Embracing memories or avoiding memories? (spouse, marriage, psycho, years)
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I have good memories, and a lot of bad ones. I honestly do a good job of dismissing the bad ones. They happened, they're over, and I've moved on to better times. I try not to dredge up the bad stuff. There's no point. Why would I want to relive disappointment or pain? The only purpose is to see what can be learned from them, and using that to progress in life, and not to repeat the errors of the past.
I learned several painful things about some of my family (people who are all deceased now) within the last year. Knowing these facts helps me to better accept the bad things in my past, because now I'm working with a fuller knowledge of the limitations of the people involved. I don't know if knowing is better, but it shifts the blame further from my immediate family. I guess that allows a bit more forgiveness of those closest to me.
Over all, I think the present and the future are far more interesting to me than the past.
I have plenty of good memories and had a happy childhood. Sometimes I'll think of the good times with people who have gone before me.
I try not to think about the tragedies and deaths. It's easy to get sucked into a vortex of depression complete with plenty of liquor, sad music and poetry. Better for me to push those thoughts and tendencies aside and do something productive instead.
I am a mix. I try to enjoy the good memories if they come to mind, but I know if I dwell too long, I will feel sad for the times and people who are gone. I learned to manage that.
The holidays can do it. I remember some good times at the holidays with family 20 - 30 years ago. Playing board games, enjoying food, everyone together. Doing the gift grab bag thing. Nice Christmasses like that are gone now, never to return. People are dead, the family home was sold, the kids grew up and moved to distant places. My siblings and I are old and deal with sick loved ones. There is no hope for a better future anymore, nothing to look forward to. That's just the way life is now.
This year there were no decorations or gifts or any signs of Christmas at all, just sadness and getting through the day waiting for that blessed moment when I could escape into sleep for a couple of hours. Wait, not true, someone did drop off some tasty cookies! It would have been easy to look back on happier days and feel despair, but I wouldn't let myself do that. Instead I smiled at the pics on FB of my daughter and niece's enjoying their happy Christmas, and I am truly glad that they are in a part of life in which they can build their own memories.
Very poignant. Especially the line "There is no hope for a better future....nothing to look forward to...."
This is the harsh reality of aging. Not much is going to improve, at this point.
I have lots of wonderful memories and they pop in my head unbidden. But then my devious mind will say "But what about that bad part?" and off I go into a down-spiral. Trying to learn to control that. It turns negative when remembering past physical activities that can't be done anymore.
Truly you "can't go home again"....so I don't try to revisit places or people much. I may never see my sisters again, in reality. Maybe. Who knows. But we have endless good memories of times past, including "Christmas Past" which, as you say, will never come again.
I have good memories and I enjoy them. I wouldn't want to forget them. My mom is suffering with Alzheimer's and the good times have been stripped from her. So I say enjoy them while you can. I fear I am going down the path of my mom.
When I retired, after three months, I moved from Boston to Colorado. Driving out of the Northeast, I felt myself driving past some places of unfortunate memory (Cleveland, Pittsburgh) and then on into the uncharted (unremembered) middle of the country. I felt like I was dropping the past, all of it, Boston, work, disappointments, failures, New Jersey early life. It was very geographic and unexpected but I think it went well. I feel in a way that I've only been alive for almost 4 years now, with retirement.
Been well to do and been poorer then poor.
All the while I said, its those "moments" in my life experiences that cannot be taken from me.
Then I realized- My recall is waning as I age. Some things just fade and with it that cherishness.
........
Yes, that is another thing, that I was thinking about here, as I say about actual books, my diaries with their associated pictures, perhaps an element of symbolic magic where many things, not just a few, help us remember as we age, keep the mind active.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sand&Salt
Very poignant. Especially the line "There is no hope for a better future....nothing to look forward to...."
This is the harsh reality of aging. Not much is going to improve, at this point.
I have lots of wonderful memories and they pop in my head unbidden. But then my devious mind will say "But what about that bad part?" and off I go into a down-spiral........
For that, I remember the wisdom of D'Hoffryn or Clyde Massey, where when faced of not getting what they wanted, it was, "Oh, well!"--D, "We-ll, win some, lose some!"--Massey (Buffy tvs, 11 Harrowhouse).
For me, when I remember all those disasters, near and far, it is in a few seconds, "Oh, well! C'est la vie!".
Last edited by TamaraSavannah; 12-30-2021 at 10:24 AM..
It started me wondering whether you all share the mixed feelings? Or are you more like one or the other of my folks, either always happy with remembering good times in the past, or never wanting to think about the past at all?
Like many people, I have good and bad memories and mixed feelings about them.
Good memories usually come in happy times. Sometimes they are evoked in melancholic times to ease the pain of loss such as on my parents' death anniversary.
I tried not to dwell in the past, not to think about the few life changing or traumatic events in my life. However, these bad memories did come as nightmares with frequencies luckily diminished with times. On rare occasions - when facing life challenges, I evoked these 'bad' memories to draw strength and courage, reminding myself that I had gone through and survived worse things.
I am always an optimistic person and have become more contented in my 'old' age. All my bad memories had pretty much faded away years ago. I cherish all the good memories. I bash in a warm and fuzzy feelings whenever memories of the happy times flood my mind especially during holidays.
When I retired, after three months, I moved from Boston to Colorado. Driving out of the Northeast, I felt myself driving past some places of unfortunate memory (Cleveland, Pittsburgh) and then on into the uncharted (unremembered) middle of the country. I felt like I was dropping the past, all of it, Boston, work, disappointments, failures, New Jersey early life. It was very geographic and unexpected but I think it went well. I feel in a way that I've only been alive for almost 4 years now, with retirement.
My sister moved to a town close to our miserable childhood town. It was creepy getting off at our old Garden State Parkway exit and passing our old town to visit her.
For the first year, my sister talked about passing old streets and neighborhoods that dragged up old unpleasant memories. She loves her new home and has moved on emotionally. I don't know how she did it. I doubt I could.
My mother felt like her life began with her divorce and move so with retirement.
I appreciated reading this. Living to our ages is a small success, I think. Like all things in life it's bittersweet. There are so many losses by this age that sometimes I don't think I'll ever have time to fully grieve them all.
So maybe it's good that the years have softened them into bits and pieces of whispering memories that come unbidden for a moment and pass. Should they persist I get the message - it's unfinished business and I won't avoid. I'll take some time and conscious effort to make peace with that little nagging memory and try to lay it to rest. It's a ghost of the past.
I'm guessing most of you experienced folks do the same. Maybe you just have a less conscious, less clinical, process than I. Betcha you do.
The best thing I ever learned about memories is that they are Mine. I can frame them any way I want. If it's to pat myself on the back and say, "Look how well I survived that" I have my own permission to do so. Then maybe I'll list in my head some ways it made me stronger or smarter to go through a personal disaster. That's helped me to soften the blow of many a hurt. Time and distance and my own version.
But I'd much rather dwell on all the loving memories, the things that make me feel good. I don't avoid the unpleasant if I can't. Don't want to make extra work for myself! But if the sad memories come I think there must be a time and place for them too as a part of living as a human being, a part of the more gentle grief process, and I try to recognize them as such.
Then finally there are the ones that bite. Those are the suddenly remembered times I hurt someone and felt justified. If I feel any guilt about that now I know I'm going to have to take steps to make it right. That's the hard part. Sometimes the solutions don't come easily because the other person is gone or because bringing it up may cause further hurt.
I really make an effort to come up with a creative way to lay my part of it to rest, though, because I don't want to carry old miserable feelings around with me.
If I pay attention to those above things and do what I can I like to think of it as cleaning house, keeping my side of the street swept, dealing with old feelings. Doing that also makes me feel good.
When I'm up to my neck in uncomfortable feelings a last resort that helps is just asking myself why I should expect to have a life free of discomfort when everyone else has their own issues to deal with. Feelings give me a hint what needs to be tended to and can't hurt me. It's the ones I don't deal with that can.
In some ways grief makes all the good things in life seem sweeter than ever. Not a bad lesson to learn at all.
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