Turtle Shells... still typing on my phone. Lazy! I say!

Screeching to a halt

So, let’s jump right into this, ok, good....

Remember when I was contacted by a member of my mother’s bio family? Well, I’d been looking for them for years and by years I mean decades so this was quite the big deal, right? I even, on my own, found my mother’s brother ...Hello!!! Her BROTHER!! And his daughter, my cousin. I wrote to her on Facebook and was all...

 “Hey, I think you’re my cousin and your dad is my uncle. Surprise!”

She friended me on FB and said that they’d never really had much to do with my mother’s mom ( apparently, batshit crazy is a family trait amongst the women) and her dad actually hadn’t been raised by her AND he’d love to meet me and.... My mom... yay! So exciting!! He’s been thinking of her his entire life!!! We’ll be like best friends. There’s a family reunion coming OMG!! XOXO

I........ did what I do best.... I packed the situation into a box and put into a safe and pushed it over the side of a boat into the ocean.

Bye!!

I don’t know what happened. I can’t explain it. I’d been looking for so long. I was thinking that I’d have family and we’d do Thanksgivings and I’d love my cousins and wow, I have an uncle( which I did know. My mother spent her entire life marinating in hate and loathing that he’d been kept and she’d been given away.... except, surprise!! He’d been given away too....)

And when it can time to pull the trigger I froze in emotional terror.

I couldn’t pretend that my mother was something that she wasn’t AND, I didn’t want to drag out my baggage in pillowcases and empty them at their feet either. Like, Hello!!! I’m good... ya, she was my mom... uh huh... she was sexually and verbally and emotionally abusive... Right. So, pass the turkey?

I couldn’t see that unfold. I couldn’t see how that situation wouldn’t be painful for me. I couldn’t see a way that they wouldn’t be freaked out and how that would crush me and somehow, me, the victim here, would be seen as..... Less than. I have a HUGE chip on my shoulder about being seen as less than.

If I were a psychiatrist, right now is where I’d tell you that that stems from having a bio father who considered me less than worthy because I didn’t call his wife, mom. And how that lead me to skipping down a path of bad choices in men who I innately knew would never chose me because they would care for me.... Less than.... whomever or whatever or.... just in general. 

And I didn’t want to choose that again. 

Now, 

1. look who has learned to see her weakness and chose a different path!!
2. That might not have happened at all and I may have missed out on a great and loving family connection
3. It’s worth not knowing to protect my heart. 

That number three is a little heartbreaking. I can wish all day that life hadn’t kicked me so hard that I wear a shell or... I can accept that that has formed me and think of it as a bonus that I have a shell or.... I can try and live life maybe taking the shell off sometimes.....?

I don’t know. 

What do you think?

As a side note... I can’t get my paint because the store is closed. Hurmph.

Be well bears,

Me