Depression has been a part of my life for most of my adulthood. Looking back, it probably hung around in my childhood too, but I didn't recognize it for what it was. Mostly, it's situational, but then there's the Seasonal Affective Disorder that shows up every fall, sometimes seemingly out of the blue, leaving me wondering what in the world just happened. I'm learning to manage it better every year, though that is hard. Who wants to prepare for something like that? The irony is that, the more accepting I am of this unwelcome guest, the better things seem to go.
My first and scariest major depressive episode happened my junior year in high school. I ended an 18-month relationship and did some pretty stupid, drama-filled, ridiculous and hurtful things in the process. My world came crashing down, as my entire high school identity had been tied up in being half of that couple. Living in a small town, we were a fixture at the high school. And now we were fodder for gossip. We had couple friends who were now awkward to be around. I had no one to spend my weekends with as my boyfriend had been my best friend. I still miss that part of our relationship just a little bit, more than 20 years later.
I also had lost my grandmother, and then blew my knee to smithereens, requiring surgery, excruciatingly painful physical therapy, and a brace/crutches for months. Those events led to missing 2 full weeks of school, just as the semester was ending. I was a good student and a perfectionist. That only added to my stressD.
As spring came, I spiraled further and further into the pit. Eventually I decided that the only way out of my pain was to take my own life. And I hatched a plan. I had to wait until after a job interview Looking back that seems ludicrous.....Why wait until after the interview since I clearly wouldn't be around to do the job??? I knew my family would be out for the evening and I could simply drift away. It seemed so perfect.
Somehow, my ex knew what I was planning. And he KNEW that it was urgent. He told a school counselor who intervened. He saved my life, even though I had been terribly hurtful to him. I think other people knew I was struggling, but he was the one who knew just how much. See, that's the thing about love. You can not like someone but still love them very much and I'm pretty sure that's how my ex felt about me. Sure, he was mad and he had every right to be, but he still cared deeply for me. So, when he knew I was in trouble, he was there.
It took several long months of counseling for me to move away from that dark place. It was a lot of hard work, learning to be on my own again and figuring out how to be my own person. It was good, necessary work, and I'm so very glad I did it, but it was one of the hardest things I ever had to do. And I vowed I would NEVER EVER allow myself to get that deep again. I'm proud to say that I never have. But that doesn't make winters any easier for me.
Thursday, November 23, 2017
Tuesday, February 3, 2015
And this is my brain.....
On winter....
Remember that old commercial with the fried egg? This is your brain on drugs?
Well, this is my brain, on winter.
I've made no secret that I live with SAD (seasonal affective disorder), which is not surprising considering my history of depression. While others are going on about the beautiful colors of fall and how they can't wait to wear hoodies and drink cocoa under a cozy blanket on the couch, I find myself on my bathroom floor, crying, rocking back and forth, saying "no, no NO" over and over again.
True story.
And then I went to my acupuncturist for my season's supply of a supplement called "Shine" and set about moving forward.
I've learned the hard way that I simply can't allow the darkness to get too close for too long. Fall is the time when it comes knocking, and I can actually feel it lurking around the corner, waiting to close in on me. That darkness is tangible to me. I fear it. And yet, I've also come to accept it.
I've tried fighting it. I've tried ignoring it. I've tried to fake it and pretend it's not there. But it is. And I'm coming to understand and accept that this is an immutable part of me, just like my eye or hair color.
With that, comes a bit of freedom. I used to see my depression as a weakness, something to hide, cover up, fight against. But that implies that I should be ashamed of it. And yet, I'm not ashamed of my hair color, my height, or my bra size. This is just as much a part of me as those things are, and, in many ways, more valuable. Maybe it's more akin to my intellect? Something that I was predisposed toward, but can either nurture or stifle?
Clearly, I'm not finding quite the right metaphor.
The upshot is that I'm trying to be more understanding and accepting of this. This time of year is hard for me. I'm not as productive or energetic as I am at other times. Acknowledging and accepting that has lifted a huge weight off my shoulders. I know that, as the weather improves, my productivity and energy levels will increase. And come next fall, they'll drop off again. And that's going to have to be okay.
Remember that old commercial with the fried egg? This is your brain on drugs?
Well, this is my brain, on winter.
I've made no secret that I live with SAD (seasonal affective disorder), which is not surprising considering my history of depression. While others are going on about the beautiful colors of fall and how they can't wait to wear hoodies and drink cocoa under a cozy blanket on the couch, I find myself on my bathroom floor, crying, rocking back and forth, saying "no, no NO" over and over again.
True story.
And then I went to my acupuncturist for my season's supply of a supplement called "Shine" and set about moving forward.
I've learned the hard way that I simply can't allow the darkness to get too close for too long. Fall is the time when it comes knocking, and I can actually feel it lurking around the corner, waiting to close in on me. That darkness is tangible to me. I fear it. And yet, I've also come to accept it.
I've tried fighting it. I've tried ignoring it. I've tried to fake it and pretend it's not there. But it is. And I'm coming to understand and accept that this is an immutable part of me, just like my eye or hair color.
With that, comes a bit of freedom. I used to see my depression as a weakness, something to hide, cover up, fight against. But that implies that I should be ashamed of it. And yet, I'm not ashamed of my hair color, my height, or my bra size. This is just as much a part of me as those things are, and, in many ways, more valuable. Maybe it's more akin to my intellect? Something that I was predisposed toward, but can either nurture or stifle?
Clearly, I'm not finding quite the right metaphor.
The upshot is that I'm trying to be more understanding and accepting of this. This time of year is hard for me. I'm not as productive or energetic as I am at other times. Acknowledging and accepting that has lifted a huge weight off my shoulders. I know that, as the weather improves, my productivity and energy levels will increase. And come next fall, they'll drop off again. And that's going to have to be okay.
Sunday, January 11, 2015
The year of "YES!"
2015, I have decided, will be the year of YES!
YES when it might be easier to say no.
YES when it might be more comfortable to say no.
It's time to say YES to new adventures and experiences.
YES when it might be easier to say no.
YES when it might be more comfortable to say no.
YES when my first reaction is "no."
YES to spontaneous suggestions from friends and loved ones.
YES to all the good things available to me.
YES to the "crazy" ideas that pop into my head (well, probably not all of them).
YES when my kids suggest fun things (or even not-so-fun things from my perspective)
YES to the world around me.
NO, I won't become a doormat or allow the kids to walk all over me, but I want to my interactions with the world to be more positive. "Why not?" instead of the automatic "no." I tend to be practical, so I've always got reasons why I shouldn't do things or why I can't. I want to change that this year.
So my MIL died.....
(Look what I found in my "drafts" folder from MONTHS ago! It feels unfinished, but I have no idea where I was going with it, so I'm publishing it as is).
There's really no good way to title this post, especially since y'all know my relationship with her was rocky at best. If you'll recall, she broke her hip in early 2013, had surgery, had a pacemaker, found cancer, was miraculously "cured" of that cancer (clearly I have my doubts), but the leg break wasn't healing, so she wasn't ambulatory so she'd been in a nursing home/rehab center ever since.
There's really no good way to title this post, especially since y'all know my relationship with her was rocky at best. If you'll recall, she broke her hip in early 2013, had surgery, had a pacemaker, found cancer, was miraculously "cured" of that cancer (clearly I have my doubts), but the leg break wasn't healing, so she wasn't ambulatory so she'd been in a nursing home/rehab center ever since.
All caught up now? Good.
She passed away on July 2. And it really was time. Maybe even past time. I didn't like the woman. There's no secret there, but she was still a human being and compassion says she'd been through too much. In the end, she developed an infection (likely in her mouth as she refused to allow her dentures to be removed for cleaning), and her body simply shut down. FIL knew it was happening, but wasn't with her when she died. He's doing as well as can be expected. I'm sure he misses her, but I'm equally sure he's been saying goodbye for a year and a half.
We went up as quickly as we could arrange. Thankfully, it was summer, so we didn't have to work around all of the school, sports and church activities that are a normal part of life September to May. And then we cleaned.
People, please, for the love of all that is holy, teach your family the importance of weekly cleaning! PLEASE. The toilets were horrific. FIL put those blue tablet things in the tank and probably figured that was good enough. It's not, of course. And I'm sure much of the cleaning simply wasn't on his radar. It wasn't something he did so he didn't really think about it, and then it gets out of hand and he doesn't have the expertise to fix it.
Which is where I came in. I packed some of my favorite cleaning products, plus a giant tub of disinfecting wipes and several pairs of gloves, and then I got to work.....and put my children to work too. They now understand why I insist they clean the bathrooms once a week or so, even if it doesn't look dirty! Under the water line in all 3 toilets was solid brown. Hubby thought it was from the hard water, until I showed him the streaks the cleaner was making in the gunk. To be fair, some of it was hard water, but much of it came off. Some of it probably never will. Oh well. When it comes time to sell the house, Hubby and his brother will just replace the dang things.
Then there was FIL's geriatric toy poodle who's never been properly house-trained. That dog wets on everything! We've known that for a while and have worked with FIL before to get things cleaned but it doesn't do much good with the dog still around (the dog was put to sleep the week after the funeral. He was at least 19). For a number of reasons, including FIL's tendency to hang on to lots and lots and lots of stuff, I'm sure we'll have to replace flooring eventually too because I'm quite certain that the dog lifted his leg on all kinds of corners in that house, and the furniture never got moved to clean underneath.
I have to say, though, that FIL did really well with all of this. He was willing to let some things go into the trash. Other things went in that he'll hopefully never miss. Having become an expert on this behavior from my diligent viewing of "Hoarders," I reminded DH that now was really not the time to push that issue, so we didn't run through the house tossing things hither and yon. FIL allowed DH to throw away all kinds of things from the fridge. "Dad, this mustard expired a year ago. Do you even like mustard? No? Okay then we should toss it." I think FIL has never really processed things in that way. Someone left behind some almond or soy milk and that someone might want it.....probably not since it's long since expired. That gave me quite a bit of hope that we'll be able to help him let go of things over the next few years.
Growth hurts
(Another from the "drafts" folder that never got published. As it's relevant to things I'm pondering for the new year, I'm publishing it too).
As I've said, many times before, I know there are good things coming. Changes are happening in my life and they're going to be AWESOME. I can feel it.
I'm continually frustrated when they don't seem to materialize, however. I want a postcard from the Divine, thankyouverymuch, with clear instructions or a hint as to what I'm supposed to be doing.
Recently, (on the very long and boring drive across southern Idaho, in fact), I had a revelation.
See, my MIL is dying. I'm not sure she realizes it. I don't know that FIL has realized it or accepted it, and I'm quite certain that several of the other siblings will be rather shocked by this. But, thankfully, my DH is accepting it. His mother fell and broke her hip a couple of weeks ago. During her surgery, the surgeon noticed that her bone was particularly crumbly and sent it off for a biopsy. She has bone cancer, in addition to the hip fracture.
The thing is, MIL is not one to work to overcome obstacles. She's a perpetual victim, powerless to make her life any different. The recovery from a broken hip is very painful and difficult. It requires determination that I just don't think she has. She also suffers from high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, and dementia. Her short term memory is pretty well shot. With all of this, I didn't think she'd recover from the broken hip. Now, with the cancer diagnosis, well, I think she'll be gone before Christmas.
This brings up all sorts of practical issues for me, issues that I'll process and write about at a later date. Today is about my revelation.
Dh said something about how his mother had "lived a good life." It was all I could do not to snort my disagreement. Her life does not look "good" to me. In fact, it looks pretty freaking miserable. If that's the definition of a "good" life, then it's not a life I want to live.
And that's the revelation. I've gotten rather spoiled and complacent. (And whiny, if I'm honest). I spend a lot of time doing very little and complaining about not having a fulfilling life.
Hello?!
Really, MIL has had an easy life. Comfortable. Safe. Predictable.
Uninspired, boring, unenlightened as well, in my opinion (hey, it's my blog. I get to be opinionated).
But, here's the thing.
I have a pretty easy, comfortable, safe, and (relatively) predictable life. And I'm allowing myself to become complacent. If I don't change something, I'll wind up sitting in my living room watching the world go by just like MIL.
That's the *last* place I want to end up. So, it's time to make some adventures for myself, embrace the interesting, enlightening, adventurous and fun life I want to lead. The life I want to, someday, be remembered for.
As I've said, many times before, I know there are good things coming. Changes are happening in my life and they're going to be AWESOME. I can feel it.
I'm continually frustrated when they don't seem to materialize, however. I want a postcard from the Divine, thankyouverymuch, with clear instructions or a hint as to what I'm supposed to be doing.
Recently, (on the very long and boring drive across southern Idaho, in fact), I had a revelation.
See, my MIL is dying. I'm not sure she realizes it. I don't know that FIL has realized it or accepted it, and I'm quite certain that several of the other siblings will be rather shocked by this. But, thankfully, my DH is accepting it. His mother fell and broke her hip a couple of weeks ago. During her surgery, the surgeon noticed that her bone was particularly crumbly and sent it off for a biopsy. She has bone cancer, in addition to the hip fracture.
The thing is, MIL is not one to work to overcome obstacles. She's a perpetual victim, powerless to make her life any different. The recovery from a broken hip is very painful and difficult. It requires determination that I just don't think she has. She also suffers from high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, and dementia. Her short term memory is pretty well shot. With all of this, I didn't think she'd recover from the broken hip. Now, with the cancer diagnosis, well, I think she'll be gone before Christmas.
This brings up all sorts of practical issues for me, issues that I'll process and write about at a later date. Today is about my revelation.
Dh said something about how his mother had "lived a good life." It was all I could do not to snort my disagreement. Her life does not look "good" to me. In fact, it looks pretty freaking miserable. If that's the definition of a "good" life, then it's not a life I want to live.
And that's the revelation. I've gotten rather spoiled and complacent. (And whiny, if I'm honest). I spend a lot of time doing very little and complaining about not having a fulfilling life.
Hello?!
Really, MIL has had an easy life. Comfortable. Safe. Predictable.
Uninspired, boring, unenlightened as well, in my opinion (hey, it's my blog. I get to be opinionated).
But, here's the thing.
I have a pretty easy, comfortable, safe, and (relatively) predictable life. And I'm allowing myself to become complacent. If I don't change something, I'll wind up sitting in my living room watching the world go by just like MIL.
That's the *last* place I want to end up. So, it's time to make some adventures for myself, embrace the interesting, enlightening, adventurous and fun life I want to lead. The life I want to, someday, be remembered for.
Wednesday, February 26, 2014
Revelations
Yes, it's been a while.
These things come in spurts and I've been crazy-busy in my real life, so
my blog has suffered. Now I'm back with
some rather interesting developments....at least they're interesting to me and
I thought I'd share.
Last fall and then again this winter, I signed up for a
Process Journaling class through my local community ed program. i thought it would be an art journaling/mixed
media class, which it was, but it was (and is) SO much more than that.
We did a lot of non-dominant work. The instructor would have us write a question
or statement with our dominant hand and then respond with our non-dominant
hand. The idea is that our dominant hand
is the "rational" side, the side that tells us the rules and is a
constant critic. This side is important,
no doubt, but for many of us in Western society (myself included), this side
soon drowns out the quieter voice from our more spiritual side. By writing with our non-dominant hand, it
forces us to pay more attention to what's really going on with our psyche, our
emotions, our soul, our spirit.
I've done a lot of soul-searching, trying to understand
myself and the people closest to me, and I thought I had it all pretty well
figured out. On the one hand, that
meant that delving into that deeper side of myself wasn't scary or
surprising. On the other hand, I learned
much much more than I expected.
In a recent class, I kept coming back to how I have to
finish my chores before I can play. Of
course, there are ALWAYS more chores to do.
There's laundry and dishes and dusting and vacuuming and cleaning the
oven or scrubbing out the fridge or organizing that junk drawer and on and on
and on......I'm sure you can relate to that.
In my world, that means that I NEVER get to play. And if I do play, I have guilt.
I've long blamed that voice, and others relating to my
perfectionism, on my parents. To be
sure, those voices started with them. I
can still hear them admonishing me to "Do it again, and this time, do it
right!" or "If you can't do it right, why do it at all?" But I learned through my journaling that I've
taken those voices and made them my own.
*I'm* now the one saying those things to myself!
At first, it made me sad and angry. But then I realized how freeing that
was. If *I'm* the one behind all of
that, then *I* have the power to change it.
I can rewrite that script!
The second half of that class revolved around
"trust" and "let go."
Those were the messages I kept getting as I worked through it. That's hard for me, as you well know. I'm a road map and reservation kinda gal, so
trusting and letting go when I don't know what's ahead is hard for me. But I'm doing it more and more and the next
revelation was even better!
Sunday, September 1, 2013
Adventures in Mother Land
This summer saw us celebrating my parents' 50th anniversary. Their anniversary was in July, but since Tristan left for Europe that day, they pushed the celebration to early August. There was, of course, lots of drama and phone calls and stress and insanity leading up to the event, but really, I'll skip most of that and give you just the highlights.
As a friend said "Honey, you're saner than you have a right to be...."
I designed the invitations for this shindig. I made 6 different ones, in various styles and colors, including a joking one that said "50 years ago they got hooked," complete with a fish and a fish hook. Sadly, that was NOT the one they chose. There were issues with the colors and why does it look like it's going off the page? And, and, and....but all in all, that part went pretty well.
Except, see, mom wasn't hosting her own party. That would be rude. But a note about not bringing gifts was NOT rude and HAD to be on the invitation, despite my being the "hostess" and not wanting it there. *sigh* I put it in tiny print at the bottom.
Oh, and the wording....."Mom and Dad appreciate your presence and/or your cards and good wishes. They request no other gifts please." So, at least it was coming from THEM, but we had to have the "and/or" because otherwise people might feel obligated or pressured to come and we wouldn't want that.
*sigh*
Then the RSVPs. My sister and I had already agreed to have just ONE of us handle those--me--for fear of miscommunication and lost RSVPs, double RSVPs and the like. It just makes sense, right? Well, mom got all worried that Sis would be upset that I was handling it. Like we never talk to each other.
As it was, I forgot to put a few people on my list and a few RSVP'd to her rather than me!
*sigh*
So, people started calling and emailing to let me know they were coming, or not. And then the out of town relatives decided they were coming.
And, as my sister said, "the crazy train left the station!"
See, it never entered my mother's head that people would actually TRAVEL for this.
I kid you not, she never imagined that my aunts and uncles would want to be there.
She really and truly never thought they'd come.
This led to dozens of phone calls about who was staying where and which hotels to direct them to and on and on and on. And, of course, since *I* was hosting but I don't live there anymore so I didn't have all the information, I was supposed to play this ridiculous telephone game! Thankfully, that took care of itself because my aunts and uncles called my parents.
But, see, my parents live about 10 miles out of a small town. A small university town. Which is 10 miles from another small university town. These two towns are so small that the universities actively work together to coordinate events like Mom's/Dad's weekend, Homecoming, rivalry games, graduation, move-in weekends, and the like because there is not enough hotel space in these two towns to accommodate out of town folks if they didn't.
And this particular weekend was move-in weekend for one of those universities. So all the hotels were full to bursting.
PANIC!!!!!
Or not. LOL!
Sister lives in a bit larger town about 30 miles down the road. So that's where lots of aunts and uncles stayed instead. That's also where we wound up having several meals, but I'm getting ahead of myself.....
Relatives. I love them. I'm thrilled that so many of them were able to come. I saw folks I hadn't seen in over a decade. But now we have to PLAN things. The reception was from 2-5. And then we had to have dinner at 7:00 and a brunch the next day at 10. At first mom wanted all of these at the same place and got rather testy when I suggested perhaps another venue might work.
Eventually, with everyone staying in the farther town, we moved the dinner and brunch to that farther town. My family took a hotel room for Saturday night so that we could give our kids an escape route. They'd been on their best behavior, essentially being shown off like China dolls, all through the reception, and now we're supposed to go to dinner with 25 of my closest relatives. MY relatives. But these are strangers to my children.
So, after dinner was over and we're all chatting away, I handed the keys to Tristan and he took his sisters back to the hotel to swim and watch movies and such. When I had mentioned that they might do this, mom got pretty irritated, but I finally decided that I was just going to ignore her irritation and take care of my family myself.
And now I have to go back to cover a few things......
Candy Boxes. Oh good heavens! Mom found these fun gold boxes so she bought them and put them together to give out as favors. She put Hershey's Nuggets in them, the ones wrapped in gold, of course. And then got a bit irritated because my sister doesn't like chocolate, and chocolate doesn't like me, so neither of us eat it. Okay, whatever, there will be 70 other people at the party to enjoy the goodies.
Mom wanted these tied with teal ribbon to match her wedding color. Okay great.
But this is my mother we're talking about, so it's never that simple.
Sis and I were tying them just like you would a package, with a little twist on the bottom, and we were whipping through them. Mom HATED that. "But there's a twist on the bottom! Let me show you how to do it RIGHT!"
Why does it matter mom?
Because WHAT WILL PEOPLE THINK?
My sister says "They'll think 'Oh how cute! CANDY!' They won't think 'Oh my goodness! I can't eat this yummy chocolate because the ribbon was tied wrong!'"
Gotta love my sister.
And later that evening, sister commented that she was glad we'd left the finished favors at the church because mom would've spent that evening "fixing" them.
The Reception. It went really well, mostly. We ran out of some of the food and Mom wasn't happy that some of the cake wasn't cut, etc, but no one really noticed. And if they did, they were too polite to say so.
Setting up for the reception was quite the exercise in patience. Mom had rounded up lots of photos of them when they were young, wedding pictures, photos of us as children, our weddings, our kids, etc. But then she had a right fit because the photos were all different sizes and such. She had to re-frame Sister's wedding photo because it was matted and therefore larger than mine and what would people think?
Read that again.
This is what goes on in my mother's head.
At first, I thought she was worried that Sister and I would interpret things that way, so I made a joke about knowing she always loved Sister best.
But no.
She was worried that her FRIENDS AND FAMILY would see photos and decide that she favored one or the other of us and/or our children based on the size of the photographs and frames.
Really.
I told her she had a shallow bunch of friends who weren't worth worrying about.
Mom re-framed more pictures.
*sigh*
Good child/bad child. Growing up, I was the "good" one and sister was the "bad" child. Now, my parents never outright said these things, but it was there. I was a rule-follower and Sister would ask Why? and test the limits. I did well in school. It came naturally to me. Sister's brain is wired differently. She learns differently and so she struggled. I would buy the cheap thing, even when I wanted something else, where Sister would buy the one she really WANTED. There are things about her personality that I truly envied and now that we're adults, I emulate her in many ways (while still following the rules, of course! :-D)
This sort of thing is damaging to both children. Those expectations HURT. Sister stayed married to a jerk for an extra year because she didn't want to be "the family F* up" again. I grew into persistent and paralyzing perfectionism. And it could have destroyed our relationship.
But we've worked our tails off, separately and together, to move beyond that. We love and appreciate each other for our differences. She's my biggest fan and cheerleader and the first to tell me I'm being an idiot. She'll often say "If that's what you want to do, go for it! What's holding you back?"
I adore her.
But it appears that Mom is still casting us in those roles. Everywhere we were supposed to be, Mom would chastise Sister about being on time. She would tell her what time to leave and "don't be late," while commenting to me that Sister is *always* late.
Guess who was late?
Yep. Mom (and Dad).
Except for the time she made us an hour early.
*sigh*
As a friend said "Honey, you're saner than you have a right to be...."
I designed the invitations for this shindig. I made 6 different ones, in various styles and colors, including a joking one that said "50 years ago they got hooked," complete with a fish and a fish hook. Sadly, that was NOT the one they chose. There were issues with the colors and why does it look like it's going off the page? And, and, and....but all in all, that part went pretty well.
Except, see, mom wasn't hosting her own party. That would be rude. But a note about not bringing gifts was NOT rude and HAD to be on the invitation, despite my being the "hostess" and not wanting it there. *sigh* I put it in tiny print at the bottom.
Oh, and the wording....."Mom and Dad appreciate your presence and/or your cards and good wishes. They request no other gifts please." So, at least it was coming from THEM, but we had to have the "and/or" because otherwise people might feel obligated or pressured to come and we wouldn't want that.
*sigh*
Then the RSVPs. My sister and I had already agreed to have just ONE of us handle those--me--for fear of miscommunication and lost RSVPs, double RSVPs and the like. It just makes sense, right? Well, mom got all worried that Sis would be upset that I was handling it. Like we never talk to each other.
As it was, I forgot to put a few people on my list and a few RSVP'd to her rather than me!
*sigh*
So, people started calling and emailing to let me know they were coming, or not. And then the out of town relatives decided they were coming.
And, as my sister said, "the crazy train left the station!"
See, it never entered my mother's head that people would actually TRAVEL for this.
I kid you not, she never imagined that my aunts and uncles would want to be there.
She really and truly never thought they'd come.
This led to dozens of phone calls about who was staying where and which hotels to direct them to and on and on and on. And, of course, since *I* was hosting but I don't live there anymore so I didn't have all the information, I was supposed to play this ridiculous telephone game! Thankfully, that took care of itself because my aunts and uncles called my parents.
But, see, my parents live about 10 miles out of a small town. A small university town. Which is 10 miles from another small university town. These two towns are so small that the universities actively work together to coordinate events like Mom's/Dad's weekend, Homecoming, rivalry games, graduation, move-in weekends, and the like because there is not enough hotel space in these two towns to accommodate out of town folks if they didn't.
And this particular weekend was move-in weekend for one of those universities. So all the hotels were full to bursting.
PANIC!!!!!
Or not. LOL!
Sister lives in a bit larger town about 30 miles down the road. So that's where lots of aunts and uncles stayed instead. That's also where we wound up having several meals, but I'm getting ahead of myself.....
Relatives. I love them. I'm thrilled that so many of them were able to come. I saw folks I hadn't seen in over a decade. But now we have to PLAN things. The reception was from 2-5. And then we had to have dinner at 7:00 and a brunch the next day at 10. At first mom wanted all of these at the same place and got rather testy when I suggested perhaps another venue might work.
Eventually, with everyone staying in the farther town, we moved the dinner and brunch to that farther town. My family took a hotel room for Saturday night so that we could give our kids an escape route. They'd been on their best behavior, essentially being shown off like China dolls, all through the reception, and now we're supposed to go to dinner with 25 of my closest relatives. MY relatives. But these are strangers to my children.
So, after dinner was over and we're all chatting away, I handed the keys to Tristan and he took his sisters back to the hotel to swim and watch movies and such. When I had mentioned that they might do this, mom got pretty irritated, but I finally decided that I was just going to ignore her irritation and take care of my family myself.
And now I have to go back to cover a few things......
Candy Boxes. Oh good heavens! Mom found these fun gold boxes so she bought them and put them together to give out as favors. She put Hershey's Nuggets in them, the ones wrapped in gold, of course. And then got a bit irritated because my sister doesn't like chocolate, and chocolate doesn't like me, so neither of us eat it. Okay, whatever, there will be 70 other people at the party to enjoy the goodies.
Mom wanted these tied with teal ribbon to match her wedding color. Okay great.
But this is my mother we're talking about, so it's never that simple.
Sis and I were tying them just like you would a package, with a little twist on the bottom, and we were whipping through them. Mom HATED that. "But there's a twist on the bottom! Let me show you how to do it RIGHT!"
Why does it matter mom?
Because WHAT WILL PEOPLE THINK?
My sister says "They'll think 'Oh how cute! CANDY!' They won't think 'Oh my goodness! I can't eat this yummy chocolate because the ribbon was tied wrong!'"
Gotta love my sister.
And later that evening, sister commented that she was glad we'd left the finished favors at the church because mom would've spent that evening "fixing" them.
The Reception. It went really well, mostly. We ran out of some of the food and Mom wasn't happy that some of the cake wasn't cut, etc, but no one really noticed. And if they did, they were too polite to say so.
Setting up for the reception was quite the exercise in patience. Mom had rounded up lots of photos of them when they were young, wedding pictures, photos of us as children, our weddings, our kids, etc. But then she had a right fit because the photos were all different sizes and such. She had to re-frame Sister's wedding photo because it was matted and therefore larger than mine and what would people think?
Read that again.
This is what goes on in my mother's head.
At first, I thought she was worried that Sister and I would interpret things that way, so I made a joke about knowing she always loved Sister best.
But no.
She was worried that her FRIENDS AND FAMILY would see photos and decide that she favored one or the other of us and/or our children based on the size of the photographs and frames.
Really.
I told her she had a shallow bunch of friends who weren't worth worrying about.
Mom re-framed more pictures.
*sigh*
Good child/bad child. Growing up, I was the "good" one and sister was the "bad" child. Now, my parents never outright said these things, but it was there. I was a rule-follower and Sister would ask Why? and test the limits. I did well in school. It came naturally to me. Sister's brain is wired differently. She learns differently and so she struggled. I would buy the cheap thing, even when I wanted something else, where Sister would buy the one she really WANTED. There are things about her personality that I truly envied and now that we're adults, I emulate her in many ways (while still following the rules, of course! :-D)
This sort of thing is damaging to both children. Those expectations HURT. Sister stayed married to a jerk for an extra year because she didn't want to be "the family F* up" again. I grew into persistent and paralyzing perfectionism. And it could have destroyed our relationship.
But we've worked our tails off, separately and together, to move beyond that. We love and appreciate each other for our differences. She's my biggest fan and cheerleader and the first to tell me I'm being an idiot. She'll often say "If that's what you want to do, go for it! What's holding you back?"
I adore her.
But it appears that Mom is still casting us in those roles. Everywhere we were supposed to be, Mom would chastise Sister about being on time. She would tell her what time to leave and "don't be late," while commenting to me that Sister is *always* late.
Guess who was late?
Yep. Mom (and Dad).
Except for the time she made us an hour early.
*sigh*
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