Dealing with the past

First, thank you Roz and Willie for your kind comments.  Happy New Year!

I have been thinking about this Christmas quite a lot in the past couple of weeks and I have come to some realizations.  First and perhaps most importantly, I don't think I have ever blamed my parents for anything and I don't really feel the need to forgive them.  I'm not sure why other than perhaps I have had zero expectations of them from the beginning and when you have low expectations, it's pretty hard to be disappointed.  Funnily enough, I think that's one of the things that always bugged my mother:  that I had found a way not to need her.  I always felt she wanted me to need her so that she had some control over me.  So, I figured out a way not to need her and never put that weapon into her hands.

I do feel that they did the best that they could.  I do see a legacy of how I was treated, but I can choose not to be a victim.  I have always had good friends, I have accomplished a lot in my life and I really don't feel like I have any room to complain.  I am firmly of the opinion that nobody gets through life without scars of some kind from life.  My youngest brother said we all got through the best that we could and that's the truth.  It's just a part of life that good and bad things happen. 

I said in my last post that I had created an imaginary daddy that still came to help me.  As an adult, I look back at that and realize that was my coping mechanism.  Even though imaginary, he was pretty good to me.  LOLOLOL  I parented myself through him.  Weird, but true.

I am reminded of a couple of things that I have heard.  One is by a guy that had some rare disease and he realized that it was really hard to find a doctor that could treat what he had.  He eventually found someone and because of that experience, he set up an on line physician search that helped people find the very best doctors to treat whatever disease they had. When he was asked if he ever asked himself "Why Me?" that this disease had happened to him and he said, "Why would I?  I never asked why me when good things happened to me".  I think that's right, life just comes:  good and bad.  The second thing I think about is Dean Koontz.  His books are favorites of mine and he got a special place in my heart when I wrote asking for a book to auction off for a non-profit I worked for and he sent a personal note along with the book apologizing for its late arrival.  If I remember correctly, it even came over night delivery.  He grew up with an alcoholic, schizophrenic father, who terrorized him and his mother.  He said about it that when he was a child he was a victim and now that he is an adult he chooses not to be a victim.

This past Christmas was eye opening and I guess although I am sad that my brothers went through the same things as I did, I am glad that we all now know that we weren't alone in how we were treated.  It is good to know that I was wanted at least before birth and that they were trying for a girl.  I also think I have nothing to be ashamed of as far as how I dealt with my upbringing since I was a child and just doing what I had to do to survive.  My parents did the best that they could as I like to believe most people in the world do.  We are all just doing the best that we can with who and what we are and all the baggage we bring along.

I am embracing 2018 and thinking a lot about who I want to be.  I want to be proactive not reactive and I get to choose and that feels pretty good!

Happy New Year, indeed!