It's not a Siege
19/8/10 16:39![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eredienI was reading this comic today and realized I should probably print it out and put it on my wall.
I think I've always labored under the fear that if I didn't actively put a lot of effort into every relationship, that the relationships (and the people) would just disappear. They, truly, wouldn't exist without my effort. So I over-effort, and lose myself. Gee, I wonder how I could have learned that? *coughmomanddadcough*
That loss of myself through putting too much into the relationship kept me (until a few years ago, when I started having a relationship with myelf) from realizing that I don't really want much of a relationship with my parents, because such a relationship is/was just too much damn effort to maintain. It feels like a siege every time.
I guess this is why I was so pissed off every time I was reminded by my parents that I wouldn't physically have existed without my parents' efforts at my birth and beyond. They were willing to put a lot of effort into having me, but not into getting to know me, the person I gradually became; I had to put all the effort into that, and never saw much dividend.
My sister and I talked today about our mutual feeling that maybe my mother wanted children, but possibly resented actually having us, and possibly resented raising us. I think it's the first time we'd ever discussed it, but the feeling was always there--you know how you're driving down the road and only see the animal crossing the street, black on black, because the light from your headlights catches its eyes and reflects back to you? We were the headlights, and we could see the animal in the gloom from time to time via the reflection, but the animal wasn't created by the car's headlight glow. It had its own separate existence and trajectory in the dark, before the light ever found it.
I think I've always labored under the fear that if I didn't actively put a lot of effort into every relationship, that the relationships (and the people) would just disappear. They, truly, wouldn't exist without my effort. So I over-effort, and lose myself. Gee, I wonder how I could have learned that? *coughmomanddadcough*
That loss of myself through putting too much into the relationship kept me (until a few years ago, when I started having a relationship with myelf) from realizing that I don't really want much of a relationship with my parents, because such a relationship is/was just too much damn effort to maintain. It feels like a siege every time.
I guess this is why I was so pissed off every time I was reminded by my parents that I wouldn't physically have existed without my parents' efforts at my birth and beyond. They were willing to put a lot of effort into having me, but not into getting to know me, the person I gradually became; I had to put all the effort into that, and never saw much dividend.
My sister and I talked today about our mutual feeling that maybe my mother wanted children, but possibly resented actually having us, and possibly resented raising us. I think it's the first time we'd ever discussed it, but the feeling was always there--you know how you're driving down the road and only see the animal crossing the street, black on black, because the light from your headlights catches its eyes and reflects back to you? We were the headlights, and we could see the animal in the gloom from time to time via the reflection, but the animal wasn't created by the car's headlight glow. It had its own separate existence and trajectory in the dark, before the light ever found it.
Tags: