A Cautionary Tale

A Cautionary Tale Once upon a time, there was a family – at least my husband and I thought there was a family. We had all the look and feel of a family. Of course, there were problems, as with most stepfamilies. The biological mother was bitter and insecure and she did her best to brainwash the children into believing that their father and his “girlfriend” and then new wife, was not significant to them, that we did not really belong as a central part of their lives. But we loved the children and we felt that since the children were young, they would mature and eventually be able to see things as they really were. We also always thought our love for each other would prevail – so we tried to persevere. We went through quite a few mini-estrangements, there was a time when their mother even moved them out of state and each and every time we (correction - I) jump through hoops and bent over backwards to get everybody back together again. We made the usual excuses, they were young, they were confused, they were brainwashed and ergo, fucked up. They need time, they needed patience, and they needed love The years passed and we all got older. But the older these children got, the more problems presented themselves. Little problems and big problems. And it seemed, the more problems there were, the more estrangements – and the more reconciliation, and then, again, even more estrangements. And again, we waited for the children to grow up – to awaken from their arrested development and take their place in a real and rational world– a world where MOMMY’s influence waned significantly and their own self-actualization was realized. And again, we made excuses. They were busy, they were stressed, they were trying to make their way in the world, and they didn’t know how to relate in a normal and meaningful way. They needed more time, they needed more patience, and they needed even more love. So here’s the thing – it took us almost 38 years to figure out that we were playing a very insignificant role in the lives of these children and that they were playing us. We had never really fit in. When we lost our youngest daughter – the one who was the most screwed up emotionally and yet the most real and loving (almost 4 years ago), we had STILL been waiting for the other 2 “children” – then in their 40’s - to grow up. By then, we had had so many set backs – so many false starts, so many dashed hopes. But at the end of the day, we were still making excuses. And then, one day, we looked within and we found that we could no longer find any more excuses to make. We searched long and hard but we just came up empty. The well had run dry. And we knew - right then and there - that there wasn’t anything left for us in those relationships and that it was finally time to walk away. I wonder if Lizzie Borden had killed someone other than her parents, would they have made excuses for her? She was always a good girl – she must have been really upset, really stressed to commit those ax murders. How about Jeffrey Dahmer’s parents? Would they say he was always a good boy and that perhaps those women were asking for it? Now I actually understand a parent’s need to forgive their children, to excuse, to overlook their misdeeds. It is part of a basic survival scenario that is necessary to employ so that they can convince themselves that it wasn’t their fault that their children evolved into hateful, abusive parodies of their beloved offspring - so they can convince themselves that they did not raise “bad” children. But what if these children are no longer able to be empathic and compassionate? What if they are now programmed to be perpetually indifferent and unloving? What if they are just not interested in the needs of their parents and other family members? What if they have just become insignificant to them but they just haven’t “got it” yet? So this is how our story ended – after 38 years, we not only realized that we had been blown off by our ES (for reasons known only to him), but we found that we were still getting jerked around, lied to, manipulated and hurt by our duplicitous ED. As an added attraction, our 23 year old GD was also joining the game and was beginning to blow off our phone calls and not contact us. And so we walked. So consider this to be a cautionary tale folks. And as the waiting to hear from an EC for some of you continues, it might be good to start thinking of what you want your lives to be. Will you always want to be waiting, checking your phone, your email, Is THIS really the way you want to live your lives? So it might really be good to THINK about it. And it is my true hope that it doesn’t take you almost 4 decades to put it all together and realize what is true and what is not true – what is real and what is not real.