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I don't really like talking to or interacting with other people in general. It is an unwelcome intrusion on my sense of balance and solitude. I just want to sit at home and be left alone in the quiet.
Yea thats basically how I have become......
I hate what this world has become and I WANT NOTHING TO DO WITH IT to be very frank with everyone!!
Thank you people! I don't feel so alone now knowing I'm not the only one who honestly doesn't enjoy being around most of my family. I liked them more when there was over a thousand miles between us. I got suckered back into the you owe it to your parents to move back home spiel and have regretted it ever since. Mother is mentally ill, both mom and dad were abusive when I was a child. Dad's current wife has multiple severe mental illnesses on top of being a holier than though religious bigot. None of my aunts, uncles, cousins save for one cousin have ever had any contact with me as an adult and they don't have anything to do with each other either so its not just me. Dad is funny because he talks like a white supremist even though my family genealogy research shows he is from 3 ethnic groups. Regardless if I visit him he is constantly speaking derogatory towards non-whites, off course gays, liberals, Democrats, the college educated (who he deems are idiots compared to his high school dropout intelligence). His wife who talks 90 miles a minute like a chipmunk on speed will chime in condemning everyone who doesn't have the same religious beliefs as her as evil, going to hell and will break down into a audible prayer right in the middle of conversation like she was mental. So uh yeah I don't enjoy being around them but spend about 4 hours a week visiting dad and practically race out the door when my time is up. How would you feel being multi-racial having a parent that condemns non-whites plus having same religious beliefs and not being a hater of other ethnicities or gays, etc. Also I'm college educated so I'm basically everything he hates. On top of that they get angry at me because I refuse to go out to dinner with them as they eat out nightly. But I don't eat fast food, am on a strict diet to lose weight, plus have 30 food allergies so this is an on-going tension between us and is why they got mad at me tonight.
Right now my brother and sister are having MAJOR drama. I am very glad I do not live near them. They are now vying with each other to out do the drama and get our parents' attention.
I have enough problems with my husband being unemployed, not wanting to live in this town, my son's issues, and life to deal with it. We live 4 hours away and may move further and that is okay with me.
Funny, when we lived nearer and had to live with my folks, WE were the screw ups. We moved away, my brother moved in, and now they complain about HIM.
My sister was recently complaining about him (bro) at our parents for Mother's Day and how she felt ignored, blah, blah, her kids weren't fawned all over for a change, his new girlfriend and her son were favored, blah, blah.
Welcome to my world.
I loved reading those texts from 4 hours away as I sat in my dining room, enjoying my quiet with my immediate family.
I don't see my family of origin all that often. Once a year is enough, usually not during holidays. It's more of a sense of obligation than enjoyment. Calling one parent or the other once every one or two months seems enough. I don't observe holidays at all. Can't really say why, maybe it just seems unnatural for a calendar to tell me when to be nice to people. I suppose I might care about holidays more if I had had a family that instilled a sense of warmth and happiness during the holidays, but somehow that didn't really happen.
In my opinion, the choice of whether you associate with your family of origin should be based on whether there's a mutual sense of respect and caring, and wanting to know each other as people... as opposed to you being there to play the "son/daughter/brother/sister" role they want you to play in their imaginary mental movie of life, without knowing you as a person. If you are showing a sense of respect and caring toward them, and it's not reciprocated, then it's perfectly justified not to spend much time with them. In that case, I'd say you're doing your part, and it's not cold of you to avoid them, just cold of them not to treat you in a respectful and caring way. Don't blame yourself for coldness that you didn't originate.
Some people are lucky enough to have family with a sense of mutual caring, respect, and warmth, and some are not. That's life. It's not necessary to pretend something's there that's not (and I do agree that some people on this thread are being a bit too smug and self-righteous, as if they know what it's like to walk in your shoes, when they don't).
That being said, I'd say "blood is thicker than water" in the sense that it should take a bigger offense before you cut family off completely. At some level, being family does mean something. All I'm saying is that it's justifiable to spend less time and attention on them if there's not much of a sense of caring coming from them. As Obi-Wan Kenobi said, "trust your feelings...."
I see them as much as I can without anyone reaching the point of annoyance. Life is going by too fast and I don't want to hit that day where I wish that I had spent more time with them, but no longer have the option.
kind of. my mother has never really forgiven me for when i abruptly dropped out of college and moved halfway around the world w/o telling them.
i still talk to my parents once per month or so and occasionally show up for xmas. i was broke and homeless a while back, when they found out they demanded i fly home immediately until i got back on my feet. have slowly repairing my relationship with them every year.
am actually flying out to see them for the first time in almost a year next week. hopefully it goes well. have had a good relationship with them the last few years aside from being distant.
Talk to my Mom almost every day and see her several times a month she lives alone since my dad passed away two years ago, she is 85. I love the time with her and will cherish it when she is gone. See my sisters regularly. Just lucky I guess that I really do like my family.
Location: Huntersville/Charlotte, NC and Washington, DC
26,706 posts, read 41,855,063 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by PhenomenalAJ
By that, I don't mean your spouse and kids but your parents and extended family. How often do you see them/visit/call? Do you enjoy visiting them? I generally avoid them as much as possible but my mother calls and nags me to death if I skip holidays like Xmas or Mother's Day so I occasionally get roped into these things but I generally avoid them if I can.
I keep in frequent contact with my mom but the rest of the family I don't. They don't seem too interested so I return the favor.
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