Family

[Davyc]

Some people have wonderful families, some do not. Some people had a wonderful childhood, some did not. Some people still have family, some do not.

Families are both strange, frustrating, warm, cold, wonderful, horrible, loving and compassionate - it is said that we can choose our friends, but not our family.

My point? How do you view your family?

I have no family left, apart from two cousins who live in Wales and ten cousins who I have had no contact with, ever, in Australia - the latter I have no idea whether they are still alive or where they may be now. I have a sibling, but she has been estranged from the family for more than thirty years and I have no idea if she is still alive. I remember the priest visiting my mum (Roman Catholic) after she had been in hospital. He asked mum if I was an only child. Mum didn't respond. He looked at me and with questioning eyes and shrugged as if prompting me for an answer. I said a sister. He turned back to mum and said "you never mentioned you had a daughter", to which mum shuffled herself to edge of her seat and said, with venom in her voice, "She's not my daughter!" The priest looked puzzled and said "whose daughter is she then" and mum edged further forward and looked the priest straight in the eyes and said "The Devil's Daughter". You can imagine the silence that followed. I mention this, to give some perspective to my immediate family.

I had a brother, but he died when he was seven and I was only two and a half at the time. I can only remember one thing about my brother, he was talking to mum about school and mum turned to me and said "not be long before you go to school". I must have looked horrified at the prospect, but my brother put his arm around me and said, "Don't worry, I'll look after you". He never got the chance. I found a little treasure trove of my brother's school books and cub scout paraphernalia that my mum had kept, and it gave me a glimpse as to the kind of person he was - I still have those items and treasure them to this day.

I never married. I was in love with my childhood sweetheart at the age of 10, but she was compelled to move to a different part of the country with her family. I feel that we would have married and started a family of our own, but it was never meant to be. I then met a woman online and she lived only a short train trip from me and invited me to come stay with her one bank holiday weekend. I was quite excited to think that this could be the start of something, but when I arrived at her place she introduced me to her family 'and' her husband; talk about having the wind taken out of your sails lol. The next I met, we spent two years together but one night she said "I have something to tell you and you won't like it". My first thoughts ran to the prospect of her being pregnant, but no. I pressed her to tell me what she had to say as she squirmed about, not sure how to say what she had to say. Eventually with me pressing her she blurted out "I'm a lesbian" - I rolled up laughing, she said "Are you upset", to which I responded "Do I look like I am?" still laughing. Of course when I calmed my laughter I was upset, but you have to let people sit in the driver's seat of their own lives. I never met anyone after that - a few casual relationships that never amounted to anything.

I spent the last 15 years of my mother and father's lives caring for them. Five years for when father was alive - he died aged 82, and ten years looking after and caring for mum until she passed away at the age of 89, that was nine years ago. It was both a privilege and frustrating, watching someone you love deteriorate over a long period of time and knowing that there is nothing you can do to bring back the spark is not easy to take. I'm the last man standing, as they say. I live alone in a retirement complex, have made some lovely friends here and have taken on a caring role for some of them who are in their 90's.

My own life was a mixture of good times and bad. I played in a band (rock band, I played guitar) for 15 years and had a wonderful time. I ran my own business for 20 years before retiring last year - I am officially an O.A.P lol. I appreciate my mother and father more now, more than I did in my early years and I miss them greatly, but we will be together again when it's my turn to throw off this mortal coil.

I did some digging into my family tree - I only got so far before hitting brick walls and websites demanding substantial amounts of money for access. I found out that my distant relative was William Wallace (from the movie Braveheart) and that my family were border reivers. I had no idea what border reivers were until I looked it up and found out they were cattle thieves who came over the borders of Scotland to steal cattle and take them back for their families to feast upon. I wasn't sure that was a good find lol. There some other surprises that jumped out with famous footballers being there in the family tree - this was mostly from my father's side. My mother's side was complicated by her mother being a migrant from the French quarter of Canada with a maiden name that was taken from her adopted family, so her true maiden name remains a mystery.

I miss my family and find that I wish I had valued them more when I was younger and carefree (read reckless lol); hindsight is wonderful teacher as well as a haunting nemesis of guilt that prods me every now and then that I could have done better. But my life was what it was and I knew no different back then. I hope I haven't bored you, lol.

Every family is a precious gift, but every family is different with the good mixed in with the bad and the ugly. I hope you all have wonderful families and cherish them always - even amidst the arguments and fallouts. How do you view your family?

 

[Luce NDs]

Respect is a grand gift ...

Everyone has a family that has good, bad, ugly and beautiful roots ... but alas ... much is among the unknown ... and yet we declare we know all when we don't know much.

Not knowing much is a grand drag ... thus some of us are gifted with curiosity and questions that others prefer to avoid ...

Knowledge seems to infer a sense of responsibility ... isn't that the craps?

I like the grand old Hebrew expression god of the unknown ... a vast topic for interchange and discourse! Something more demanding respect ...

How many have respect for what they don't know? So it leaves us ... (or so it ghost)!

 

[BetteTheRed]

I have an uneven relationship with my family. My parents are both gone, and I looked after both of them in their later years, my Dad from a distance because my Mom, substantially younger, did much of the day to day care, my Mom by moving in with her after he died. I have two siblings, a middle sister from whom I am quite distant (we never got on all that well, and she left home at 17), and a baby sister, with whom I get along well. (Generally; we went to England together in 2019, and things were a bit strained by the end; put three middle-aged siblings/cousins in a narrowboat for 11 days, and she must have "fixed" my knitting twice a day for the entire two weeks...)

I've been married once. Divorced after 13 years, and he died a few years ago of cancer. I had a "friend with benefits", whom I "dated" for 24.5 years before he died, of kidney disease plus COVID, in February last.

I have three kids. The first I didn't bring up, I gave him up for adoption. He lives in Australia, so I've only "met" him twice, but we get along a treat, proving that apples don't fall far from trees. He's a spitting image of my mother, actually. My second lives on Salt Spring Island, so I have only seen him once in the last seven years; it's an expensive flight or a very long drive. I drove him home across country (it takes a solid five to seven days to get there and the same back) after his Dad died. We're close, though, and he never misses calling me on Sunday afternoon. And my youngest is a daughter, who I get along with fine, but rarely see or talk to; she works three jobs and is never home. However, she's taken on Christmas dinner for the two of us (and maybe my sister, who at present says she's not coming), that she will do on Christmas Eve at her place. I'm not terribly inclined to Christmas-ize my house for one visit; I put up my ancient creche and that does, generally; I'm deathly allergic to evergreen trees.

The rest of my family all live in England. I generally visit every 2-3 years; I have a favorite cuz, almost my age, with whom I have been getting in various mischief for 50 years or so. So he and his wife and his house and his narrowboat are my "home base" when I'm there.

My primary family these days are my critters: an 11 year old foxhound/husky cross named Lucy (a rescue who for various reasons is difficult and quite badly socialized; not my fault) and a very large (floofy as well, I'm afraid) and very beautiful tortie-point Ragdoll named Atwood.

 

[Mrs.Anteater]

I am the youngest of four. My oldest sister always was very family oriented, but also had high expectations, for example that one would be sending cards to birthdays and Christmas and ” not forget” her. When I was getting close to 30 in age without having an outlook on a lasting relationship, she was very annoying by telling me in a condescending way that “ I will surely find someone”, which eventually soured our relationship. It might have had an influence on my decision to marry when I met my (ex) husband at 31 and took the fact that he seem to agree with me a lot as a sign that we are a good match and married him. His dream was to immigrate to Canada - which I was in a position to make come true- Canada needed my profession and my parents had just divided up their inheritance, so that I had a good chunk of money as a starting point. Our son was 2.5 when we got here.
When I tried to make up with my oldest sister before I left, she just commented” what for- you are going away anyway”. I was pretty close to my other sister, but she had an anxiety of flying, so it took her years to come and visit. My dad had a severe stroke a couple of months before we left. He died six months later.
Of course, we thought we would be back to Germany every year- little did we know how little vacation Canadians have and how long it takes to get settled.
It’s curious how relationships evolve. It took about ten years and a significant crack in my oldest sister’s happy family world ( her daughter turned out to have mental health problems), for us to find a level relationship. Meanwhile, my other sister had practised short distance flying in Europe to prepare to come and visit me. That visit was a relationship nightmare and it’s only now, another 10 years later, that we carefully find a way of communicating again.
When my parents divided up the inheritance, it split the family, because my oldest sister always felt she got the short end of the stick in the family. But when my dad had his stroke, it brought us all together again.
I would say, we have always been a moderately dysfunctional family with an unspoken trait of anxiety disorder and depression, but every time there was a crisis, we were healthy enough to pull together.
I recent years, my mother, after being able to stay at home with private caregivers until 85, had to go into a nursing home. She is highly manipulative, but after all these years, we have figured her out. Another fact that has made us pull together.
My immediate family fell apart after I figured out that my (ex) husband likely had ADD and a learning disability, but he himself felt the only issue was that “I wasn’t nice enough to him”. It was likely a bit of both. My son inherited a bit from both of us, the learning disability from him and the smarts to deal with it from me. With that, he has made his way. Unfortunately, he has the anxiety part from my side of the family, which led him to not be vaccinated, straining our relationship and of course worrying me for his life.
It’s interesting, to see the evolution of relationships.

 

[ChemGal]

Smallish family. Typical problems, with immediate family no major conflicts. My immediate family is all in the province, extended family mostly in MB snd ON (parents both from Winnipeg). Chemguy's family on his mom's side is similar although both his brother and sister have cut themselves off from some of the family at times. They are all mostly in Calgary. His dad's side we don't have much to do with a number of them. Generation after us is very small for those we see. I have 2 nephews and then 4 cousins once removed. Chemguy, mom side has 3 cousins in their 30s brother & sister in their 30s, 2 in their 20s and we are the only ones who are married. There is a generation after us on his dad's side although I actually get confused with who are 1st cousins as there's one of those funny generation gaps. Some of the ones we do see who are our age (with kids) are actually cousins once removed. His dad's side has done some nasty things, Grandma (now deceased) called around telling the family we were getting divorced - Chemguy's mom really empathized the family was really nasty to her. Summer 2019 2 worked together where one called saying the other was dead and then the one who was supposedly dead would show up with a sob story about a broke down truck needing money blah blah. These 2 will always show up to ask for money but didn't even come to the funeral for Chemguy's mom. There were numerous times it was stated ties were cut, I think 2019 permanently severed that BS.