I just came from therapy. As so often I didn't know what to talk about and I HATE it when P says: "it's your time, you can talk or just lie there". Sure.. but I'm PAYING you! To not waste the appointment I thought I just talk about something that I already posted here. I thought it wouldn't be a productive appointment anyway, because I already wrote about this topic, but I was so wrong.
I told her that I always had problems with the fact that you have to love your parents, like I described in an earlier post. She asked me then if I love my parents or my sister and I answered truthfully: no. As I answered I got a weird feeling, so I asked her: why do I feel bad about it eventhough I know that I don't have to love them and that I'm saying the truth. She told me something that I really needed to hear: Of course you don't have to love them.
So eventhough I know I'm right I feel bad about it. P called that brain washing.. Since I can remember it was a must to love your family. You see it everywhere, you hear it everywhere. The whole society is build on the fact that family is family, that the connection by blood is the closesed connection you can have and therefore you automatically love your family. You never question it for your depending on it. As a child you have to love your parents, how else can you keep going if there is no hope for change? At least you think it is love, because that's what you are expected to feel. Later you discover that it can't be love, how can you love sombody you despise?
It is true, I'm not confused about that anymore. I know that I don't have to love them and I'm right to not love them. But there is still something that tells me I'm a bad person, doing so. It will take a lot of time to get rid of that wrong moral. A lot of self-parenting. It is probably this wrong moral that is engraved the deepest into everybody. That is why today was the first time somebody told me that I don't have to love them. It would be easier if other people would understand it too. Imagine you are the only one telling yourself the truth and everybody else says you're wrong.
I know I'm right, and some day I will be freed of wrong guilt.
I can relate so much and quite some time back I wrote about exact this topic. It was a long hard road to truly disown my Mother and even more though to give some responsibility to my father which died early. Took him down from the pedestral. I do not despise them anymore yet they are so far in the past and I have a family I love dearly. My chosen family. People which love me as I am. People from all walks of life, nationalities, races. There are very few families which arent dysfunctional to a certain extent however were any kind of abuse is involved that is a no go for me. By now I can live well with the statement that I dont love my family of origin but dearly love my chosen family. It takes time, yet the more often I said it, the better I felt about it! Hugs to you. xxx
ReplyDeleteBTW, when are you returning to the USA? and where will you live?
From recent experience with my relatives, I know that it is TOTALLY okay to feel anything YOU want to about family now. Phew.
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