Skip to main content

Door Slam

Lily says,


My window was open!

Why should I say sorry when it wasn't my fault?

I didn't know there was a problem if a door slams.


I had just called up to her angrily that she had to absolutely be out by 8.15am after she decided to take her phone back upstairs with her despite my protestations.

Unusually she had come down about 7.30am, all chatty, looking for me - big hug - getting ready for her first full week of school attendance.

Twenty minutes later, both of us in tears in different rooms, Husband asking me what he should do and wanting to help, mother-in-law cowering downstairs...@~#{£%&**!

I am trying very hard to lower my stress levels.  I am very overweight and in my 50s. I have 2 aunts who died from ovarian cancer in their late 50s and 60s and I had a smear test booked for today (which the nurse has just cancelled).  I think a lot of people might tell me to withdraw from Lily and let her manage things on her own, that she is old enough.  If we had come to this in the normal way I would agree, but I am acutely aware of the fragility of her attachment.  I fear that me withdrawing would lead her to separating herself completely, like her brother did.  I see that our relationship now, though, is not healthy. 

I tell myself to do what is best for me because I am the only one who can really do that.  The children will keep draining me and that is what Husband sees, and hates. He calls them dementors.

Yet I am a loving, giving person and that gives me pleasure and validation.  How can I honour that and protect myself from abuse?  Husband goes into battle mode, armour on, defenses up. That just makes me sad and despairing. He says I am noble which is like when people tell us we're 'amazing' for adopting.  They are difficult compliments to own because we are not doing it with that intention and at no time does it feel amazing or noble.  I think, to achieve a goal in your work, or a sport, or an activity might feel in itself uplifting, invigorating, amazing. Perhaps to consciously make a sacrifice or favour another over yourself might feel honourable and right and so you might be ok about someone else calling it noble.  The key difference, I think, is the consciousness and the goal.  What I do, what we do, most of the time is pure instinct and survival.

It's 9.15am now. Lily still hasn't made it out of the door.

Photo by Paweł L.: https://www.pexels.com/photo/empty-hallway-1320733/ 






Comments

Popular posts from this blog

there's always tomorrow

How do I break down the contradictions in Lily's idea of who she is versus what she does and how she shows herself to be? Yesterday she told us at dinner that she is having a competition with her best friend to see who can be the most tanned this Summer. Husband and I bit our tongues and merely nodded with interest. We wanted to say: "You do know that to get a tan you have to be up when the sun is up?" or "You do know that to get a tan you have to go outside?" But it was suddenly clear to me that in her head she was a completely different person - one who jumps around beaches with lithe brown limbs and lies back on picnic rugs with sand between her toes.  I remembered my own Baywatch-based alter-ego. My dream had always been to lose weight and magically change my coarse curly hair for one of those glossy bouncing pony-tails.  Those kinds of daydreams are precious at any time in our lives but especially for a teenager. So it was good that Husband and I didn't...

Flipping Days and Nights

I am almost certain that Lily did not go to bed last night. Despite all reminders and a day without any exams (and consequently not going to school) yesterday, she apparently forgot the deadline for the second art sketchbook which was today. She made it into her physics exam this morning but apparently nearly stopped and sought medical help because she said her vision was blurring.  She told me she might have an allergy, "that's what the medic said".  It's been pouring with rain for 48 hours.  I don't need to check the pollen count (but I do), it's low and she's never suffered particularly.  I don't think it's allergies I tell her. She shrugs and says she needs to have a lie down, she didn't get much sleep last night. She's decided she doesn't need the melatonin anymore and I think she's cramming all night, going to the exam first thing, home by midday and then sleeping till, well, I wake her up. She's eaten dinner with us the l...

Unceasing Character Assassination (UCA)

This is an unstoppable verbal torrent which contains some inciteful observations, some creative metaphors and lots of criticism, distain, incredulity and outrage. It is spoken with insistence and without a break.  There are almost no rhetorical questions that I can think of and most of it is therefore phrased as a definitive account of what 'you do' and what 'you think'. It comes after an argument/melt down and feels, at first, like something one should respect.  Both husband and I have experienced these and some instinct tell us there is merit in letting Lily get these things off her chest. There might be useful learning on both sides and an opportunity for us to acknowledge where we have made a mistake, or explain further why we said or did something that we did. The trouble is, it is very hard to get a word in edge ways and even less likely that what we say will be given any credence. Above all, there is no reduction in fervour.  If anything, she becomes more vindict...