25yearsmlc

[25yearsmlc]

Breakdown

thanks...I agree with your take on the forgiveness article but I also think she has some points. Seems to me it does apply more to those who reconcile. Otherwise, for ME, letting go and forgiving is freedom for ME...so an apology is not crucial. Plus they are RARE~

but yes, of course, to reconcile you'd need change, reassurances, and more. An apology is part of all that.

My T recently said "There are 2 types of apologies. The 'sack cloth and ashes" apology, in which the person REALLY sees how they were wrong, where they erred and how it hurt the injured party. They are sorry."

"The other type is the 'Impact apology' wherein the offending party apologizes... for the other party being hurt...not b/c THEY hurt them, not b/c THEY ERRED or wronged the injured party,

but b/c the other party was impacted. Like too bad it "happened"....

the 2nd type of "impact apology" is not so useful in life.

But I "get" that distinction. Makes sense for me.

[25yearsmlc]

That is curious, that you only feel this way in regards to your Son, and not your Daughters.

The curious side would be, how much do you see your Husband in your Son ???

I'm glad that you are willing to step aside, and not let this drain you.

Don't want to see you posting as a WAS ya know...

Thanks for the Blue, it helps....


Good question. I pondered it after I wrote that.

The thing is that it's Son who is raising the issues to me so much. He has not lived here for 8 years so maybe he's just not used to seeing his dad this way, or in a new way,

OR maybe he now feels old enough to comment. (I think that's it).

So it's him that is "in my face" about it all. The girls seem to have accepted things more (maybe?) and have lived with this as it is, for longer.

Or maybe they don't want to confront/resolve conflict or don't believe it can be done.

but son on almost a daily basis, raises his concerns to me so that I feel moved to DO something. I'm not complaining, ...well maybe I am.

I think it's healthy for him to raise the issues but it affects our R b/c he is raising the issues, you know? I'm not mad at him, btw. I'm just interacting with him more about 'real stuff" than before. And more than with the girls.

he's pushing the issues and wants to FIX things...in that sense he may be like his dad. But I do not NOW see him as very much like his dad.

Does that answer it?

And btw, the meeting is in 2 hours. NOW d15 does NOT want to go, (SIGH) so we'll see what happens.

I'll bring a book and let them all hash out whatever it is...

[25yearsmlc]

how do I begin a new thread? (I forgot)

[25yearsmlc]

Here's another piece on Forgiveness....reminded me of my dad when he was on his death bed. So filled with regrets...

Food for thought. Input welcome...

Forgiveness

is a heartache and difficult to achieve because strangely, the act of forgiveness not only refuses to eliminate the original wound, but actually draws us closer to its source. To approach forgiveness is to close in on the nature of the hurt itself, the only remedy being, as we approach its raw center, to re-imagine our relation to it.

It may be that the part of us that was struck and hurt can never forgive, and that forgiveness itself never arises from the part of us that was actually wounded. The wounded self may be the part of us incapable of forgetting, and perhaps, not meant to forget…

Stranger still, it is that wounded, branded, un-forgetting part of us that eventually makes forgiveness an act of compassion rather than one of simple forgetting…

…at the end of life, the wish to be forgiven is ultimately the chief desire of almost every human being.

In refusing to wait; in extending forgiveness to others now, we begin the long journey of becoming the person who will be large enough, able enough and generous enough to receive, at our very end, that necessary absolution ourselves.

- David Whyte

Excerpt from Readers' Circle Essay, "Forgiveness"

[Mach1]

So, If I read that correctly..

Your Son's last memories of living "at home" , included what normal MLC B.C. behavior ??

8 years would put him moving out right before the bomb.

So what his perception of home life is, has remained the same (although he knew what was happening) , and your view ( and daughters) of that daily living, has changed. Only in a different direction.

You aren't the same Mom that he last lived with, and neither is your husband, the same Dad that he last lived with.

So maybe he expected things to be like they were back in '05? '06 ????



Sound about right ?

[25yearsmlc]

Yes Mach I think that is a part of it.

He knew what was going on at the time and was furious at h. And he said "dad, you're being selfish." To no avail.

In Son's eyes, his father is simply MORE gone now than he was when son lived here b/c of h's long hours back then. (FTR when we married, h was not an MD student. He was a veterinary student and I married him HAPPY that he was not a physician b/c "they don't have time for their families". H went to med school later, and I did say yes. In fairness, neither of us knew what we were getting into OR that our son would come along 8 weeks before h began med school and I was in my last year of law school. ALL of which is to say, things happened that changed our plans...like LIFE.)

Now h is gone days at a time and though there are financial arguments in favor of h's choice, they're getting a little harder to defend.

(To keep it simple let me say that at first, taking a pay cut in exchange for a pension made sense. I'm NOT referring to the military, but to his taking the fed job. But after 2-3 years the paycut would have made up for the pension b/c YES the paycut was a 6 figure pay cut. And meanwhile we suffer AND then he gets deployed and that cuts his fed pay MORE?? Geez, ream us some more please... AND the time from home -weekdays there and weekends here-was supposed to be 6 months. Now it's nearly 3 YEARS...wtf?

So to son, and to ME now, it's just more of the same.)

The financial arguments are weaker but I can see h's reasoning of having invested so much time/money into a pension he won't want to give it up now. AND HE IS applying for one here in town, and this city is huge compared to where he is now. Frankly I can't understand why there have not been more openings for him here.

I think h wants to be home, but not nearly as much as he needs to want it...his sense of urgency is recent b/c he gets that I'm NOT happy with this. On low reserves.


The kids picked up on it earlier in part b/c they never knew the math of it but they get the gist. To them He's gone for some money reason and that's the same argument he used for Alaska,

although I know he had an obsession based more on lifestyle and the "last frontier" and my DB coach said h's vision of Alaska was of immortality. Kinda true. H was going to turn 50 then, and when he spoke of it there, versus when I did, there were very different versions.

He thought it was so "brisk" (not deathly cold) and "such starry nights" (not dark for 20 hours a day)....he LOVED it and none of us did but him. We tried and we did "when in Rome" and I'll always be a little proud of having made it through there, for 4 winters...and GAL like a maniac.

But frankly, as I look back I realize that the only time I had ever said no to one of h's dreams/tasks, the Alaskan move back, was the one. He never really grasped, or admitted grasping the ENORMOUS impact his choices had on others. He got a "no" and couldn't believe it. H would not drop it or adapt to the fact that his wife/kids did not want to live there. It devastated me to realize my/our wants were not significant enough to just drop it. To h, he thought I was being irrational. That I had brainwashed the kids (Son said "yeah b/c we never noticed the cold or dark. Mom made us notice it.")

The kids seem to really resent that he doesn't acknowledge the impact. I don't blame them. I think he'll need to do a sack/ashes apology but I cannot make him do it.

The kids and I went to the T yesterday and no one died!

I left after 3 minutes so I can't say what they said b/c I don't know.

But all the kids went and d15 said the T "didn't suck" and the older d said he "moved things along" and son said "he's a good guy, good enough."

They were upbeat and funny and affectionate to me. The older ones said something like "good try Mom. We applaud your motherly concerns" which was teasing and funny but if I read into it, it's a little sad. So I won't read into it.

The only thing the T said while I was there was "your mom is in a tough spot so maybe WE can figure out a way for HER to extricated herself from your R issues with your dad."

He also asked if any of my kids had been to T and my son said he had...(wth?)

All in all, I felt good about it, but a little sad.

But I'll know more about it all after I see T myself. Not that he'll tell me what THEY said but he'll have recommendations for me.

And I do want to just pass this baton off...I feel like I am very affected by h's r's with the kids (which used to be a positive. He'd get down on the floor and do tea parties with d when she was 6 and I found that so boring. But h was a great dad when they were little and he was home...he was nurtured by their love and they thought he was a hoot...so sad to see how they feel now.

There IS still love. I see it in all of them.

But there's an awkardness that comes from chronic type of emotional pain I think...it's fear and resentment and so much unsaid...

[ThisDayForward]

Forgiveness is giving up the hope that the past could have been any different, it's accepting the past for what it was, and using this moment and this time to help yourself move forward.

[25yearsmlc]

hey if I start a new thread, can someone "in the know" hook me up with a thread to this link?

Am I using the right words? Well let me know however you fine computer literate folks say it...and I'll put in a request...

THANKS!

Sincerely,

the "soon I'll be an outsourced/obsolete liberal arts major"....

[keep_going]

25 -

When you start a new one I'll be happy to copy the link to this one there.

[25yearsmlc]

thanks...now I just have to think of my new thread etc.

good talking to you today...you're even stronger than you knew, aren't you?

Hey, it sounds like a small thing to note, but it's not small.

It's H U G E... you are going to make it...

and I cannot wait til we fast forward your life to where I KNOW you will be just around the corner...

with a few more "laps" (hard ones, but the light is at the end of the tunnel!)

and you'll be able to detach, move forward but still be "in the now, and you will be at peace...

I promise!
((( )))