What not to do.

Every so often, another family member pops up and suggests to me, that it is time to let go, to forgive and move on or really revert back to my old self and go back to my old relationships within my family of origin.

They question me as to why I don't…and make comments that it is time to let the negative go and remain only positive.

How is it that I am the one being questioned here?  The rest get to continue on doing mostly what they used to do, changing very little and no one is questioning them.   Why?  How is it possible to be so unruffled by abuse?

Shouldn't the questions be directed at them?

How is it that when abuse was diagnosed in our family, most didn't react to the abuse?  That they didn't change their lifestyles or see how it was possible, and to make changes to prevent it from happening again.  AND to feel what being raised by two such individuals meant in their worlds.  It seems like victory over abuse was when you could keep your life being the same, without very little changes.

No questions are asked to those who stayed in relationships, now with the knowledge of abuse.  No one asked how is that possible?  How doesn't that change your relationship?  How can you add abuse and it is okay?

Instead, I am asked pointed questions about FAMILY, and how I can leave and this and that or not forgive, and move on.

Interesting, they ask me about family and I ask them about abuse.

They don't mention anything to me about abuse. They only speak of family.

What the family needs, and they skip over abuse.

They want me to leave abuse alone and come back to the family.

Interesting to note what we each are focusing on.

I believe this is a major flaw in the minds way of thinking, that if you focus on family, abuse will disappear.  If you just see that our mother is old now, and not see her past.  To take snapshots of  our parents lives and not their whole life. Then, you can miss the abusive years…and just see the good times.

My mother did this. And it was proved to NOT work on abuse.

She didn't capture all of my father's life, or even the girl's lives and in the end, she still ended up married to a pedophile.  You can't just pick the things in life you like and feel good about.  Focus on the good and let go of the bad…doesn't create a good life.  IF this was so, my mother and father would have a very good life. 

My mother continued down the path that was set in place by her family.  How she responded, reacted or didn't, when abuse came knocking at her family door, was to not look at it…and it didn't serve her well, or those within our family.

I am taking a different path.  

I am looking at abuse and focusing there, in hopes of stopping the legacy on my branch of the family tree.

Please ask me questions about abuse…for that is where the answers lie in keeping a family together.  If you don't look at abuse, abuse will destroy your family.

My mother's life is my example…of what not to do.