I am a bird who really needs her nest. Even in college, when other girls were bunking together in impossibly small spaces, I needed my own little room, my very own, filled with bookshelves and quiet space. As I have aged, this has become more and more the case.
I think it has to do with being a bit of an introvert. I've spent most of my life posing as an extrovert, but the older I get, the more introverted I become. Anyway, I need that quiet space, and I especially need it when my life is chaotic.
Well, my life is chaotic: the divorce proceedings are taking up far too much of my time, and work is busy, and I still haven't totally adjusted to this single working mom thing. And this week I spent two partial days at the courthouse, taking court mandated classes. (The parenting class was actually four hours, and more interesting than I thought it would be. It said exactly what I thought it would, and I didn't learn anything new, but the presenter was good, and that helped.)
And then there's house repairs.
I am in the middle of what I call my mini-kitchen-remodel. This is not a big dream remodel - this is done out of necessity and with the slimmest of budgets, but I'm hoping that by keeping an all white pallette (counters, cabinets, backsplash) it will look clean, crisp, and maybe a tiny bit chic. There was mold under the sink, and it just had to go: it wasn't healthy, and that made the kitchen my number one priority for house repairs. I kept the upper cupboards (which though old, are perfectly fine), and tore out the bottom half of my kitchen, including part of the floor tiles. As remodels go, this one is tiny: no walls moving, no major layout changes, no upper cabinets. I've gone the IKEA route, cheap all the way, but upgraded a bit on the backsplash, sink, and faucet. (Have you seen the prices of faucets? It's insane! A curved tube with a handle is hundreds of dollars - yeesh.)
And my sidewalk - the one the neighbors complained about - is under repair now, and my garage door got fixed today to the tune of about $600. Oh, and did I mention that our cat got sick, and this lead to a $600 vet bill? And on top of the vet bill, the cat has been urinating blood all over my house, until we locked her in the bathroom (so now it's only in the bathroom). (I love our kitty - she's a sweet girl, and a lot of comfort to Katherine. She's worth it. We're giving her antibiotics and pain meds, and she's diagnosed with cystitis and crystals in her urine, so she's now on a specialized cat food.)
Kitchen cabinets in the living room, countertops against the bedroom wall, my cupboard contents in piles in the basement, a kitchen that is unusable, a bathroom filled with a sick cat. We're eating out every meal or eating cereal in paper bowls.
It's chaos.
And I'm venting.
The bills are making me sleepless - literally. The refi money will only stretch so much, and I'm spinning at night.
I know, breathe through it. Keep breathing.
It's possible that my kitchen will be usable by the middle of next week (with plumbing!). It's possible that kitty will be better by then. It's possible that the sidewalk will be fixed. And next weekend I'm doing a half day yoga retreat, adn though my body is tight from lack of use, I'm really hoping that it will wake me up and help me to feel more myself.
I want my nest back. I want this to be done, to head into an "easy" time. Please?
I know that I've made such huge strides, and that I'm likely being impatient. But I really, really, really look forward to next weekend, getting my house cleaned and moving back into the kitchen, and looking forward to the living without such repairs needing to be done!
I can do this. Right? Deep breaths...
****
This is a messy post, like my messy house. Living in chaos makes me feel chaotic - even my brain feels disorganized. But because some sweet and kind readers have told me that reading my struggles and successes helps them to feel more hopeful, I will end on this hopeful note:
In the past four months, I have:
- converted to full time work
- refinanced my house ON MY OWN
- hired an amazing nanny (remember, sharing her so that it's affordable)
- done most of the mediation and paperwork for my divorce
- filed for divorce
- mothered, worked
- taken the best vacation I've had in years
....and begun home repairs that make my house not only more pleasant but also more functional
I know I'm rocking it. I'm prouder of myself than I've ever been. But don't mind me if I get grumpy sometimes, and completely lose my mind, like I am today. I am human, and I'm allowed to be human. I'm tired, and I'm ready for a break. But I've come a long way, and I haven't forgotten that.
Upward and onward.
Showing posts with label childhood influence on divorce. Show all posts
Showing posts with label childhood influence on divorce. Show all posts
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Monday, November 5, 2012
Ohhhh..... A-ha!
I have not written about my parents on this blog yet....but today something has come up, and so they receive their debut.
I love my parents, and they love me. But it has been difficult to reach peace in my relationship with them: my childhood was filled with name calling ("moron" and "cretin" were among the most used, and it didn't matter how many As I got in school, whenever I made a mistake the names were trotted out like ugly ponies), slaps, and what I now recognize as inconsistant parenting: the same action on my part could receive very different responses one day to the next, based on my parents' moods. What might merit a laugh one week would merit a slap on the next, and I never quite knew how to judge which it would be.
It wasn't all bad. We had fun together camping and boating and such, and they didn't phyically abuse me (though slapping and spanking is NOT a parenting technique I'd recommend, and I don't hit my daughter, ever). They told me that they had high standards for me because they knew how capable I was. They told me they loved me.
When it was time for college, they informed me that there was no money to give me, and then they took a trip overseas. When it was time for my brother to go to college, they offered to pay his whole way. (Ironically, I worked my way through school, graduating with multiple higher ed degrees and no debt and no help, and my brother never finished community college.) For my 16th birthday, I got a tote bag with a built in umbrella. For my brother's 16th birthday, he got a car. (I could not make this up. I can still picture that ugly tote bag.)
Writing it all down makes my stomach hurt. When I would point out the inequalities my parents would mumble that they loved me very much and tell me not to be so sensitive. When I told them that I hated them calling me names, they told me that I was "persnickety" and that I wasn't happy unless I got my own way and couldn't I take a joke?
Eventually, I proved the persnickety thing right. I spent most of my twenties avoiding my parents. In hindsight, I also spent most of my twenties proving to them that I was smart, capable, and worthy. I got a degree in the subject they respected, and worked in a field that made people say "wow" and "you lucky girl" even though it wasn't really my thing.
I tried to live my life opposite from them - my more-than-I-needed degrees were at least a partial response to the fact that my mother never went to college; waiting until I was almost 30 to get married was a response to the fact that they got married when my mother was still a teenager. (My parents called me an old maid. Seriously.)
I like to believe that I have set aside my anger with my parents for some of their behaviors, for their inability to parent me the way I wanted or needed to be parented. Forgiveness is sweeter than anger, and I have tried to drink sweetness. I thought I had gotten so, so far from those roots that I was no longer influenced by them, and my path had proven that.
Which leads to my latest telephone conversation with my father.
My house is in a state of disrepair, all that deferred maintenance, and my refi money is only going to go so far. My dad called me - a nice phone call, at least at the outset - to check on me and see how I was doing. I said, "Well, sometimes it's a struggle, because I can't do everything I need to do." My dad said, "If there is anything I can do to help you, please ask," and I said, "Have you ever installed a garage door opener? Mine broke and I'd have to pay an installer several hundred dollars to replace it, on top of the cost of the new equipment." My dad said, "Yes, I gave one to your brother and installed it." I said, "Could you help me install mine?" and he said, "You know, I'm pretty busy."
Seriously.
For one of the first times in my adult life, I did not just say "Okay." I said, "Dad, it hurts my feelings when you say you want to help me and then when I ask for help you just repeatedly" (this was not the first time we've had a similar conversation) "shut me down. If you don't want to help me, please don't offer and then say no, just be up front about it and don't offer help when you don't mean to follow through."
He said, "What? When did I ever do that?" and I rattled off a couple of recent times. He said...
....and here's the clincher, folks, so please pay attention....
"Oh! I guess my words and actions don't line up, and I'm sorry for that. My heart is in the right place, you must know that!"
Let's repeat that. "My words and actions don't line up." Yes. That is the definition of my childhood, of the home I grew up in. And as I thought I was running away from my family of origin, choosing a man so different from them in so many ways.....I chose a person whose words and actions did not line up. And then the breezy "My heart is in the right place," as if that makes it all okay, as if it didn't matter what he said or did at all and I should be thankful that he thought about helping me at all even if he had no intention of following through.
A giant, rude, sudden a-ha! moment.
Bryan knew how to say the right thing in a pinch, but then when I asked him to follow through he would get angry and tell me I wasn't being reasonable or that there was no pleasing me. I think that sounds a lot like "persnickety" talk. I would try harder and harder to please him, and he would tell me that he loved me and he wanted our lives to be great, and then he would continue doing whatever he wanted even though we'd agreed on a different path, and then he'd actually be mad at me for pointing out the discrepency, and then I'd feel bad about myself because maybe I was just a persnickety brat after all.
Damn. That is a giant load of baggage right there!
In love, words and actions need to line up. Actually, not just in love, but in life. Integrity means saying what you mean, and acting on it. If you offer help, you mean it sincerely. If you say "I love you" you can't call names or yell. I am very, very clear about this, but I hadn't realized that I was choosing men who didn't live by that credo (Bryan was not the first). I hadn't realized how deeply my family of origin was in my bones, that all my running away hadn't gotten me that far after all.
I had been running around trying to please Bryan, trying to make him love me, the exact same way that I tried to please my parents, being who I thought they wanted me to be. Oh good grief!
It has taken me 43 years to realize that this is my problem, and it's all summed up in that little conversation with my father. I have chosen to be around men whose words and actions did not align, because that is how I was raised.
BUT:
I am not the little girl who was informed I was bright and capable one minute, and belittled the next, so that I never know how to feel...I am a woman who knows her own value much more than that little girl did. I am strong and smart and kind, and I've proven it many times. I do not take my self worth from my father, or from Bryan, and I get to choose who I spend time with. I am allowed to have boundaries.
I feel very, very good about calling my father on it. I wasn't rude, I didn't start a fight, but I said, "No." I will probably have to repeat myself many more times, because I don't think my father is particularly enlightened. But it's not about my dad, it's about me. It's about how I view myself in relationships to others, and it's about making sure that the men I invite in have words and actions that align.
I feel like someone just opened the door to the jail, and I've stepped into a pool of sunlight, blinking.
I choose to be around people whose words and actions align. Period. If they screw up, I'm allowed to say, "That's not okay with me" and stand my ground. I don't have to be rude, I don't have to fight, but I don't have to go along with it either.
And I can't be sure, because the proof is in the living that is to come, but I do believe I've just learned a very good lesson, maybe even THE lesson for me. Free at last!
I love my parents, and they love me. But it has been difficult to reach peace in my relationship with them: my childhood was filled with name calling ("moron" and "cretin" were among the most used, and it didn't matter how many As I got in school, whenever I made a mistake the names were trotted out like ugly ponies), slaps, and what I now recognize as inconsistant parenting: the same action on my part could receive very different responses one day to the next, based on my parents' moods. What might merit a laugh one week would merit a slap on the next, and I never quite knew how to judge which it would be.
It wasn't all bad. We had fun together camping and boating and such, and they didn't phyically abuse me (though slapping and spanking is NOT a parenting technique I'd recommend, and I don't hit my daughter, ever). They told me that they had high standards for me because they knew how capable I was. They told me they loved me.
When it was time for college, they informed me that there was no money to give me, and then they took a trip overseas. When it was time for my brother to go to college, they offered to pay his whole way. (Ironically, I worked my way through school, graduating with multiple higher ed degrees and no debt and no help, and my brother never finished community college.) For my 16th birthday, I got a tote bag with a built in umbrella. For my brother's 16th birthday, he got a car. (I could not make this up. I can still picture that ugly tote bag.)
Writing it all down makes my stomach hurt. When I would point out the inequalities my parents would mumble that they loved me very much and tell me not to be so sensitive. When I told them that I hated them calling me names, they told me that I was "persnickety" and that I wasn't happy unless I got my own way and couldn't I take a joke?
Eventually, I proved the persnickety thing right. I spent most of my twenties avoiding my parents. In hindsight, I also spent most of my twenties proving to them that I was smart, capable, and worthy. I got a degree in the subject they respected, and worked in a field that made people say "wow" and "you lucky girl" even though it wasn't really my thing.
I tried to live my life opposite from them - my more-than-I-needed degrees were at least a partial response to the fact that my mother never went to college; waiting until I was almost 30 to get married was a response to the fact that they got married when my mother was still a teenager. (My parents called me an old maid. Seriously.)
I like to believe that I have set aside my anger with my parents for some of their behaviors, for their inability to parent me the way I wanted or needed to be parented. Forgiveness is sweeter than anger, and I have tried to drink sweetness. I thought I had gotten so, so far from those roots that I was no longer influenced by them, and my path had proven that.
Which leads to my latest telephone conversation with my father.
My house is in a state of disrepair, all that deferred maintenance, and my refi money is only going to go so far. My dad called me - a nice phone call, at least at the outset - to check on me and see how I was doing. I said, "Well, sometimes it's a struggle, because I can't do everything I need to do." My dad said, "If there is anything I can do to help you, please ask," and I said, "Have you ever installed a garage door opener? Mine broke and I'd have to pay an installer several hundred dollars to replace it, on top of the cost of the new equipment." My dad said, "Yes, I gave one to your brother and installed it." I said, "Could you help me install mine?" and he said, "You know, I'm pretty busy."
Seriously.
For one of the first times in my adult life, I did not just say "Okay." I said, "Dad, it hurts my feelings when you say you want to help me and then when I ask for help you just repeatedly" (this was not the first time we've had a similar conversation) "shut me down. If you don't want to help me, please don't offer and then say no, just be up front about it and don't offer help when you don't mean to follow through."
He said, "What? When did I ever do that?" and I rattled off a couple of recent times. He said...
....and here's the clincher, folks, so please pay attention....
"Oh! I guess my words and actions don't line up, and I'm sorry for that. My heart is in the right place, you must know that!"
Let's repeat that. "My words and actions don't line up." Yes. That is the definition of my childhood, of the home I grew up in. And as I thought I was running away from my family of origin, choosing a man so different from them in so many ways.....I chose a person whose words and actions did not line up. And then the breezy "My heart is in the right place," as if that makes it all okay, as if it didn't matter what he said or did at all and I should be thankful that he thought about helping me at all even if he had no intention of following through.
A giant, rude, sudden a-ha! moment.
Bryan knew how to say the right thing in a pinch, but then when I asked him to follow through he would get angry and tell me I wasn't being reasonable or that there was no pleasing me. I think that sounds a lot like "persnickety" talk. I would try harder and harder to please him, and he would tell me that he loved me and he wanted our lives to be great, and then he would continue doing whatever he wanted even though we'd agreed on a different path, and then he'd actually be mad at me for pointing out the discrepency, and then I'd feel bad about myself because maybe I was just a persnickety brat after all.
Damn. That is a giant load of baggage right there!
In love, words and actions need to line up. Actually, not just in love, but in life. Integrity means saying what you mean, and acting on it. If you offer help, you mean it sincerely. If you say "I love you" you can't call names or yell. I am very, very clear about this, but I hadn't realized that I was choosing men who didn't live by that credo (Bryan was not the first). I hadn't realized how deeply my family of origin was in my bones, that all my running away hadn't gotten me that far after all.
I had been running around trying to please Bryan, trying to make him love me, the exact same way that I tried to please my parents, being who I thought they wanted me to be. Oh good grief!
It has taken me 43 years to realize that this is my problem, and it's all summed up in that little conversation with my father. I have chosen to be around men whose words and actions did not align, because that is how I was raised.
BUT:
I am not the little girl who was informed I was bright and capable one minute, and belittled the next, so that I never know how to feel...I am a woman who knows her own value much more than that little girl did. I am strong and smart and kind, and I've proven it many times. I do not take my self worth from my father, or from Bryan, and I get to choose who I spend time with. I am allowed to have boundaries.
I feel very, very good about calling my father on it. I wasn't rude, I didn't start a fight, but I said, "No." I will probably have to repeat myself many more times, because I don't think my father is particularly enlightened. But it's not about my dad, it's about me. It's about how I view myself in relationships to others, and it's about making sure that the men I invite in have words and actions that align.
I feel like someone just opened the door to the jail, and I've stepped into a pool of sunlight, blinking.
I choose to be around people whose words and actions align. Period. If they screw up, I'm allowed to say, "That's not okay with me" and stand my ground. I don't have to be rude, I don't have to fight, but I don't have to go along with it either.
And I can't be sure, because the proof is in the living that is to come, but I do believe I've just learned a very good lesson, maybe even THE lesson for me. Free at last!
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