It's all about the drama

"Family quarrels have a total bitterness unmatched by others. Yet it sometimes happens that they also have a kind of tang, a pleasantness beneath the unpleasantness, based on the tacit understanding that this is not for keeps; that any limb you climb out on will still be there later for you to climb back." ~Mignon McLaughlin

Tensions have been high this week between oldest daughter and her father. I'm just going to put it out there that we are a family who cannot seem to have a discussion without it descending into a shouting-fest of some sort. It's disheartening and discouraging to know that nothing of importance can be discussed rationally here. I think I've been living this way for so long that I would spontaneously combust if we started acting like normal people for even 5 seconds.

So the other night I get three quick pings to my phone alerting me that I have some new text messages. It's my oldest daughter letting me know where she is and then she proceeds to leave this gem, "...and please tell Dad to stop calling me because I have nothing to say to him..."

I am, above all things, a very patient person. You can push me and push me and push me but I will remain calm in the presence of all this pushing. I will be giving the benefit of the doubt during the initial pushing and even when I'm up against the wall from the pushing, I will do my best and try to see things from the perspective of the person doing the pushing, knowing full well that they will not afford me the same courtesy unless I scream that no one ever looks at things from my point of view and then, begrudgingly, they might take a peek but not with any seriousness, not with anything that tells me that they value my point of view at all. I may be patient, but I am not stupid.

About six months ago, I read about the "Drama Triangle." Reading that article felt like I was finally seeing in print how my life is being played out. The drama triangle consists of a victim, a persecutor and a rescuer. We tend to rotate through these roles during our lives but I think that mostly, I am a rescuer and certainly, in my role in this family of mine, (husband, wife, 3 children) I am always the rescuer because I get dragged into it by the victim and the persecutor (which probably makes me a victim but for purposes of this post, I will maintain that I am the rescuer).

Here's how things work in my family. Daughter and/or son have problems with father because father is rigid and opinionated and loud and forceful (in a loving way). They start arguing and before I know what has hit me, I get dragged into their battles even when I don't belong there. Son or daughter will give me messages to give to their father and father will do the same thing. I never win in this position, not that I am looking to win anything. All I know is that I never feel anything but bad when I allow myself to be dragged into the triangle. If I side with my husband because I agree with his position, then I am the good wife but the bad mother. If I side with my children because I believe they are in the right, I get told I am being disloyal and I am asked to "just go along" even when my heart is telling me that going along is the wrong thing to do.

I spend a great deal of time being the middle man here. At least once a week this drama triangle plays out. Father will see daughter's messy room and tell me, "You need to sit her down and talk with her about her sloppiness." I'll reply, "Why can't you tell her this?" and he will say, "Because I'll lose my temper and things will get ugly." So the threat is made that a potential storm will erupt if I do not step in and tell our daughter what HE wants to tell her. To spare us all (rescuer that I am), I step in and deliver the message then I get to bear the brunt of our daughter's scorn for being asked to clean up her messy room that I didn't care about in the first place. This is a trivial example but I'm trying to prove a point. I wasn't concerned about her messy room, HE WAS, and yet I had to take his fight on as my own. I end up feeling resentful towards both of them. I crave peace and so I tell myself that my resentment is a small price to pay for that peace, but lately, I am not so sure.

I keep trying to break this dysfunctional cycle but mostly, I fail because disengaging from the drama triangle means that I am left to deal with all those uncomfortable feelings I'd rather just ignore. I have to prepare for everyone being angry with me and I am a people pleaser of the highest order. I have to be prepared to hear things about myself that are probably untrue. but are said to me as a way to get me to join the triangle.

When my daughter text messaged me to relay a message to her father, I had had enough of all their bullshit and so I replied, "I am not your messenger girl. Tell him yourself."

Guess what happened? He called her until she picked up her phone and they talked. Surprisingly, the world did not end.

I need to remember this...that they do not need me to rescue them even when they are begging me to do just that...that I do not need to rescue others to feel that I am important or loved in this family...that refusing to be manipulated by the people I love is letting them know that I deserve better, and more.

Seventeen

In seventeen years, she has aged seventeen years, while, I, her mother, haven't aged a day (curious, I know!). There hasn't been a day in seventeen years that I have not loved her. She came into my life when I needed her most, and so I think of her as my very own earth angel. She came after I already had a girl and a boy, and after I had learned the very painful lesson that to wish for anything other than perfect health in a child is foolish and reckless and selfish and wrong. My wish came true with her because she was born in perfect health, and the instant I saw her face, for the first time in 5 1/2 years, I felt safe in this world again.

To say that she is amazing is not enough. To say that she changed my life and filled my heart with the most awesome love is saying only part of what she means to me. I have always dreaded the time she would grow away from me but as it draws nearer, I'm less fearful because I'm finding that what I'm focusing on now is watching how she takes on this world because, trust me, you will not forget her. She is going to do great things. I love just watching her

She is
serious,
complex,
organized,
straight-forward,
hard-working,
relentless,
self-motivated,
goal driven,
wise beyond her years,
secure,
talented,
strong,
tall,
beautiful,
intense,
complicated.
real

...and then sometimes, there are moments when she forgets that she is carrying the world around on her shoulders...and she heart-attack-laughs with me like a crazy person. I love those times. I carry them with me always.

In all of this world, I loved her first.

I loved her first.

Little white lies are still lies

All my life I have struggled with telling the truth. This is not something I am proud to put into writing. I remember the first time I got caught telling big lies. I was attending a Catholic school, in the fourth grade, and when we got graded tests back, we were to bring them home and have them signed by our parents. I can't remember the subject, (I'm leaning towards it being History) but anyway, I failed a number of tests and I could not bear the thought of having to bring those failing grades home and having to face the disappointment of my parents and so I did the next best thing and forged their signatures.

I don't know what possessed me to do this or think I could get away with it, but I suppose at the time, I thought I was clever enough to outsmart everyone. I got away with the forgery until my report card came home and there was a big fat D glaring out at all of us and my parents wanted to know why they hadn't been informed. It all came out then, the forged signatures (and I remember practicing writing my mother's name so I was pretty calculated in my deception), and my terrible lies. I know my parents were tremendously angry with me for a very long time and I also know that I continued to justify my behavior to myself by saying I did it to spare THEM. I am older now and I know without question that I did it to spare ME.

I would like to say that this little incident was a light bulb moment for me and that I never again told another lie but that would be untrue. I have continued to skirt around issues and tell little white lies when I have felt cornered and when I have felt that it would be to my advantage to omit the truth. I've tried to figure out why it is that I choose to tell lies instead of the truth. I think it has to do with not wanting to deal with people being angry with me. I think I believe in my deepest of hearts that there are some people who do not really want to hear the truth if it's not what they want to hear and so I tell them what I think they want to hear instead of what is real.

My husband hates it when I carry around a lot of cash so he will ask me how much cash I have on me and even though I know I have $100 on me, I will tell him $40 because I know that he won't start in on a lecture. I know that $40 will be an acceptable amount according to his estimations and so that's the number I give him. I tell myself we can both feel good this way--he can feel like I'm not carrying a lot of cash and I get spared the tirade I'm not in the mood to listen to anyway. It's a win-win in my eyes even though I know that at the core of it all I am not being honest. It's not that he would begrudge me spending that money anyway. It's just that he thinks it's stupid to carry cash and I don't happen to feel that way. I could give you a truckload of ways I am dishonest like this. The lies slip out easier than you would imagine.

I try hard not to lie about big things but that's such a subjective statement. Who am I to qualify lies, to measure them out and say which ones are acceptable and which ones are not, which ones are little and which ones are big? There are probably people who are horrified that I lie about the cash I carry while I go around telling myself it's no big deal. I also give myself points for fessing up if I get caught in lies. I'm not afraid to admit that I've lied if I've been caught or if I feel too guilty and rat myself out. At night I ask to be forgiven for those things and I also ask for help in being a better person because I think each day is a new chance for me to start with a clean slate and that makes me feel hopeful about maybe being able to actually achieve that goal some day.

On winning and losing

"If winning isn't everything, why do they keep score?" ~Vince Lombardi

Here is one of many reasons why I love my son. For the past couple of years he has been playing a team sport in college where his team has won only one time each year (they play about 95 games each season). Tonight, when he called, I asked him who they were playing and I asked him if there was a potential for a win tonight, and he replied without hesitation, "There's potential for a win every time we go out and play."

I honestly don't know where he comes from because we are a family of mostly sore losers here and I say that with the utmost kindness and love because, well, they are my family and I guess I have to. My husband was an athlete growing up and no one loses nastier than he does except, perhaps, my youngest daughter who is a carbon copy of him only cuter. Losing for them is personal and it is painful and it is a reminder that they cannot control everything. I think if I was an outsider looking in, and I saw how they react when they lose, I would probably tsk, tsk and get up on a high horse to tell them to please get a life. But since I live with them, I see that their mentality is focused on winning because they do not see the point in playing if they are not playing to win and so they see losing as a waste of their time. They lose a little love for the game they are playing because winning is always the goal. Playing well doesn't seem to make them feel any better about losing. Ever. Both my husband and my daughter are very difficult personalities, they are driven and self motivated and they are both very successful in everything they do because they do things to do them THE BEST. Their approach to life makes me love them all the more because they will not concede that losing is something that will happen to them. It's just not an option they consider.

But my son? Well, we could all learn a thing or two from him about losing with grace because that is what he does. He goes to practice every day of the week and works alongside his team and he prepares himself for the next game always with the thought in mind that he has a chance of winning even when reality suggests he should probably prepare for another loss. I can't tell you how proud he makes me, how it humbles me and makes me want to be a better loser myself because I have picked up some bad habits hanging around with the rest of the crew here. My son will tell you that you cannot win everything and he finds contentment in doing his very best, in giving his all regardless of winning or losing. He doesn't think he is a loser because of the many losses his team has suffered. He always looks ahead and believes there is chance that at the end of the next game there will be a big W beside his team's name.

Anyway, I just think he's totally awesome.

You can steal happiness

"It's a mean town, but I don't care. Try and steal this. You can't steal happiness."~The Weepies

Except you can.

I like the idea of The Weepies song, "Happiness." The song basically says that if you're really happy, no one can steal that happiness from you, but I have to say that it's been my experience that people can and do steal happiness away from each other. I'm not sure if it's intentional or not, but I do know that there are certain people in my life who don't seem to like it if I am happy and it's almost as though they want to knock it out of me so I can't have it if they're not having it. Misery loves company but I guess happiness should just shut up and stay in a corner somewhere. I don't get that about people. I am always happy when/if other people are happy. I'm not jealous of them. I don't want to knock their happiness out of them just because I might not be happy in that same moment or if they have something I don't have.

As a for instance, the other day I had made a cake for my daughter's birthday. Her father wasn't going to be home the day of her birthday so we went into her room with the candles all blazing and we started to sing to her. Well, she had the ceiling fan on and all the candles blew out so I stopped to relight them and as I was relighting them she motioned with her hands to "speed up the process" so I asked her if she had a problem with us singing to her and she said, "well, my birthday's tomorrow, not today." Um...no kidding. I'm the one who gave birth.

Me and her father were just happy and being silly and all of the sudden it was like...STOP!!! You cannot be happy because I'm not in the mood for it right now. So then I asked her if she wanted some cake and ice cream and she curtly told me NO and reminded me AGAIN that it wasn't her birthday. OKAY! I hustled out of her room and got my husband some cake and ice cream because the reason he wanted to sing early was so that he wouldn't miss out on the cake. I know. He's like 2 years old on a good day.

But my point is that I was feeling happy about her birthday and WHAM!!!, then I was in a bad mood because I started to think how I went out of my way to do something nice and how it was unappreciated and how I am sick of having to tip toe around all these moody people who want to steal my happiness away from me.

So even though I like that Weepies song, I'm afraid it's just a bunch of nice sounding words, set to a catchy tune, that sadly don't ring true in my world.

Endings

There are important events in my life that I do not remember. I do not remember the last time I held each of my children before they were too big to pick up, but there was a day when I no longer could pick each of them up and it seems to me that I should remember this. My world should have halted for a second so that I could savor those moments, but I think what happened was that I picked each one of them up for the very last time and I simply went on with my day not even knowing that something important was ending.

Can you hear me now????

"The way we communicate with others and with ourselves ultimately determines the quality of our lives."-Anthony Robbins

You should be a fly on the wall when I am on the phone with one of my children and my husband happens to be in the same room. Complete chaos takes over as I try to have a one on one conversation with one of them while my husband is interjecting questions and comments. I cannot complete a thought or a sentence without him trying to take over the conversation, but if I offer to hand the phone over to him in an attempt to end the madness, he waves me off like I am bothering him. I don't know what to say about this except that I hate it. I tell him before, during and after these phone calls that I do not appreciate being the mediator or being interrupted, but this never registers in a way that brings about a satisfactory behavioral change on his part. I'm going to start going into the bathroom and locking the door from now on when I want to talk in peace because I don't see this changing any time soon.

This is what happens, though, if I bring up to him that I've spoken to one of the kids (and he wasn't around to hijack the conversation). He'll start bombarding me with questions that he feels I should have asked them and if I haven't asked them those questions he tells me that I've neglected to find out/ask about the most important things! WTF? Yep. He does that every damn time as though I have somehow mysteriously developed telekinetic powers and can read his mind to know what he wants me to ask them. This is what I live with!

Sometimes I want to slam my cell phone to the ground and stamp the shit out of it. I know this would make me feel better about the lack of phone conversation etiquette in this house.

Sweet tooth

I was craving something sweet and we had nothing in the house so I took a little trip to the grocery store and picked up the following: pound cake, vanilla ice cream, strawberries, chocolate chip cookies, Dots, Jujyfruits, a frosted apple coffee cake, and a bag of pretzels in case I feel like something crunchy and salty.

Seriously, I can't do anything small.

There's no water that can wash away this longing to come clean

"We all grow up with the weight of history on us. Our ancestors dwell in the attics of our brains as they do in the spiraling chains of knowledge hidden in every cell of our bodies." ~Shirley Abbott

About a year and a half ago I wrote a letter to my parents. In it, I spoke of the memories I have of my childhood with them and how I felt those things shaped me into what I am today. I put it in an envelope, addressed it and prepared to mail it off but for some reason, I could not do it. I took the envelope and placed it under my bed where it's been collecting dust ever since.

This is what I think about presents. I think the best presents are the ones that are made by hand, not bought in a store. I know that not everyone possesses the talent to paint or sculpt or write music, but I think if you have those sorts of talents, they are the things that people like me prefer receiving. My most prized possessions are things my father has made for me, things my children have made for me. Those are the things I look at and want to keep safe and feel better just knowing I have them. A sweater from Macy's just doesn't have the same effect. In a fire, I would not think to save a sweater because it was given to me by my parents. But a painting or a piece of furniture made with their hands? Those are things I know I would fight to keep with me.

Even though I have this blog on the internet, I do not share this space with anyone in my family or even my friends. It's so hard to explain how I am this intensely private person and at the same time I am willing to share my feelings with total strangers without batting an eye. It makes no sense and yet it makes perfect sense to me. I feel at ease opening my heart because I'm not risking the involvement of the real people in my life. I think I do not always trust that my family and friends will be careful of my heart. I don't know what I'm afraid of--maybe it's that they would stop loving me if they knew the real me--the one who is imperfect in a million different ways, the one with messy feelings that leak all over the place when what is prized in their world is keeping up appearances, keeping it together.

Sifting through books and whatnot under my bed, I came upon the letter I wrote to my parents and once again I thought about sending it off in the mail to them. I took it in the car with me and passed by the post office for weeks without stopping to get it weighed. I don't know what finally made me mail it. I think I asked myself what I was waiting for and could not come up with a good enough answer. I think I asked myself if I would regret not sending it to them should something happen to them and I knew in my heart that I would. I think I wanted to stop being afraid of owning up to how I feel and I realized that I could not control how they would respond, but I could at least be brave enough to open my heart and say, "this is me." And so I did. I held my breath, then let it go.

A couple of days ago, I received a call from my parents and they told me they loved what I had written, that they had never read anything more beautiful in their lives. They kept referring to my letter as a gift. I cannot tell you how happy this made me because as I've written before, we are not a family who does under the surface living very well. We keep our feelings in check even if it kills us. A lot of the time, actually almost all of my life, I have felt like it's been killing me or at the very least, killing the spirit of who I really am. The last time I tried to communicate to them how I was feeling during a rough period in my life, they changed the subject which left me feeling like I could not be my real self around them--I had to be what they wanted me to be, not what I was. They tend to give me that message a lot, and after a while, I learned to take a hint. But this time? They did not come back and tell me anything more than that I had truly moved them with my words.

This is what I have learned: Sometimes, when you're really scared about opening your heart to people you should be able to open your heart to, they do not disappoint you.

Merry Christmas

“Christmas gift suggestions:
To your enemy, forgiveness.
To an opponent, tolerance.
To a friend, your heart.
To a customer, service.
To all, charity.
To every child, a good example.
To yourself, respect.”~Oren Arnold


From my home to yours, Merry Christmas.

Text messaging Christmas lists

It seems I have a new thing to hate about Christmas (not that I hate too many things about Christmas, but, well, you know what I mean...) Anyway, the new thing around my house is that I'll be out shopping and hear that familiar sound indicating I have a message of some sort on my phone and I'll go take a look and what do you know, I'll have a multimedia message waiting for me. It will be a picture of exactly what someone wants me to buy them and I'll also get colors and sizes and all the other necessary details about where I can pick it up. After I receive these multimedia messages I typically have to make about 5-10 phone calls clarifying things because the picture isn't that great and God forbid I make a mistake and get the wrong thing because THEY TOOK THE TIME TO SEND ME ALL THE INFORMATION AND EVEN PROVIDED A PICTURE and the least I can do is get it right. Right?

OMG.

Enough already with the text messaging.

One more thing I wouldn't do

I wouldn't copycat an old Seinfeld episode by sending out Christmas cards telling someone that in their honor I was donating money in their name to my favorite charity. Nope. Wouldn't do it!

*For more things I wouldn't do, see the entry below. I might just keep adding to it since more things come to me every day.

Things I would not do...

I wouldn't take the box of Jujyfruits someone had bought for themselves and eat all but the green ones because I HATE THE GREEN ONES.

I wouldn't cause a long jam up at the drive through ATM because I was conducting about 20 transactions and behaving like I was the only one in the world who needed to use the machine.

I wouldn't send Harry and David fruit to a bunch of kids because "I'm on a health kick again this year."

I wouldn't try to sneak into the turn lane when there wasn't any room resulting in my car being half in the turn lane and half in the forward moving lane making it impossible for those behind me to go anywhere when the light turned green. (this happens so much where I live my blood pressure goes through the roof just thinking about it)

I wouldn't ask for advice on my blog then reprimand those whose comments aren't perfectly aligned with what I really wanted to hear.

I wouldn't tell my significant other that next year we ought to just get a small, fake little tree to put on a table somewhere because it's just way too much work for "us" while I was sitting on my ass in another room watching tv.

I would not pretend not to hear my significant other coming into the house with bags and bags of groceries when I am able to hear my significant other typing on the computer from 6 rooms away. In other words, I would not have selective supersonic hearing.

Hope dangles on a string, like slow spinning redemption

I love how I am able to bend my life around everyone elses--at a moment's notice sometimes--how I am able to shift and conform and mold myself to be what others need me to be all the time, but how when I ask one simple thing, it cannot be managed--it is too hard, it is not what someone else wants to do.

So there's that.

I make a mental note of these things, these messages that are sent to me day after day, year after year that I used to dismiss as part of the "job" but now keep track of with a fierce determination. I think about them when I'm out running. They give me energy. They push me to do more, to want to get stronger.

When I dream, I am never married, and I never have children and oftentimes, I am flying high above the world with the wind in my hair. It is simple and calm. I am watching the world from a distance, and I know that I like it that way. I don't remember much of my dreams, but I do know that I fly and that it feels like what I imagine heaven must feel like.

Even though I've started to hate Dr. Phil because he's always celebrity name-dropping, and he has this weird superiority complex thing going on, there is one thing he says that makes total sense to me. He says that people treat you the way you teach them to treat you. I've done a horrible job with this but part of me doesn't want to own up to this because it's just one more place where I've failed and it's one more thing I've got to fix. The list just keeps getting longer and longer.

I am committed to living in reality, however, so I will add it to my list of things to do--teach them to treat me how I treat them.

Rage - Scenes from her life - Story #1

A husband and wife sat across from each other in a booth where they were eating Chinese food. The wife ordered, then the husband ordered. and then they started to talk about a recent disappointment in their lives which they eventually agreed was small in the grand scheme of things. They agreed to be happy and remember how blessed they were to have all the good things they had in this life.

Out of the blue, the wife said to her husband, "I want you to know that lately I've been filled with rage," because she had been filled with rage lately and she didn't know who else she could share this terrible secret with besides him.

The husband said, "What are you talking about? Your life is wonderful."

The wife replied, "I know what you think you know about my life, and I am telling you that you are wrong. I am filled with rage, and the only way that I'm finding I can deal with the rage is by making sure that I put myself first for a change and stop worrying all the time about other people's happiness. I am becoming bitter from all the years of taking care of other people and never feeling like I am making anyone happy. I am sacrificing things that I want to do because in the back of my mind I am thinking this will result in their happiness but when it doesn't, I am left to ask myself what I am doing with my life except wasting my time?"

The husband looked uncomfortable and worried and clueless as all at once and immediately told his wife that she was being over dramatic. He asked her, "Well does this mean will I have to worry about you along with everyone else now?"

And the wife took a deep breath and explained to him one more time that her happiness and well being should be of concern to him, that he should be worrying whether she was happy because she worried about his happiness all the time, and isn't that what married couples do?

She told him, "The fact that you do not worry about my happiness makes me crazy. It makes me feel like I have no one in this world looking out for me and if that is the case, as it has been proven time and time again, then I'm going to take matters into my own hands and start looking out for myself."

The husband looked everywhere except at his wife and said, "Where is this coming from? I thought we were going to focus on the positive?"

The wife replied, "You don't understand. Just because I point out to you something that bothers me doesn't mean that I do not recognize all the wonderful things that I have. One has nothing to do with the other, and I don't want every conversation that I start about me to turn into a conversation about somebody or something else because that's what always happens here."

The husband looked around, and the wife could tell by his eyes that he was shocked and sad and panicked to hear these words come out of his wife. "Can't you just be happy." he pleaded? "I'm happy."

And this is the part of the story where the wife was always losing because she knew in her heart that at best, what we know of each other is what we allow others to see of us, and sometimes, even when show them what's beneath the surface, all they want to see is what they want to see.

The wife finished her diet coke, fished an ice cube out of the glass, and crushed it between her teeth because it felt good to her to crush something.

They paid the bill, walked to the car and began their drive home. The wife leaned her head against the cool glass and looked up at the stars. She felt so small, almost invisible, but she did not tell her husband this because she wasn't up to hearing once again how very lucky she was.