.
It has taken some of the pressure off my mom also, though she still has to do the heavy lifting financially for us. But by bringing more income and eliminating the storage unit cost, I feel I helped at least a little even if I couldn’t work. I did repay her for the money she loaned me for my car, almost all of it. Still have $900 to go.
I would love to do more, but, I can’t right now.
Still, I wasn’t useless. I wasn’t wasteful with what time I did have.
If God looks for us to make the most of what we have to work with, I hope that He is satisfied with my efforts.
I can’t tell you all where I will land on this, but this year has been crazy for everyone. Everyone I know has had problems this year, so I guess we’re all in this together.
Still, while I’m struggling, my spirit is not broken.
Not many people my age believe they will have a bright future.
I think it depends on what you go by.
While I find it hard to be optimistic about the state of the world in general, I know I don’t know everything.
God finds ways to bless people no matter what goes on in the world, somehow. That’s always been true if you read books by people of faith.
So my fate isn’t tied only to the world din generals, however much it feels like it.
Success may not look like what I wished, but I might still find it, in my way.
The clouds have silver lining.
I can’t know for sure if the end of next year will see me in a much better place or not, but, I can hope.
Even if it doesn’t, I hope I will have learned not to take it all personally, not to base worth on money, and not to blame myself for things I cannot control.
Wishing all of you the same, and a good holiday season, stay honest– Natasha
I had to read this book for Literature class last year called “Esperanza Rising”.
I liked it, though I saw many people did not care for the main character, but to me, the story was relatable in many ways.
I’m not Mexican, nor am I an immigrant, but nonetheless, the themes of Esperanza feeling like she must support her mother and be “la patrona” reminded me of the transition I went through at 20 when my father moved out.
My sisters and I wanted him gone. We no longer felt safe with him around (I wonder now if I ever felt safe around him, even as a small child).
Still, having a parent leave was like yanking a pillar out from under us, in some ways.
My father was never the most emotional stable or mature person,so it was odd to me that him leaving shook us up so much. When he was around, he spent most of his time ignoring us and a good portion of the rest of it tormenting us for kicks or because he was taking out his frustrations of the day on whoever was available.
Not a reassuring person.
It’s strange how even a bad father can still sem like a staple of your life. Even his presence alone can change ow you feel, though he may be mostly checked out of your life.
I guess our dad controlled our household ymanic. We might have hated it, but we couldn’t avoid it.
We lived around him being home and getting around his moods and whims. He’d sometimes have family meetings whenever he wanted to change something.
Often the change didn’t last, but we had to be there. And he didn’t like to wait.
I sometimes got my way in the house by getting dad on my side, if it was something I knew he’d approve of. That’s how I got chickens and ow we go out garden started.
I really did the hard part, but my dad’s insist was what go my mom to get going on it.
My dad literally would tell me sever times that my mom had to be dragged into things “kicking and screaming”.
Not the nicst way to talk about your wife, I thought.
Me and my dad are go-getters. We are the people who initiate things.
However, a trait I had that my father seems only to have in small amounts, is the ability to plan and execute efficiently.
My father can start a basic idea, like a business, or suggest a backyard garden. And he will take some steps to bring it about. Like print fliers and canvassing from door to door, or paying for chickens or the coop etc.
But after that he’ll run out of juice. His business was always very disorganized and he struggles to find consistent help for it. He made few improvements to it over time and then wondered why he lost so much of it with the recession and other issues.
Knowing what I do now, I could probably help him fix some of it, and I’ve made some suggestions, but he is reluctant to listen to me, a 26 year old who’s never owned a business.
My Dad is very good at marketing. Whatever parts of a job involve that, he’ll excel at. He also is good at acquiring some skills of the trade.
But polishing it, and knowing how to adapt to a changing audience and methodology is not his strong point. (I’m trying to illustrate how I think I diverged from this.)
From as far back as getting a dog, I remember taking over family projects. My parents talked about getting one, but my mom wouldn’t sit down and start looking into it till I pushed for it and got my father on my side.
This started long before my father recognized the power struggle in our family was coming down to between me and him.
His words, by the way.
He later, once I was a teenager, would say I was trying to turn my sisters against him. Which wasn’t even true because for many years I barely said anything about our issues to them because he didn’t like it and I didn’t think they were on my side anyway.
When I switched churches he made me promise not to influence either of them to leave his church. I didn’t outright tell them to, but they came to me of their own accord to say they don’t like it and wanted to leave and of course, I told them to do what they thought was right but I wouldn’t say 100% to leave (keeping my word.)
But they knew what I thought and they had already agreed with it for years, so once they were old enough, they left.
After my dad moved out my mom left it too. I wasn’t surprised, I knew she didn’t like it either.
The funny thing is my dad knew all of us didn’t like his church but had no issue forcing us all to go, and even when my mom had tried to find an alternative, he manipulated her into staying by having big emotional argument about everyone going to the same church as the man of the house, or he didn’t have proper authority.
I now think this is a stuipd argument. Though it’s best if everyone goes to the same church at least while you have young kids, I think a mature family can work through it if they have slightly different preferences. As long as everyone believes in the same basic things, I really don’t care if you prefer charismatic or traditional church style.
But I digress.
Since I left first,my dad blamed me, but really if he hadn’t forced me to go in the first place, it wouldn’t have happened. And for ages after I switched, he made constant digs about me “missing a great time” at his church. And if I ever had an issue with my church, he’d say “I wouldn’t go back” after that.
He visited I once (after he had a falling out with his pastor), and didn’t like it.
Anyway, the funny part is he left his church after COVID anyway, since he didn’t agree with the Pastor so way of handling it. I didn’t agree with my pastor fully either, but I thought it wasn’t any reason to leave. I had community there.
Does this paint a picture of how my father and I are different? Good.
And why am I bringing this up?
Well, it’s complicated, but the idea I’ve circled around in the last 6 years is that once my dad moved out, even before that maybe, I was pushed into the role of head of the family.
La patrona, as the Mexicans called it in the book.
My dad left a hole in our lives that felt like a vacuum. All the energy we sent avoiding pising him off now had no object.
To be honest, for the first year, we fought with each other a lot. We were addicted to the drama and we didn’t know how to function without it. I remember a lot of the fights now as pretty stupid ones but they seemed legitimate at the time because they were similar to the ones we had with him.
My mom had a hard time keeping it together, as she became the main provider for the family (though my dad did provide some support) and had three daughters who were emotional wrecks.
I handled it better at first and then months in my physical and mental health broke down. Thankfully, by then my other two sisters were a little more recovered and were able to support me through a darker time.
Then I climbed out of that, with help from God and friends and family, and began to build my new life with other my father in it.
But even in those times, I still very much seemed to fulfill the role of head of the family.
I pushed for more and more changes. Like I started to work on de-cluttering our house, implement new systems for homeschooling my youngest sister, finding ways to organize who did what around the house.
Not all of it stuck, but we made progress.
I don’t do it alone, my sisters certainly help and my mom still does most of the financial heavy lifting.
But leading the family is not the same as providing for it. I found out. I may not contribute as much money but when anything needs to be done, I tend to be the one to push for it.
Like getting our pets taken to the vet when they clearly need it. Didn’t happen till I pushed for it.
Adopting two new cats, I pushed for it till I got my way.
And just the other week I organized my family into cleaning and organizing our garage which has been needed since we moved in, honestly, but my Grandma would never do it. And couldn’t even do it, since she can’t lift heavy stuff anymore.
My mom’s talked about it, but admitted that she probably wouldn’t have thought it out the way I did.
I came up with a strategy, to take one section per day, clear it out, sweep, dust, disinfect, and the put stuff back in a more organized way and throw out what we didn’t need, or recycle it.
After the first two days I also designated spaces for stuff we were going to take to E-waste, or hazardous waste.
I enlisted my family to help based around when they were working, since I had the week off. It was mostly between me and my sister who doesn’t have a job yet, but my mom and other sister pitched in based on their schedules and we got the thing done in 6 days, taking one day off because we were so bushed.
If you could see what it looked like before, you’d be amazed 6 days was enough. And that included moving a lot of the furniture out of it, then back in in a different order, moving some heavy cabinets and shelves to a new spot and then clearing out every spider infested corner.
It’s not a pretty looking room now, but we can walk in it, which we barely could before, and we have a lot more open space, and will have even more after we have a yard sale and get rid of the hazardous waste.
I noticed something about myself while planning and overseeing this project.
One thing is that I didn’t do it the way my dad would have.
Sure, he would have pitched the idea and insisted we do it, he probably would have even helped…but I remember how it went when we moved and the same thing happened.
Stress, tears, and a lot of arguing. Also a lot of getting mad at us girls for not helping the way he wanted.
There was some arguing this time but only because my Grandmother didn’t want to get rid of literal trash or stuff she’d never even used (and she didn’t even buy it, it was left there by other people who lived in the house).
My grandma is a hoarder, unfortunately, so that I got her to agree to let go of any of it was a small wonder in of itself.
But I have learned something that my father never did, which was that if I pitch something a certain way, I get better results.
(At least if my father knows this, he only uses it in business. With personal stuff he just scares people into submission.)
But I don’t like to do that.
So I thought my Grandma would be more willing to get rid of the stuff if it was for a yard sale, which is going to raise money to cover my car expenses.
My grandma is a kind person who will help you out if she can, but she lacks imagination.
That being said, she’s willing to help us out but often had no clue where to begin. So, I came up with this idea.
Though, we did have some arguments ensue even so…but we worked around it.
It was a lesson for me too in what my family is best suited for. If I need someone to work fast and get rid of the most stuff, my mom is better. If I need someone to sort things out with details, my younger sister is better. If I need someone to just help me move things I can’t do by myself, my middle sister is best.
And they all admitted upfront that I was the only one with a clue how to organize everything, or a vision. My mom and my middle sister are both neat people (far more than I am, ironically) but they don’t have a lot of creativity when it comes to arranging stuff efficiently.
I’ve already made lot of changes around the house that maximized our space with very little effort, and they would never have done it, but they adapted to the new arrangement with gratitude.
Makes all our lives a bit easier.
But another thing I took over(to be honest, long before my dad moved out) was emotional health.
I am the first person to pick up on if anyone is not feeling well or is upset in my household. And usually the person who jumps to do anything to comfort them.
I remember I started helped my youngest sister deal with her nightmares or fear of the dark once my mom stopped doing anything about it.
I talk to my sisters about their dreams and problems, and my mom also. They don’t always listen to my advice, but I’m there.
I’ve never considered myself to be a very sympathetic person, it’s mostly been trial and error for me to learn how to help, but I know that if I don’t pick up on it, half the time, no one else will.
Right after my dad left, I was dealing with the emotional outbursts and mood swings almost every day because my mom was at work and I didn’t currently have a job…it was not fun.
But we got through it somehow.
Now I mediate stuff even between my dad and the rest of my family…Which is the crowning irony after he made it out like I was the one turning them against him.
Which he’s never apologized for saying or taken back, I doubt he remembers saying it now.
I think I started doing this stuff when I was a teenager, maybe younger, and once my dad left, it just became official.
And running all these projects, I’ve learned to compliment them and ask for their help respectfully, instead of doing what my dad did and bossing everyone around and berating them for not doing it fast enough.
I noticed a difference between myself and my dad when my sister was doing something that I didn’t really want her to do yet, and I said “I appreciate that you’re doing this, really, but right now I need this done faster because we have limited daylight.”
And she stopped and helped me, no issues.
And the funny thing is, I didn’t even really think of it as being a different way to handle it till I remembered that my father would never have said that to any of us.
I mean literally, never could I even imagine him using that approach. It would have been: “Come help me do this” at best and angrily saying “What are you doing that for? you’re supposed to be doing this” more often.
I also made sure they had breaks and tried to overlap so that someone could rest (including myself) and someone else tagged in.
Another thing my Dad never did. He once yelled at me for being lazy and told me to get off my “ass” (his words) when I was resting from moving stuff into our new house.
And that’s just one example.
But you know, I used to be way more like that. I used to talk to my family a lot like my dad did.
Till I realized that I sounded just like him, and I began to consciously choose to be kinder and more respect.
And I found that I really felt that way.
Doing the right thing actually felt pretty easy for me, because I’ve practiced the skills of guiding people more nicely and motivating them without threats.
I think that my family agreed with me that it needs to be done, but I’ve motivated them to do stuff they didn’t think about at first also, with the same method.
I felt weird about it at first though. Like, am I managing my own family? Is that really my job?
And I realized that parents do it all the time, but since I’m not a parent, I didn’t think of it in that light.
Of course, you may think it’s kind of sad that I, the oldest child, am in this role, instead of my mother, or my father.
And if I was honest, there are times I feel like I’m not getting fair treatment. Frankly, my emotional needs are often overlooked in my household because I’m the strongest personality. If I don’t spell it out for them, they will just not notice I’m upset.
But I notice even if they don’t tell me.
The price of being the most sensitive person is that you are usually giving out more than you’re getting in many situations.
There are things they do better than me. And more of. I do have shortcomings.
But it’s not want to say I kept the family together. I don’t think any of the rest of them would have or could have done what I did. Or still do.
To the point where I worry about moving out because I wonder who will take over. I hope that by then they’ll be more independent and it wont be as necessary. I know I can’t do this forever.
Some people would probably hate it. I don’t hate it. I like feeling like I can take care of people, and like I have an important role in the house.
I do resent it sometimes. I think all of us at times feel under appreciated and like we do more than we should have to.
And I dream of a day where I could live with someone who would want to put in as much as I do. I find it hard to picture. I know that my family is just not wired that way, thanks to years of abusive cycles.
We’re still way better than we used to be…but it may never be my ideal. I may have to start my own family to make that happen.
And it’s not that I expect perfection, (in case you’re getting that idea). I expect there will be tantrums and issues and fights even if I have my own family, I know my husband and I will not always agree.
But my wish is that it will be on my terms, that I can work out things without someone shutting me down or shutting me out, and that I can know we’ll at least have the same goal. Something I’m not sure of in my current household.
The one good thing about marriage is that you do get to pick your spouse, you can choose someone who has the same vision as you, you don’t get to choose your kids or anyone else in your family except them, so you need to choose wisely.
I think it will be good practice having run my current household.
The funny thing was, my dad always said from when I was a kid that Was the most mature one. More so than him. (Red flag by the way. A parent should never say that to a kid.)
I knew it was not true probably when I was 7 or 8…by the time I was 15 it was true. And by the time I was 20, it was saddeningly true. And now, it’s almost ridiculously true.
I’ve matured so much that I don’t really need my father anymore. I don’t mean this in a defiant way. I mean that I literally don’t need him. When we talk, there is nothing at all I feel like he can tell me or do for me, expect help out a little with money, that I can’t do better myself or find a better source for.
He seems like a small person in a way to me. I think love makes people seem larger when they do it well, but when they are selfish it makes them seem small, if you’re not under their control.
Since he lost his control of my life, I’ve flourished, though I’ve made mistakes and had dark days…but I’d never go back.
He was holding me back at 20, to be honest, and he’d really hold me back now.
That is not to say I’ve abandoned my father. I don’t plan to do that…but I know it’s never going to be the same…and I hope to goodness it’s never even close.
My family is aware of my position, but they really don’t like to acknowledge it. I think, in a way, it embarrassed them that so much got put on my shoulders. They don’t often thank me for it.
I’m hurt by this sometimes, but then I remember that it’s partly because the situation is so messed up that they find it hard to talk about. They’re glad I’m there, but if they try to face it, they fear it will crumble on them. Maybe sometime they’ll be ready to talk about it.
And I really don’t want constant affirmation about it, I find it awkward to think about too.
They have surprised me too, I’m not saying it’s one sided. But the power balance always has been in my favor
My dad became a self fulfilling prophecy. He also told me I was more mature then him, it’ll it became ture. He said I was trying to take care of the same from him, until he basically handed it to me by default.
I remember that he told me “you win” when he left.
I wan’t trying to win…but I was trying to protect my sisters and my mother from what I feared was going to be the same treatment I already got, or worse. It was turning into it before he left.
I played my dad masterfully to get him out of the house, and I didn’t even do it on purpose. I think God must have guided our actions, because we just went on blind instinct and it made our dad more and more angry till he exploded at my mom enough for us to point out to her how out of control the situation was.
I have to appreciate my mom for stepping up also. She’s not always been the perfect mom, but we certainly couldn’t have done it without her and she’s at least tried to change. Which is more than my father has.
I’ve learned that you get what you get, with your family. You can wish they were different, but to be honest, don’t you think they wish you were different too?
I know that my family finds me a little too driven and too pushy for comfort…and I try to rein it in, but I can’t always go with the flow either.
Family is just a balancing act, like most things. And I’m okay with that now, I wasn’t always.
So I’ve learned to accept things and not let them ruin my happiness.
I think I sound like a much older woman than I am, because of the responsibilities I had to take up…but you know, after I listen to my generation talking about how they feel like they have no purpose,and whine about every little hardship, and lack the basic skills to manage their own lives…I think I might have been Lucky.
Maybe God used all this to spare me from becoming someone with a victim mentality…which is the worst torture of all, though they don’t see it as such while they’re in it.
Sure, I would like to play the victim card sometimes, but…I know I shouldn’t. Society makes it easy for me to, but I try not to give in.
See, on this blog I can come to show only my good side, or I could do what many people do, and gripe about my flaws and struggles only, without ever balancing it out with my success.
I don’t think either extreme is really helpful to people or realistic. We all have our Ws, and our Ls. Our highs and our lows.
My story is unique, but that doesn’t mean other people can’t see themselves in it.
I don’t know how many people could do what I did, you’d have to have the circumstances line up the right way for it.
But you can generally do something, even if it’s small, to improve your life and take some control over it.
I find little changes lead to bigger ones.
And big changes often happen very fast and feel uncomfortable, till we get used to them.
My point in all this is that becoming the head of the family is the role that I grew into because of circumstances, and then in it, I found joy and the satisfaction of learning some of my own strengths, as well as weaknesses.
So whatever your thing is, your situation, your opportunity, I encourage you to make the most of it. Often the present is just a stepping stone to the future. Even if you don’t have the opportunities you want now, you may be able to get there if you use the ones you do have.
This might sound kind of weird, but, I don’t know that I’ve ever “felt loved”.
I mean at least not by a person.
I am a Christian, and I have experienced God’s love. I think most skeptics would doubt that’s a real feeling. And since I can’t prove to them that it is, I don’t know if that counts for them.
I think there is a psychological reason for why I don’t feel human love.
I recognize love, in my mind. But there are walls up that block it from reaching my emotions.
Growing up with an emotional manipulative and abusive father, it’s not rocket science.
For my father, saying “I love you” was usually only a thing that happened when he was berating me.
It was pretty twisted in a way.
“We’re doing this because we love you, Natasha.”
And what they were doing was berating me for everything I ever did around them.
If you want the full story of how this started, keep reading. Otherwise that was my TLDR explanation.
Let me explain:
I was told I was rebellious. Even though I hardly ever broke a rule in my entire life. I’m not kidding, I barely even broke bedtime rules. I like limits and boundaries, they make me feel more balanced. I wasn’t the type to unravel them without a good reason.
But yes when I decided something wasn’t good for me or helping me anymore, I would protest it.
So when I decided I wasn’t enjoying drum lessons anymore, I said I wanted to quit. That’s where it all started.
This was after a year long of taking them, which my father agreed on as a trial period. When I brought up to him that I didn’t want to anymore, he said “Oh you’re not gonna quit.”
Mind you, I hadn’t ever actually used the drum in a real performance, or any performance. And the only time I even tried to play along with my dad and his friends, they criticized it because it was too loud…you know, because you learn drums to play a quiet instrument.
Since I saw no purpose whatsoever in learning it anymore, I was miffed at my dad breaking his agreement with me.
After thinking about it, I pointed that out to him, respectfully enough, I thought. And he said fine, I could quite.
But that wasn’t the end of it.
He talked to his best friend and the friend’s wife, as well as my mom, about me wanting to quit, like it was one big crime.
I couldn’t understand why they cared so much. Since I wasn’t using the drum for anything, what did it matter?
But it turned into a whining session where his friend aired some other grievances about me that I had no idea he had.
Apparent’y, I made some joke during one of his music lesson with one of my sisters. Just about tomato sauce. That was it. I didn’t even really direct it at him, just made a joke about the ingredients in tomato sauce. He was deeply offended.
Now, as an adult who has taught a class, I completely could understand why he might have been annoyed that I interjected while he was teaching.
However, as an adult who teaches 10-11 year olds, I would expect that behavior from that age group, without it really being malicious. And I was only 12 at the time of this conversation.
A 12 year old interrupting to make a joke isn’t , in my mind, a big deal. If it happened to me, I would have simply given the kid a warning, explained why it was disrespectful, and left it at that. If they didn’t do it again, I wouldn’t even tell the parents because who the heck really cares that much?
Apparently, my dad’s best friend.
Now he never said a word to me about this, oddly enough, nor did he ask my mom to talk to me about it delicately.
I didn’t hear about it till this big confrontation with 4 adults, all of whom told me I was a brat, disrespectful, and not nice to other people.
At the time, I also took singing lessons from this best friend’s wife.
She didn’t like me much because I couldn’t stand still while I sang. And I got tired easily. Also I didn’t like the music choices that she insisted on. She didn’t ever teach us any songs we actually got to pick, and when I asked if we could learn any songs I actually knew and liked, she said no because they were pop songs.
I guess it was her right as a teacher not to teach it if she didn’t like it, but she really shouldn’t have expected me to be interested in learning if it was all music I didn’t care about. I’m pretty sure music teachers in actual public school pick at least some songs the kids like.
I found out years later that the reason I can’t stand up easily is I have uneven legs, so I tilt to one side when I stand (good think my name isn’t Eileen), and I have a more curved spine than usual and a curved tailbone, making it hard to stand straight for long periods of time. I have gotten a bit better with some chiropractic treatment and exercises to improve my core, but it’s never been easy for me to move the same as other people, and it probably never will be unless the problem is resolved. Which is unlikely.
So she got mad at me for something I couldn’t help. and I told her and my mom that I just got tired and didn’t feel right standing.
The crazy thing is, you can sing sitting down. It wouldn’t have been a big deal. Sure it’s better to stand,but I wasn’t going to be doing any Broadway musical, it would have been fine for me to sit while learning. She sat while teaching me.
Even moving around, which was still easier for me than standing because I could at least shift balance, she wouldn’t allow.
I suppose, maybe it’s not her fault that she didn’t know I had a real problem and just thought I wasn’t listening to her. But the issue is, she never even considered any alternative explanation other than I was trying to be defiant.
Well, to be fair, after she got on my nerves with this crap for weeks on end, I was trying to be defiant. But it didn’t start off that way. If sh’e d been nice to me, I wouldn’t have wanted to act out. But she did all this from the start, when I wasn’t trying to do anything to set her off.
I know, not the most mature thing–but I was 12 years old. 12 year olds aren’t mature. Even so the worst I did was probably roll my eyes and act bored, which is rude, but hardly the kind of rebellion I would think would warrant a four person intervention.
Again, no one just sat me down and talked to me about this in a normal way first. Which is my first recourse as child care provider myself. I always gives kids a warning before I jumped to a full lecture. If they ignore the warning, then I know they’re blowing me off. But if they don’t, then they were just being kids with short attention spans who don’t know social etiquette yet. I make allowances. It’s not like every kid is going to be able to figure this out intuitively.
Anyway, to get back to how this tied into love.
During this dialogue we were having, which felt more like a one sided monologue to me, they were criticizing pretty much everything about me.
Even at the time I didn’t think it made a lot of sense, 4 adults, two of whom I didn’t really know that well, and barely talked to the one, and my parents, all criticizing me.
I’m now very against this approach in practice. I think most people with experience with kids or even teenagers would be. Two people is about the limit for any confrontation with a kid that’s not a medical emergency, I’d say, without it feeling like you’re bullying the kid. I’ve seen kids cry over less, as it is.
Oh and I was crying through most of the conversation. Do you think they stopped? Do you think they tried to comfort me and get me to calm down?
Nope.
Tey told me I shouldn’t cry anymore.
And my singing teacher even picked apart the way I was sitting as being a defensive psotiosns.
Can’t imagine why I would have feel the need to protect myself , under the circumstances.
Now that I’m experienced enough to know how weird this situation was , I’m amazed my mom didn’t see it that way. But I figure my father probably bullied her into it, as he usually did.
The icing on the cake of all this was that one thing I was getting in trouble for was something my dad told me to do, and though I even expressed doubt about doing it to him, he said it would be fine. So I did it.
It was not fine.
He conveniently had forgotten he told me to do it. He admitted to it during the confrontation.
Do you think they stopped? Do you think they apologized to me for the mistake? Do you think they admitted it wasn’t fair?
Not in my memory. But I have blocked out a lot of it, I could be wrong…I do know it wouldn’t be in character for them to do it. I can’t recall either of the other two adults ever admit they were wrong.
My dad would only admit he was wrong about imagined things, not real things. Go figure.
The part that made this about love, much to my dismay both now and then, was that they claimed this entire humiliating experience was done out of love.
Yeah…it really felt like being torn apart for 2-3 hour staring was an act of love.
In the end, though, I did still quit the drum. I find it funny that the thing that set this off was still something I won about. Yet, I feel like I lost more than I gained from the experience.
I’m not sorry now I quit drum, it wasn’t for me. I’m not even sorry I took singing lesson, I enjoy singing. Granted, I hated taking them for that woman, but I did like learning it and I like knowing a bit about it now.
I do still wish she’d taught me how to sing different styles than she did so I could have used it more widely, but them’s the brakes.
Of course one incident might not have given me a complex about love, though for some people that might be enough to do it, but I’m a reasonable person, and I was even as a teen, though less so then, of course.
Still, I could have probably put together that that wasn’t right, if my dad hadn’t reinforced it over and over again.
But pretty much any time my dad and I were alone for longer than 10 minutes he’d start up on the subject again. Bring up every example they had, remind me that his two friends,and even their family, didn’t like me. Say I was a lot like a narcissist.
The funny part is my dad is the the actual narcissist, or has BPD. One of other or both, maybe. I now know it’s common to project your own toxic traits onto someone else, I don’t know that at 12, of course.
Always though, my dad would end or begin or interject into the middle of these lectures, that this was done in “love.”
I’m a very sensitive woman. I always have been. I won’t say verbal abuse is worse than physical abuse, both suck.
But to a sensitive person, it was devastating to hear this so many times.
I’m not a meek type of girl though. I fought back.
But since fighting back, both the first time,and every time after that, never got my anywhere, it created this complex where I feel like nothing I do will ever change people’s minds about me, and I expected them to dislike me, secretly, even if I’m not aware of doing anything to them to cause it.
I expected that for many years every time I met any new person.
Unfortunately, the world had a lot of touchy people in it, and sometimes, I got proven right. I’m sure my insecurities didn’t help with that, since insecure people tend to do things to tick others off anyway, but sometimes it really just came out of nowhere.
The unlucky times my dad got involved, he would usually agree with whoever it was. Even if it was the Sunday school teacher beefing with me for causing problems just by sitting in her class doing nothing.
My sister was there too. They don’t call her in for questioning. She didn’t even know what I did, to this day, I don’t know. But I know my dad was always ready to agree with anyone who had a problem with his daughter. Didn’t matter how unbalanced that person was to begin with.
All the little things my dad did to sabotage my life, but they added up.
I can’t of course, lay the blame for everything at his feet. Some of it was my fault. Some of it was other people’s besides my dad’s.
But the person who twisted the knife every time by calling it love, that was my dad.
I’ve never had people comment on how little I seem to be able to receive love.
Because when someone says that word, I flinch sometimes, inwardly.
I actually prefer if people use words like “I care about you” or “I appreciate you” because they ton’d set me off the same way. My dad certainly would never use words like that.
But “proud for you” is a trigger too, because he used that also.
It never meant anything. I figured out years in that he didn’t mean it. And I figured out also that even if I had done something to be proud of, he would have meant it. He didn’t think that way.
Pride in us wasn’t about what we did, or even about us being his kids, it was always about what he thought we wanted to hear to do what he wanted.
See, some people just never give love, and that’s bad enough.
Other people use love as reward for good behavior, and that’s just as bad, or maybe worse.
The type of person really talk about is the kid who uses love as a motivation if and when threats aren’t working. Just so you can be both scared, and then feel guilty for being scared.
Gas lighting at another level.
Thanks to this, I can’t feel love easily.
I won’t say it’s impossible. I feel love for other people. It’s easier when it children, people who don’t scare me.
That’s what got me, truth didn’t help. Truth is very important to me. If I assume something about someone, and alt er find out a fact about them that calls that into question, I actually changed my mind. I can’t imagine not doing that. But there are many people who will never change their mind, no matter what the truth is.
It’s hard to realize that when you’re not that kind of person.
But I’ve learned to let it slide off my back more.
I’m not writing this to say that my dad ruined my life. Or even that he ruined my relationships. I have good relationships with some of my family. And I have friends. I’m learning to get better at all this.
I hope one day to have a good marriage–which I will probably get counseling for, but that’s just good sense.
And a good relationship with my own children, if God grants me them like I hope.
But I’m not going to lie about my life and say all this didn’t matter or have some effect. Admitting it mattered actually is part of healing.
So it did matter and it is sad. Even saying that took me years to get to. I’m glad for the people along the way, here and there, who did take my side and tell me that that wasn’t normal to go through that.
I had a very good grandmother who would sympathize with me, she was still there for me when my parents weren’t. I had a good youth leader who helped me see at least some of what my dad did was wrong years before I could go to therapy to her the same thing.
I wasn’t always alone. I was just alone too much for it to be good.
But we take what we get in life, and I see no point complaining about it. I think we get what we need ultimately if we seek it, but not always the way we imagine it.
I’ve still never really had father figure other than God. But God has been enough, I know that will sound weird to the person who’s not a Christian, but it is what it is. Think I’m crazy if you want, I really don’t care. Until you have a better cure for broken hearted and lonely people, I don’t really think I’ll swap out mine.
I hope that I will learn to like the word “love” when people say to me again.
I think all this came to mind not just because of the prompt, but because of a thing one of my friends, who is a very blunt person (too much like me probably) said to me at my birthday party.
She pointed out: “Look how loved you are.”
I was thinking that it was nice of them all to show up. And I thought she was right, they were trying to show love.
Yet, when she said it, I felt nothing expect probably confused.
Like I usually feel when someone says that. Or uncertain. Maybe it’s fear, maybe it’s just doubt. Maybe they’re the same thing at bottom.
If I accept that, then how will I handle it when they end up doing the wrong thing to me, or leaving me? As everyone will, sooner or later.
Unfortunately for the person who has “avoidant attachment” disorder, as one therapist told me (he was an ass though, but he might have been right about that–he didn’t help me with the problem though), the fact is that being separated from the people you love is inevitable.
It’s hard enough for a healthy person to accept loss and grief. It’s harder if you’re someone like me who has had very little chance to even feel loved at all, so any short stint of it that will be taken away again feels cruel.
I have learned however, that often we’re more loved than we see.
And that the way I interpret love is not always the way people show it. A lot of stuff is just not communicated right.
And recently, I had an ordeal that my friends did not exactly make me feel better about. Doing a lot of the same things that set me off–but I didn’t blow up at them.
I was a bit upset, but I didn’t lash out at them because I knew, at least in my head, that they meant well and were trying to help.
While I would rather actually feel better, I do at least derive some sense of comfort for the fact that I have people who will attempt to help me, even if they don’t succeed. Having grace for people is important.
And that’s a huge stride for me, from where I started from.
So if you related to this post at all, I can tell you that it’s small things like that are along the path to health.
I don’t have it all figured out yet, but I know that at least being able to treat people with some degree of trust, even if you have doubts and anxieties, is the only way to start.
It might take years for me to feel it the way others do. I can be mad about that– or I can accept it and keep trying.
Maybe this is my favorite Naruto characters are Sai and Gaara. Both characters who pretty much embody the journey of learning to feel things again and feel them the right way.
Or my favorite author is C. S. Lewis, who wrote that it was important to be able to feel the right way about things, to be a whole and happy person. [It’s in the “Abolition of Man” book.]
If you met me in person, you might not even guess this about me. My friends have told me they wouldnt’ have before I told them.
I take that good sign. I’ve worked enough on the issues I have are not all obvious. That’s progress. They used to be blatantly obvious to people, based on what they told me.
I’m not a closed off person in every way either.
I guess my point in all this it is to say that these issues don’t define me, and they don’t define you either. You can have issues like this and still be a loving person. So they make you more loving because you over-compensate, in fact.
But I think you can never been too loving, so it’s a win-win. Sometimes broken stuff can be fixed to be stronger than it was naturally. Like when they cut off the trunk of trees to graft in a stronger trunk, but keep the old root system. (They can do that with fruit trees, did you know that?). You gotta know what to keep and what to throw away.
Well this got pretty long for a daily prompt post, so I think I’ll end it here. I hope some of this was encouraging, since it was kind of raw and heavy for this kind of post, but it was where my mind went, as as you know my motto is to keep it honest.
I know it sounds cheesy, but I’m not that particular about what someone gives me in material possessions. The point is that they thought of me.
Or if they do anything else that I know is their way of showing love. It just depends on the person.
In the end caring too much about “stuff” is just a waste of time. It’s the thought that counts.
I just recently got given fuzzy reading socks as a birthday present. I love them. I never would have asked for that, but, this person picked something she knew I’d probably use and that’s the sweet part. Also I ended up thinking they were really comfortable, so it’s a win-win.
drybonestruth 