Some parents really bring their children up; others let them down
The title is an quote by an unknown author.
Most people that know me also know that I do NOT have a good relationship with my family. More specifically my mother is public enemy #1 in my life. My sister is annoying and judgmental at times, but she lives in Tampa, FL 3/4 of the year and 2.5 hours away in Sandusky the other 1/4. My dad is a pretty good guy, but he refuses to stand up to my mother. Lately I've heard my mother complaining a LOT about him, and him complaining a little about him. I think the best thing that could happen to both of them is a divorce... but that's a different story.
I'll start with a very short history of my family's dysfunction, mostly as it relates to my life. The first thing to note is that my sister is the definition of the direct opposite of me. I think I commented on that in a previous post so I'll leave it at that. Well, starting in about 6th grade I actually started to make a few friends through the band. They were all a year older than me and my mom hated that. She made that VERY clear as she often does with things that are none of her business. Using my math grades as an excuse (I got a C omigod call the cavalry,) she grounded me and said I would not be ungrounded until I got a B in math. I was grounded for about a year and a half, which effectively made me a complete outcast. Going into HS, I think I might have had 1 friend left- thanks mom! The funny thing is that after I made some new friends, I was suddenly ungrounded but I was still pulling C's and D's in math.
In HS things got REALLY interesting. I was no longer allowed to go to sleep-over parties with my female friends. No boys there, parents in the other room, still not allowed. My parents were SO overprotective that I was not even allowed to go out after homecoming my senior year in HS! The story was completely different with my younger sister though. She was allowed to stay out after homecoming when she was a sophomore I believe. She also threw house parties when my parents were out of time, drank, smoked pot.... but she was the preppy blond cheerleader which my mother LOVED so she got away with it. My mother (and sister) are obsessed with public opinion, rumor mills, and archaic ideas about social "rules." In other words, your behavior didn't matter in my household as long as you were thin, had cute hair, wore makeup, dressed to the popular norm, etc. etc.
Things got downright ugly in college. When my now husband proposed to me I called my mom to tell her the news. Her response? Something like "Oh... are you sure you want to do that? You haven't dated many boys." Just what every little girl dreams her mother will say at one of the most meaningful moments in her life. A few months before my wedding, after most of the planning was already done, my mother actually suggested that I call the wedding off. She made if very clear that she didn't like Eric because she thought he was selfish and rude. (Years earlier he had told my mother that he could NOT drive 15 minutes into town to pick up my sister from cheerleading practice. Mind you she never asked, she assumed he would just do it.) Now that things are official and she thinks that it is her duty to be the good mother-in-law she acts like she LOVES Eric and that he's SOOOO wonderful.
And all that to get to the most recent bullshit. A week or two ago we realized that we had a long weekend coming up (Eric never gets weekends off) so we decided to go home so Eric could visit his family (Sept. 1 is his birthday) and so we could visit my grandma. We usually stay at my parents' house because they have a double bed in the guest bedroom (my old room) and Eric's old room only has a single bed. I called my parents to tell them we were coming up and they said they were going to be out of town anyway so we could have the place to ourselves. Then I thought hmmm.... I bed my parents are going to take their dog Bear to the kennel (he's had a couple strokes and has a lot of "accidents.) I called and confirmed this with my dad and told him that was awesome because we won't have to board our dogs, which gets expensive. Because Bear is so old and a little crazy so he gets spooked real easy and our young dogs really scare him so we never bring them with us. We usually bring Brodie with us though and my mom has never had any problem with this.
Well, a couple days ago my mom calls and leaves a voicemail which very rudely said something like "I don't understand how you don't get it, but I don't want your dogs in my house so you need to make other arrangements. CLICK" If she had EVER said ANYTHING about not wanting my dogs in her house this would have been a different story, but she hadn't! I don't understand this at all because her dog has already ruined their carpet and she plans to replace it as soon as he dies anyway. My dogs could not possible do any damage, but it's her house so whatever. I left her a voicemail saying all of that and adding that if she insists on being stubborn and rude, that she can explain to my elderly grandmother why I have to cancel this visit. The next day I get a message not from her, but from my father saying that my mother has offered to allow us keep our dogs in the garage. Mind you their garage has no insulation, no windows, etc. etc. and my dogs have never slept in their crates let alone outside.
At this point I'm FURIOUS with my mother and sent her a pretty nasty e-mail, but they apparently did not get it before they left town. She has single handedly ruined Eric's birthday and our entire weekend. How are we supposed to find a dog-sitter with less than 2 days notice before a holiday weekend? I started checking hotels, but even the pet-friendly ones usually limit it to 1 pet, and we have 3. I finally found one with an open room that would take all 5 of us, but they wanted $150/night+tax since it's tourist season in Sandusky. (Like I always say- if it's tourist season, why can't we shoot them?) We don't have that kind of money in our budget.
Next, we call Eric's folks to see if we can maybe crate the dogs in their detached garage (since it's completely finished with insulation, windows, even heat) and maybe let little baby Zipp sleep upstairs with us. His mom didn't think we would be comfortable so she found us a small local hotel that would let us bring all 3 dogs and only wanted $88/night+tax and offered to pay half the bill!
I have to say, I love my in-laws. They are wonderful, loving, caring people and they all treat me like one of their own. I dare say I love them more than my own family! (Except my grandma who is the most wonderful person I've ever met)
So here we are now at the Plantation Hotel in Huron, OH! It's a pretty small room, but it's clean and it has a king-size bed. No complaints here! We're only going to stay the one night, but at least Eric will get to see his folks for his birthday. When my parents get back we'll see how things go, but this has definitely not helped the already very shaky relationship I have with them. Eric wishes I would just cut them out of our lives since they usually cause nothing but heartache for me. Maybe I'm just naive but I keep hoping that things will change. I keep giving my mom another chance, but every time it's just a harder let down.
Most people that know me also know that I do NOT have a good relationship with my family. More specifically my mother is public enemy #1 in my life. My sister is annoying and judgmental at times, but she lives in Tampa, FL 3/4 of the year and 2.5 hours away in Sandusky the other 1/4. My dad is a pretty good guy, but he refuses to stand up to my mother. Lately I've heard my mother complaining a LOT about him, and him complaining a little about him. I think the best thing that could happen to both of them is a divorce... but that's a different story.
I'll start with a very short history of my family's dysfunction, mostly as it relates to my life. The first thing to note is that my sister is the definition of the direct opposite of me. I think I commented on that in a previous post so I'll leave it at that. Well, starting in about 6th grade I actually started to make a few friends through the band. They were all a year older than me and my mom hated that. She made that VERY clear as she often does with things that are none of her business. Using my math grades as an excuse (I got a C omigod call the cavalry,) she grounded me and said I would not be ungrounded until I got a B in math. I was grounded for about a year and a half, which effectively made me a complete outcast. Going into HS, I think I might have had 1 friend left- thanks mom! The funny thing is that after I made some new friends, I was suddenly ungrounded but I was still pulling C's and D's in math.
In HS things got REALLY interesting. I was no longer allowed to go to sleep-over parties with my female friends. No boys there, parents in the other room, still not allowed. My parents were SO overprotective that I was not even allowed to go out after homecoming my senior year in HS! The story was completely different with my younger sister though. She was allowed to stay out after homecoming when she was a sophomore I believe. She also threw house parties when my parents were out of time, drank, smoked pot.... but she was the preppy blond cheerleader which my mother LOVED so she got away with it. My mother (and sister) are obsessed with public opinion, rumor mills, and archaic ideas about social "rules." In other words, your behavior didn't matter in my household as long as you were thin, had cute hair, wore makeup, dressed to the popular norm, etc. etc.
Things got downright ugly in college. When my now husband proposed to me I called my mom to tell her the news. Her response? Something like "Oh... are you sure you want to do that? You haven't dated many boys." Just what every little girl dreams her mother will say at one of the most meaningful moments in her life. A few months before my wedding, after most of the planning was already done, my mother actually suggested that I call the wedding off. She made if very clear that she didn't like Eric because she thought he was selfish and rude. (Years earlier he had told my mother that he could NOT drive 15 minutes into town to pick up my sister from cheerleading practice. Mind you she never asked, she assumed he would just do it.) Now that things are official and she thinks that it is her duty to be the good mother-in-law she acts like she LOVES Eric and that he's SOOOO wonderful.
And all that to get to the most recent bullshit. A week or two ago we realized that we had a long weekend coming up (Eric never gets weekends off) so we decided to go home so Eric could visit his family (Sept. 1 is his birthday) and so we could visit my grandma. We usually stay at my parents' house because they have a double bed in the guest bedroom (my old room) and Eric's old room only has a single bed. I called my parents to tell them we were coming up and they said they were going to be out of town anyway so we could have the place to ourselves. Then I thought hmmm.... I bed my parents are going to take their dog Bear to the kennel (he's had a couple strokes and has a lot of "accidents.) I called and confirmed this with my dad and told him that was awesome because we won't have to board our dogs, which gets expensive. Because Bear is so old and a little crazy so he gets spooked real easy and our young dogs really scare him so we never bring them with us. We usually bring Brodie with us though and my mom has never had any problem with this.
Well, a couple days ago my mom calls and leaves a voicemail which very rudely said something like "I don't understand how you don't get it, but I don't want your dogs in my house so you need to make other arrangements. CLICK" If she had EVER said ANYTHING about not wanting my dogs in her house this would have been a different story, but she hadn't! I don't understand this at all because her dog has already ruined their carpet and she plans to replace it as soon as he dies anyway. My dogs could not possible do any damage, but it's her house so whatever. I left her a voicemail saying all of that and adding that if she insists on being stubborn and rude, that she can explain to my elderly grandmother why I have to cancel this visit. The next day I get a message not from her, but from my father saying that my mother has offered to allow us keep our dogs in the garage. Mind you their garage has no insulation, no windows, etc. etc. and my dogs have never slept in their crates let alone outside.
At this point I'm FURIOUS with my mother and sent her a pretty nasty e-mail, but they apparently did not get it before they left town. She has single handedly ruined Eric's birthday and our entire weekend. How are we supposed to find a dog-sitter with less than 2 days notice before a holiday weekend? I started checking hotels, but even the pet-friendly ones usually limit it to 1 pet, and we have 3. I finally found one with an open room that would take all 5 of us, but they wanted $150/night+tax since it's tourist season in Sandusky. (Like I always say- if it's tourist season, why can't we shoot them?) We don't have that kind of money in our budget.
Next, we call Eric's folks to see if we can maybe crate the dogs in their detached garage (since it's completely finished with insulation, windows, even heat) and maybe let little baby Zipp sleep upstairs with us. His mom didn't think we would be comfortable so she found us a small local hotel that would let us bring all 3 dogs and only wanted $88/night+tax and offered to pay half the bill!
I have to say, I love my in-laws. They are wonderful, loving, caring people and they all treat me like one of their own. I dare say I love them more than my own family! (Except my grandma who is the most wonderful person I've ever met)
So here we are now at the Plantation Hotel in Huron, OH! It's a pretty small room, but it's clean and it has a king-size bed. No complaints here! We're only going to stay the one night, but at least Eric will get to see his folks for his birthday. When my parents get back we'll see how things go, but this has definitely not helped the already very shaky relationship I have with them. Eric wishes I would just cut them out of our lives since they usually cause nothing but heartache for me. Maybe I'm just naive but I keep hoping that things will change. I keep giving my mom another chance, but every time it's just a harder let down.
posted by d0ggiem0mma | 1:13 AM
1 Comments:
Ugh.... I really hate to hear your mom is such a bitch still. At least y'all got to go though, which is a good thing.
I dunno, cutting off your parents entirely is just one thing that's so difficult to do in your life. I mean, at least she's not three doors down so the contact can be limited and such, but can you handle that emotionally? I guess it's just a call only you can make babe, just hope you make the right one.
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