Thursday, November 23, 2006
yesterday after work, i went directly to my parents house. i spent all of today with them, and their friends at thanksgiving. today was typical family holiday fare, but last night was good. i actually had a long, meaningful conversation with my parents for the first time in a long time. i was open, and honest with them. i didn't hold back, and i tried to answer their questions. today when my dad was driving home, he asked me more questions, and i answered them to the best of my ability.
i feel so relieved. especially that me and my dad could talk at all. because it has been difficult between me and him, and it has been almost entirely my fault. my dad has been hands down the most influential person in my life. he would be more influential if he could be. it has been a painful thing to break away from him and find myself, instead of being a second him. because he is a great person. he is a stronger person than i see myself ever being. he knows so much, and want to share it with me, so i can be exactly like him. but i am not, no matter how much we would both like it to be true. we were so close before i hit puberty, that it has been really rough on both of us to grow further and further apart. but i had too. maybe i didn't have to do it in such a cold manner, i didn't have to act as distant and disinterested, but i couldn't see another way that would work. it has been difficult to seperate myself from him, especially since i spent my adolescence convinced that i hated him and didn't want to be anything like him. during my bout of self-exploration, i have found how similar we are. we are not the same. we have very different mindsets, but our core values are the same.
it is very similar to how i attack other people on my blog here. i spent years attacking him, but what i was really doing is attacking some of the things i didn't like about myself, or things i was envious of because i didn't see them in myself. i was more angry because he was ultimately right about so many things, and i didn't want to admit it to myself. he does have flaws. we all have flaws. he is more passive agressive than i am, and that is saying a lot. he is more focused on his way of doing things, whereas i am more flexible. i was more angry at him because i was angry at myself. his shortcomings were never enough for me to actually be angry at him. frustrated maybe, but he never deserved the negative energy i focused on him. he was spared a lot of it because we didn't see very much of eachother at all, but he still didn't deserve it. i know what i thought, and he didn't deserve it.
i have not been fair to my parents. i have not been fair at all. i was not the person i wanted them to see me as. i was disappointed in myself, and i didn't want them to feel disappointed in me as well. i am sure they would rather have seen me more often, or at all, since honestly there have been long stretches of time i have almost completely broken off contact with them. i very much regret that i did this, but at the time i didn't have a choice. i love my parents. i love my parents, but i know my parents. i justified it as 'setting up boundaries'. it really wasn't that. it was selfish. it was my weakness. i couldn't face them because i didn't want them to know who i was. it was absolutely an impetus for change. they are my standard for human decency. they are the moral standard i aspire too. they are my value system. i am realizing now, that they are one of the main reasons i had to change. i couldn't even face them, and it made me feel like a horrible person.
i want my parents and my sister to be a part of my life. i have been on my own, and seen how people are. my family are all good people. i love them, and they love me despite myself. they loved me throughout it all, even when they knew i was lying to them.
i have not been fair to them. it is one of the things i am least proud of, the way i have treated them since i left for college. but sitting down with them and talking to them, and showing them i am happy, and healthy, and that i have realized how important it is to be a good person like they always wanted me to be was huge for me. it will take time, especially with my dad, for him to be open around me, since he is not an open person in the first place. but he still loves me and wants to see me successful and happy. there are still some wounds there, but nothing beyond reconcile. last night was a start. it didn't fix things, but it was a huge step in the right direction.
this blog hasn't been publishing and i think i know why. i left my train of thought unfinished. i went through all the uncomfortable setup, without continuing into what i actually meant to say. my dad and i still enjoy eachother's company, very much. definitely more than most of our extended family, and we like our family. we don't like to show our inner turmoil, that is a big part of our passive agressive, distant ways. it isn't always a defect. it has allowed both of us to stay seperated from the drama by internalizing it. when we are together, we have always been completely cool. we don't yell, or argue, or even really disagree when we are around eachother. when we are together, things are fine. but we can communicate without words. we can look at eachother, and say all the unspoken words in a glance. because i know he does the same things i do in my head. i have never talked to him about it, but i know he goes through potential conversations in his head, conversations he would like to have, and practice run conversations to be prepared for things he doesn't want to talk about, but is afraid he is going to have too. we look at eachother sometimes, especially after not seeing eachother for a while, and we can just feel the thoughts behind eachothers eyes. i can see his face working, and in particular his eyes moving, and we both just know what isn't being said. and then it is over. neither of us likes confrontation, and especially not with eachother because we both tend to have trouble articulating when we are agitated. we would both just rather avoid it, if at all possible. and both of us do. i am just realizing this, all right now as i am writing. if we can avoid the uncomfortableness, we will. so somehow, we are cool. we will always have other people around us who can't handle things as well as we can. whatever thoughts and feelings we have can be put aside for the sake of other people around us. we both care enough about the people we love, we care enough about eachother to put aside a lot of the things that bother us. we both see ourselves as stable forces when we are with our loved ones. it is fun being around me and my family. we get along when we are all together. we get along with anyone else we are around, and a lot of it is because we are able to sacrifice for eachother.
tonight, i had a great time with my dad. last night he let me say a lot of things i needed to say. the conversation was mostly with my mom, because she is a lot better at acting involved while letting someone else speak, whereas my dad would rather just listen. but tonight, we had fun together in a situation we didn't really want to be in. we played board games with 12 other people at a thanksgiving party after dinner because we couldn't find the broncos-chiefs game on tv. we had both been looking forward to just relaxing after dinner, and vegging out with some good pigskin action. instead we ended up playing boardgames, which is much more effort than either of us wanted to exert. we ended up on the same team, and we had fun. in pictionary, we almost staged an impossible comeback together. he was drawing, and i guessed 'laryngitis' from his chicken scratches on a pivotal all-play, that was how in the zone we were. then, on the second game, we just dominated. we were the board game all-stars tonight, because we were on the same team. we will always have eachother's backs, but we will always try to have ourselves handled in the first place so it isn't necessary.
that is what i want with my dad. now that i have grown up and matured into someone of my own, instead of someone else to take care of, i want him to recognize that i am no longer a liability. that is one thing i know he and my mom appreciate. through all of my crap, all of the stuff that has happened, i have been supporting myself. they joke sometimes about how easy it was to put my sister through college because i have been completely off their dime. i think in a lot of ways he is still proud of me, and i think my finances are something he actually respects about me. in the end, he is a solitary person, just like me. he will respect someone who takes care of himself. it is something i have learned from him, and one of the most important things in my life. it is something i have been trying to prove to him all of my life, that i can do it with my own strength. it is important to me that he sees this in me, because it is perhaps the most important thing he has taught me. the only reason i can can be the independant, unique, and successful person i am is because of what he has taught me, and will continue to teach me.
i feel so relieved. especially that me and my dad could talk at all. because it has been difficult between me and him, and it has been almost entirely my fault. my dad has been hands down the most influential person in my life. he would be more influential if he could be. it has been a painful thing to break away from him and find myself, instead of being a second him. because he is a great person. he is a stronger person than i see myself ever being. he knows so much, and want to share it with me, so i can be exactly like him. but i am not, no matter how much we would both like it to be true. we were so close before i hit puberty, that it has been really rough on both of us to grow further and further apart. but i had too. maybe i didn't have to do it in such a cold manner, i didn't have to act as distant and disinterested, but i couldn't see another way that would work. it has been difficult to seperate myself from him, especially since i spent my adolescence convinced that i hated him and didn't want to be anything like him. during my bout of self-exploration, i have found how similar we are. we are not the same. we have very different mindsets, but our core values are the same.
it is very similar to how i attack other people on my blog here. i spent years attacking him, but what i was really doing is attacking some of the things i didn't like about myself, or things i was envious of because i didn't see them in myself. i was more angry because he was ultimately right about so many things, and i didn't want to admit it to myself. he does have flaws. we all have flaws. he is more passive agressive than i am, and that is saying a lot. he is more focused on his way of doing things, whereas i am more flexible. i was more angry at him because i was angry at myself. his shortcomings were never enough for me to actually be angry at him. frustrated maybe, but he never deserved the negative energy i focused on him. he was spared a lot of it because we didn't see very much of eachother at all, but he still didn't deserve it. i know what i thought, and he didn't deserve it.
i have not been fair to my parents. i have not been fair at all. i was not the person i wanted them to see me as. i was disappointed in myself, and i didn't want them to feel disappointed in me as well. i am sure they would rather have seen me more often, or at all, since honestly there have been long stretches of time i have almost completely broken off contact with them. i very much regret that i did this, but at the time i didn't have a choice. i love my parents. i love my parents, but i know my parents. i justified it as 'setting up boundaries'. it really wasn't that. it was selfish. it was my weakness. i couldn't face them because i didn't want them to know who i was. it was absolutely an impetus for change. they are my standard for human decency. they are the moral standard i aspire too. they are my value system. i am realizing now, that they are one of the main reasons i had to change. i couldn't even face them, and it made me feel like a horrible person.
i want my parents and my sister to be a part of my life. i have been on my own, and seen how people are. my family are all good people. i love them, and they love me despite myself. they loved me throughout it all, even when they knew i was lying to them.
i have not been fair to them. it is one of the things i am least proud of, the way i have treated them since i left for college. but sitting down with them and talking to them, and showing them i am happy, and healthy, and that i have realized how important it is to be a good person like they always wanted me to be was huge for me. it will take time, especially with my dad, for him to be open around me, since he is not an open person in the first place. but he still loves me and wants to see me successful and happy. there are still some wounds there, but nothing beyond reconcile. last night was a start. it didn't fix things, but it was a huge step in the right direction.
this blog hasn't been publishing and i think i know why. i left my train of thought unfinished. i went through all the uncomfortable setup, without continuing into what i actually meant to say. my dad and i still enjoy eachother's company, very much. definitely more than most of our extended family, and we like our family. we don't like to show our inner turmoil, that is a big part of our passive agressive, distant ways. it isn't always a defect. it has allowed both of us to stay seperated from the drama by internalizing it. when we are together, we have always been completely cool. we don't yell, or argue, or even really disagree when we are around eachother. when we are together, things are fine. but we can communicate without words. we can look at eachother, and say all the unspoken words in a glance. because i know he does the same things i do in my head. i have never talked to him about it, but i know he goes through potential conversations in his head, conversations he would like to have, and practice run conversations to be prepared for things he doesn't want to talk about, but is afraid he is going to have too. we look at eachother sometimes, especially after not seeing eachother for a while, and we can just feel the thoughts behind eachothers eyes. i can see his face working, and in particular his eyes moving, and we both just know what isn't being said. and then it is over. neither of us likes confrontation, and especially not with eachother because we both tend to have trouble articulating when we are agitated. we would both just rather avoid it, if at all possible. and both of us do. i am just realizing this, all right now as i am writing. if we can avoid the uncomfortableness, we will. so somehow, we are cool. we will always have other people around us who can't handle things as well as we can. whatever thoughts and feelings we have can be put aside for the sake of other people around us. we both care enough about the people we love, we care enough about eachother to put aside a lot of the things that bother us. we both see ourselves as stable forces when we are with our loved ones. it is fun being around me and my family. we get along when we are all together. we get along with anyone else we are around, and a lot of it is because we are able to sacrifice for eachother.
tonight, i had a great time with my dad. last night he let me say a lot of things i needed to say. the conversation was mostly with my mom, because she is a lot better at acting involved while letting someone else speak, whereas my dad would rather just listen. but tonight, we had fun together in a situation we didn't really want to be in. we played board games with 12 other people at a thanksgiving party after dinner because we couldn't find the broncos-chiefs game on tv. we had both been looking forward to just relaxing after dinner, and vegging out with some good pigskin action. instead we ended up playing boardgames, which is much more effort than either of us wanted to exert. we ended up on the same team, and we had fun. in pictionary, we almost staged an impossible comeback together. he was drawing, and i guessed 'laryngitis' from his chicken scratches on a pivotal all-play, that was how in the zone we were. then, on the second game, we just dominated. we were the board game all-stars tonight, because we were on the same team. we will always have eachother's backs, but we will always try to have ourselves handled in the first place so it isn't necessary.
that is what i want with my dad. now that i have grown up and matured into someone of my own, instead of someone else to take care of, i want him to recognize that i am no longer a liability. that is one thing i know he and my mom appreciate. through all of my crap, all of the stuff that has happened, i have been supporting myself. they joke sometimes about how easy it was to put my sister through college because i have been completely off their dime. i think in a lot of ways he is still proud of me, and i think my finances are something he actually respects about me. in the end, he is a solitary person, just like me. he will respect someone who takes care of himself. it is something i have learned from him, and one of the most important things in my life. it is something i have been trying to prove to him all of my life, that i can do it with my own strength. it is important to me that he sees this in me, because it is perhaps the most important thing he has taught me. the only reason i can can be the independant, unique, and successful person i am is because of what he has taught me, and will continue to teach me.
