The holidays are coming, are you prepared?
I think about my many blessings in life today and not one of those blessings came from my family of incest. Not one!
When I frame it that way, I should be hard pressed to miss them when the holidays arrive, right?
It’s complicated.
I think I long for what could have been, not what was.
I had a dream last night that people were investigating my brother because he mistreated a woman and then raped her. In my dream, it was a very big deal and needed to be dealt with. The funny thing is, my brother did rape a woman – me. When I told my mother absolutely nothing happened. My mother told me that he had come from the same sexual abuse I had and it was just par for the course.
That’s it!
So why should I miss my mother’s peanut brittle at Christmas? I really don’t anymore and the truth is I barely liked her candy at Christmas. She made divinity, too. I didn’t like that much either but it was the only Christmas candy we were getting so I enjoyed it.
Doesn’t that sum up the holidays with abusers? You don’t really want to be with them, but it’s all you have so you learn to live with it and — wait for it, enjoy it.
I don’t live in that fantasy world any longer. Last night I went to sleep with the images of my children and grandchildren dancing in my head.
That is my holiday focus! Them.
