You do all this work, and you get no pats on the back.

 As much as I miss my dad, I remember how I would do things for him the past 4+ years and he would not appreciate it. (That changed the last 6 months of his life.) How many times did I walk out of his house angry, vowing never to go back, vowing to let him sit in his mess, let his bills become unpaid, let his fridge be empty, let his day be lonely…

I could never get past wanting to do that when he pushed me to my limit. And I made sure to tell him that.

The Tornado thinks I was a baby, screaming for help, and she and my brother would come running to rescue me. That was not the picture at all, but it was what she painted (and continues to believe).

Why do my friends (and haha there I was eliminating them from my life in earlier posts — it’s just so complex) act more like a family than my own family? Had my brother not called me two weeks ago and said these words:

I simply cannot put more on your shoulders. You carried the biggest burden of all. You got the brunt of the care while dad was alive. You got the brunt of this after he died. We put it all on YOU. I just can't do that to you anymore. I can't put anything more on you. 

Who of my friends out there understands what I really went through? Who? Because if you DO, then you are truly a friend of mine and you truly know my situation and you care about me and you have compassion for me and you KNOW all the complexities of love, fear, effort, self-loathing, self-sacrifice, and fucking HARD WORK it was to care for a man who had Alzheimer’s, dementia... a man who loved me deeply and who took all of his hurt, fear, and anger out of me, a man who appreciated me so much in his good days and a man who knew exactly where my vulnerabilities lie. 

What. The. Fuck.

This shit is all too hard some days. 

Anyway, had my brother NOT said those words, I don't know that I would be able to keep him in my life too. VALIDATION.

V A L I D A T I O N 


What the fuck. The Tornado can’t, won’t, will never give validation. 

Why?

I cannot go to the hardware store for bread. I learned that one in Al-Anon. My girlfriend Kathy reminded me of this yesterday.  





That text was perfect. And true. Somewhat sad, but also a reminder of the gifts that God has given me. 


Speaking of gifts, there was a really nice guy I was chatting with about a year or more again and he just stopped talking to me. Out of the blue, he replies to an old old email, stating he found it in his junk/spam folder. Um... google empties out/deletes spam after 60 days, so it could not have been in his spam folder. I was going to reply, then paused as I thought about it. He’s lying. Immediately, I went to, "Well maybe he didn't mean spam. Maybe it was just missed or something and he found it or never saw it and used spam as a way to explain.” And now I’m like no. I re-read the kindest, sweetest email I wrote to a man in ages, and I thought, this guy does not really deserve a response from me. In the least. I poured my heart out to him, was honest about where I was at, and I never received a response. Had he said he was so busy, or that he was pursuing another direction at the time and that yes it didn't work out and it seems like I'm second choice but ... blah blah blah... rather appreciate honesty and an apology than this. 

Look, I feel as if I am a kind, sweet, giving soul. And I have been pushed, taken advantage of, and given people second chances too many times. I'm nearing 60. Some things I just don't need in my life. A lot of the dreams I had are gone and will never come to fruition — time has passed. Opportunities gone. (Raising a family with a husband for instance.) I guess I need to look ahead to see what I can still accomplish in this life before I move on to the next one, and I need to be realistic about those things.

So this is life. You live it. Much of what you do goes unrecognized because Hey that’s life. 



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