I want to begin by prefacing with my understanding of my placement and role in the family dynamic. I didn't have any understanding at all. I was completely bereft of tactile comprehension for who I was, who I would become and who I was treated as, in my own birth family and why this is important right now. I would go on to learn of the importance of birth order. I would learn that first born had rights, responsibilities and roles they play within the family unit. I did not experience any of these, with the exception of "responsibility" but that was the extent of who I was treated as, trained as and included as when I was growing up with my birth family. I also want to state that I did not "grow up" with my birth family but instead experienced the "growing up" portion of my life once I had kids and had left their father for being abusive and non-inclusive. He screamed everything at me. Everything WAS a FIGHT with him always. I didn't want to live like that, so I left with the kids he no longer wanted to raise. Choke on it or don't, I had to sue the man to get him to fund the kids he promised to fund. When our daughter became too combative with me, I ushered all three to their father in Pennsylvania hoping they would be safer there. They weren't and his place was a bigger shit-show than mine was. By the time I retired and returned home, it was obvious I was nobody to everybody and that was the life I was starting over from. The nobodiness of not belonging to the least inclusive and most exclusive group of people I'd ever met. My own kin. The moment I knew came in 2016. It has taken me years to grieve the loss of my birth family and the subsequent expulsion and rejection by the very people who professed, confessed and obsessed that they would love me and stand by through everything. They did not. Had I been a wanted child, a wanted young person and a wanted adult the scene would have looked very different than it did. Instead, It looked like this. Imagine if you would, it's Christmas. Everyone is happy, everyone is getting gifts and everyone shows up. There's conversation, music and food. The mood is so light that the missteps wouldn't be noticed until well after the holidays were packed away and the last bits of tinsel find their way to the trash bin. Imagine that you spent hours crafting a thoughtful gift for everybody, so not one person would be without a gift. You give sauces, family photos and a thoughtful card to each person. Your brother's get a matched set of concert tickets to Journey in April, a show you could easily arrange to attend with your brothers. "Do you get a ticket?" you excitedly wonder. No, sorry. You get a coloring book on how to be more pleasing to God. You feel the slight instantly. You feel how it's the wrong decision to be not included in such an event. You say nothing. You don't want to "spoil" Christmas for everyone with a mood, attitude or low vibes... so you let it drift until you are safely away, elsewhere. But this is the sign, the one that leaves you knowing, you aren't good enough for them. You aren't good enough for Her. Because everyone knows who the real Santa is and who has be pulling Christmas together for decades. Everyone knows who thought out the gifts, thought out the presents and bought, purchased and wrapped it all today. Everyone knows. Especially you, who didn't get a ticket. You would leave the coloring book there. It isn't your style to just accept gifts that aren't really for you. That gift was for her, for her to feel better about Your life. She never felt good about your life? Why? All those failed murder attempts left her mentally ill and here you are sitting at her table, alive as fuck! Ready to jump from an airplane to celebrate your 50th birthday. One she'd hoped she'd never see. Today I'm reminding myself of the murder attempts. The attic prison. The part where they built the prison together, then housed me in it. I'm reminding myself today of the time he picked me up and threw me down the hall, over and over and over again. This would be the moment you would need to become a powerlifter. So nobody could ever lift you and throw you again. Remember the time they were all drunk inside and left you kids alone with the fire AND the gas can? You would be blamed for the fire that day even though you didn't light it and weren't anywhere near it when it exploded, injuring your cousin. Still, you would receive the drunken screaming from an enraged Doug who never took responsibility for the horror that was the shit-show of HIS LIFE! Not yours. You were a kid. Remember? Kids aren't responsible for fires adults start. That fire, was Doug's. That gas can, was Doug's. That explosion was Doug's. Remember. Once, my son said to me "Did you know they investigated Doug after Grandma died because you called the cops on him?" To whit I say, "Son, did you know your Uncle Scott also called the cops on Doug the same day I did?" Yes, world, I wasn't the only adult sibling to call the cops on parents on the same day. So if a charge is to be levied on wellness checks for seniors who fell when their partner left the state and left them unattended. Then YES!!! I am 100% guilty of having the cops called on my parents. Yes, yes, yes! That's standard stuff for this family. When parents try to murder you, build a prison for you and pick you up and throw you around, you better believe we will be hypervigilant to care and wellbeing of those left behind. I abandoned my mother when she needed me most because my father was so abusive, it wasn't my problem. She rejected me. He rejected me. They both tried to murder me. And they both built a prison. I've never gotten an apology and as far as i can tell the younger generation is okie dokie with all of it because they are still coddling that villainous man. I hope he dies cold. I leave Doug to the remainder of his days in peace but I will be anything but silent. If people don't want to know. Look away and better yet, stay away. I am not the person they made me. I'm someone else entirely. If you can't handle the me that I am truly am. Go away. The reason this is so important right now? I am not alone. My experience is typical. Yes. Typical of the North American United States middle aged female account. Talk to any female who was first born with brothers and you will learn that typically the top sibling was displaced by a lower birth order male in some weird male power struggle dynamic within the familial unit. This is typical of North American fathers to displace their eldest child's position if she was female born and raised to be subservient to her male siblings. Typically these males are raised to be dominant and superior to their female siblings. This has a corrosive and toxic effect on the family dynamic and therefore the familial unit is experiencing a significant disruption in cohesiveness and unity. The family unit is missing in it's former form in the USA. It no longer exists and new family units have started to emerge as being dominant over the former system of "blood is thicker than water." That modality is quickly choking itself out of existence by the expulsion of the strong females from the family unit. They will continue to decline until that modality dies out with that generation who encapsulated that belief system. As a side note. I think it's disgusting that my parents tried to kill me at all. I think it's gross that I was forced to endure the years with them that I did endure. I don't think I would choose that family willingly ever again. I'm not convinced that the life path is one of choice at all. The more I'm here, the longer it appears that "free will" is a fallacy. I am simply present. I am present in this life. My life and my life path has been anything but perfect or easy. If anything it's been painful and arduous. For whatever purpose that translates to beauty. It never misses me how utterly beautiful this life has been. I've been grateful for the company along the way. Thank you for not going away.
5 Comments
Candy
12/14/2023 11:15:21 am
Whatever You've gone through, and I know it's a lot, you are a diamond. A diamond in a sea of coal. So if you had to go through it, to make you the diamond you are today, I call that a win! No matter what, you are love. ❤️
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Mari
12/14/2023 06:55:05 pm
Thank you. Some days the Truth is a burr in my saddle. I'm glad I've gotten to a point where I can do mental math. *Hugs* thank you for not going away.
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Amanda
12/21/2023 06:34:54 am
I admire the strength and softness of you & your healing journey. Im glad you're present, because you're such a gift 🎁
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Mari
12/21/2023 07:41:46 am
Thank you. Sometimes the best gift we can give/be is the safety of others.
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Amanda
12/21/2023 09:29:51 am
I appreciate you & your gifts so much Leave a Reply. |
AuthorMarihemp is a Mystic Archives
January 2024
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