after years of being a guardian, you lose yourself. Frank, you're obviously lost. you have that incredible pain inside, and you can't quite put your finger on it, can't figure out how to be whole again.
I had to think about this again. 'being a guardian'. In my history that's what I've done for MANY people, not just my wife. I could make a list of those I helped through hard times, through their careers, through other difficult things. I guess I never thought about it that way but yes, I have been a 'guardian' for YEARS and not just for my Wife.
Even when my life is at it's darkest I still somehow keep doing it. And it was the 'being a guardian' that caused my downfall years ago when I sold my company and the new management made it unbearable for my staff of young, dedicated people to stay. That was the proverbial 'straw that broke the camels back' for me. I couldn't take the shame and guilt that I had let them down.
And since then I've been struggling to re-join the world again. I was talking to my partner in our telecom business which has been hurting for the past year and told him that I 'really needed a win' after that long period of feeling lost. I told him I'm really not functional right now because we're losing and I'm just beat.
I need to change this outlook. The exercise, the change in my diet and the supplements seem to be helping. The anxiety periods are lasting for shorter periods.
Still, I need to forgive myself for not always being the perfect 'guardian'.
I don't think I posted this story but it seems relevant now:
I lived with my Grandparents from about 10-17 years old. My Grandmother was crippled due to a stroke and she was thin, frail, walked with a cane and was paralyzed on her right side. She was hard to understand when she spoke and was frustrated and angry. She took it out on me all the time, and I was her 'caretaker' when I was home. I wasn't allowed to have friends over, or do anything after school or on weekends. Just be there.
When I was 17 and a senior in high school my dad got married again so I went to live with him and his new wife. What a change, to not have to be 'locked up' all the time. He didn't really want me around so I spent a lot of time with friends and stuff.
I rarely visited my grandmother.
That fall I went to college (a whole 'nother amazing story there, I never thought I would go) and when I came back from Xmas break 2 days before xmas, my grandmother died. I was staying at my dad's and the way I found out was his sister called looking for him, and he wasn't there of course. She asked me if I knew where he was and of course I had no idea, maybe he was at work?
She says "don't you know what happened?" and I said "no" so she says quite matter of factly "Oh, your grandmother died last night".
That was it. She said she had to go to try to find him since he was working on the funeral arrangements.
A couple days later I went to the funeral. Here I was at 18, never been to a funeral and hadn't seen her in months. I went to the casket and just lost it, sobbing and shaking. standing there by myself. after a couple minutes one of my UNCLES comes up to me and says "It's ok, I know ow you feel" and helps me walk away. I remember seeing my Dad there.
I remember someone saying "She's the only mother he ever knew".
That wasn't what I was thinking though. I was thinking that here I was, the smartest person in my family, the one with the most capability to be a 'guardian' of her and who was her caretaker for so many years, the one with all the 'powers' for healing and making her laugh and being her whipping boy so she could get out her frustrations. Here I was with all this, and I wasn't there to save her when she needed me.
If only I had been her, I would have known what to do. Instead she was stuck with inferior people around her who were ignorant.
$10,000 worth of counseling later and I'm still a mess because I've found myself repeating the 'guardian' role, I guess so I can make up for my biggest 'mistake' in my life.
After the crash in my life 10 years ago when I sold the company I went in the opposite direction - little contact with very many people, never volunteering to help anyone, medicating so I don't have to feel the hurt,. the guilt of letting people down who I was 'guarding'.
I think that's where I've been stuck. Fear of making a mistake again. Even on this board I'm very careful when I post. and when someone is adamant that I'm 'wrong' it really bothers me because I'm afraid I may have hurt someone.
Thanks Ford, I think you opened a door for me. It isn't that I didn't 'know' these things about myself, it's that I don't know what to DO about them.
