I M Perfect lady

Category: Examples of an Imperfect woman

  • Being in your Truth.

    "My mom said she learned how to swim. Someone took her out in the lake and threw her off the boat. That's how she learned how to swim. I said, “Mom, they weren't trying to teach you how to swim.” —PAULA POUNDSTONE

    "Reframing what happens to us can be a healthy way to survive terrible things, or it can become a veil of denial that keeps us from moving on. Often, we simply have to trust that we will see the truth of things when we are strong enough and ready." Nepo Mark 

    What I find so remarkable is the strength of the "Reframing" in an abusive home and how many put their stock in the reframing and not even begin to begin questioning another way.

    The fear that holds the reframing together is fierce…and we call it love.  We love the reframing, not the truth.

    I had built a life for 46 years based on the reframing…and the voice of a small child undid it all. For her words matched not my reframing, but the truth that lay beneath… in my body.  

    What I find so shocking are the amount of systems all in place to hold the reframing in line.  How there are actual religions who will help keep you away from the truth, who will actually have "forgiving away reality" as their main premise. So you will repeatedly reframe the character of a man….

    "There are no sins too great to forgive…" no hurtful action, not abuse, nothing is to big to wash away. Which leaves you seeing a reframing of a man and not the man himself.

    This one small child spoke her truth and how many have walked a walk that echoes that?  Most will say they agree, they see and they know….but do their action steps show it???

    Or, do they continue to add to the reframing.

    This network of intricate lies are subtle and yet glaring.  

    In looking back, my focus for many years was in keeping the family unit together…all my attention was put into the reframing.  I never looked beneath.  I was too busy holding it all together in my mind.

    I do wonder why the young child's voice broke my frame work of lies…and not everyones.  Why they continue to work on the scaffolding and I what lies beneath?

    And what is even more disheartening, it is the child doing all the work. The parent just continues on being their self in all its glory….and the child works like hell to make them a better mom/dad…reframing each thing they say and do….

    What I also find interesting, is that to me, many will agree with what I say…but go right back to building a scaffolding they call family.

    Like little worker ants…brushing up a brother and overlooking this and that…..polishing up a mother….creating what they need.  A Family.

    No matter what.

    I see the reframing going on and on…and how they see what I say as "Negative" and they want positive….positive….positive.

    They see the negative, but reframe it over and it becomes positive.

    They use the word forgiveness to put it aside.

    They say things like "she did the best she could…." or "I don't know what it is like to walk in her shoes…"  Giving her the benefit of their doubts and reframe.

    Building this facade protects them…keeps them feeling safe and normal and in a family.

    While I hear they are moving on and going forward, what I really see is more reframing going on….and it is actually holding them in place; keeping the family together…only by reframing each action.

    I even felt that when a few came in to protest the "collective mourning" that I was being asked to "reframe" that.  Rephrase that. Clean that Up.  

    Why?  

    I don't need anyone reframing why I stayed away.

    What is weird is that I feel, some didn't want to be caught mourning a father….

    I did mourn a father.  I did mourn what I didn't get.  I mourned the loss of a dream…of what could have been.  I mourned the loss of a childhood, the loss of innocence….I mourned and I mourned and I mourned many years ago.

    I mourned the truth that was kept from me….by others and by myself.

    Reframing life keeps you from being in your truth.





  • Family Tree

    I have been drawn to trees….Artful Trees, Trees with buttons for their leaves, and whimsical looking trees….so, I began creating a tree.  This began right before my father died.  I loved the background, my hand-dyed fabric, and I called it a rich looking combination of colors. I knew I wanted the woman to contrast the tree. I tried doing a woman in red standing up on the boulder by the tree…..and it didn't feel right to me.

    When I came back to this after my father died, I then decided I wanted the lady to sit down.  Sit in reverence….of her family tree.  But….


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    The woman sitting took on this mournful look, and not in reverence, but in sadness.  It is intriguing how a woman who is sad I drape a sweater or shawl on…like she is cold…  

    I had thought to be adding things to the branches…but on this one…I can't know what that would be. It feels almost better with bare branches….it matches the energy of the woman.

    I thought I was done with the Tree thing, but I went to the Portage Quilt Shop on Saturday and saw this wonderful fabric that I thought would make the perfect border on a Tree Quilt…and it so excited me….and another tree was born…and a woman by this tree. The fabric lent it self to a completely different tree.


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    I am not done quilting either of them, but the Artful part for me is complete.  I love both of the trees…for they represent both my heritage and my future.  

    The energies are even felt in both quilts… the low dark sadness…as well as the feelings of joy and freedom….and movement in the second tree.

    It is my belief we all are born into a tree in full bloom and we get to either replicate the energies of that tree….or move on to a new tree.

    Most want to move on but do so without leaving the tree, let alone the orchard.

    They want to leave their legacy behind, but not the family tree.

    In looking deeply into the root system of the tree I was born into, I knew in order to change the heritage, for me and move forward, I could not act or be like my ancestors.  Or more succinctly, like my mother.

    "Insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result"…Einstein said.

    You simply can't grow a new kind of family by doing the same things your parents did.  

    My mother never left her abusive brother's lives.  She never divorced my abusive father.  My mother never could see how her religion kept her shackled to hurtful people.  Her definition of 'unconditional' love was stick together family rules no matter what and forgive the hurt and try to forget and move on.

    What I love is that I am doing the opposite of her…and my family tree is changing…and many are not happy with the changes I have made, what I focus on and the lines I draw in cement and how I put up restrictions around behaviors I will not tolerate.  I am the opposite of my mother and I am loving that.

    The children of my parents are all adults now and have been for years. Each will decide what part of my parents life they want to replicate, what behaviors and actions will they carry on.

    Most expected me to cling to the family tree and honor the blood that flows in it…

    And instead I let go.  I dropped off the family tree.  I had to.  It was contaminated with sexual disease and with a mother who refuses to act against it.

    Many want to keep the mother, stating she is 'child like' that she isn't capable of more…perhaps. However, the mother that I knew directed her life in a way to suit herself. She never not once acted 'helpless'.  

    Helpless to leave him, yes I agree.  Helpless to actually go throught the steps of divorce, yes that too.  Helpless to actually see the damage she helped orchestrate, yes.  I see her helpless to recognize how her religion was a tool he used and that she held dear to her heart.  Helpless in that she was easily manipulated and controlled by those she loved…but she also is strong and determined.

    She is strong and determined to hold on to her religion. It is a subject not open for discussion. No matter how it was used to keep abuse going in her home, she is not opening that clenched fist.  She will not leave that church….no matter what. Her strength is showing…

    She is holding on to family…hers.  She refuses to drop her brother after he abused her…she is holding on tightly and will not budge. She refused to give up a husband…again that is her strength…that you see as weakness.

    This is where we parted ways.

    Where she is strong, I am weak….I let go easily when I feel abused, manipulated, lied to, betrayed…etc.  She holds on.

    My strength is knowing I can and will let go.

    The freedom I have to leave relationships that do not honor me is why my tree will grow different than hers.

    I am proud to say, I no longer take after my Mother.

    And our family trees will look different. Where hers has clusters of abusers, mine is abuser free.  What she hangs on her tree and what I have on mine are worlds apart.

    Each of our lives is a depiction of our tree. How you act, what you tolerate, who you gather with, what you let go of, what you say yes to and what you say no to….etc, are all colors on your tree.  

    You create your own family tree.








     


  • Just Like Her

    Is it possible to engage with one man whose roles are so far apart and not pick one? How can you manage in your mind an abusing father and not have to pick one as the majority?  Is it possible to literally put father in a preemptive role over sexual abuser?

    I had to make sure I had the word Preemptive correct….

    Preemptive…"Serving or intended to forestall something, esp. to prevent attack by disabling the enemy: "a preemptive strike".

    I did not put father in place trying to forstall the abuse, in fact I did the opposite.  I put the abuser in first place and the father second. For the affects of his abuse far outweighed any father stuff I received.

    So each of us will mourn the loss differently depending upon which role was in first place.

    If it is Dad or abuser.

    If it is Grandpa or abuser.

    It matters what you have tried to preempt.

    I am guilty of preempting the father….and my focus has been primarily on the abuser's damage to me.  The abuser's damage was too loud to hear the faint father things he did.

    In listening to my brother speak of how my parents arranged their home to best suit the pedophile, to how my mother was nagged to call and get girls to his Sunday dinner, I can't believe that preempting the abuser is possible?  How do you save father and mother from this?  How can you not see that the intentions of engagement with their children and their children's children have not all been for the good of the abuser?  Roast dinners now make me gag…they were the last supper of innocence for many.

    That no matter how hard you try and see the 'good' it will be preempted by evil.

    Many are wanting to "forgive" and forget….and to move on.  What they are wanting to desperately do, is to stall the attack of evil feelings…of evil knowing.  

    To know to the DNA of your soul….they were not kind, but evil. Their lives were set up to serve a pedophile and serve it they did. 

    Overlooking their evil adult behavior will not stall the evil from continuing.

    They need your blind faith and loving forgiveness and willingness to preempt all bad, always…to keep mom and dad in first place.  Come on good children, DO THAT.

    I am seen as angry, bitter and insane FOR not preempting evil…I am crazy for putting their evil deeds first. Really?  Did I set the candy dish in a place where little children had to climb over his lap to get a sweet treat???   Did I put the guilt on the adult children for not going to Sunday Dinner?  Really?  

    All my actions since 2004, have been to preempt father and to get you all to see the evil AND to respond in kind.  Not only was my mother played like a fiddle, so too have most of the children.

    When will you not see that father and mother are preempted in their worlds, that evil has taken first seat?  What will it take for you all to start acting like abused children instead of children?  To start seeing the damage and toll it has taken in your lives to not step away from thy father and thy mother and stop honoring them?  

    I am now and forever grateful, that I did not preempt evil.  

    Seeing this from the eyes of a loving child looking at their parents/grandparent OR from the eyes of an abused child, will make all the difference in the world.

    The two natures don't match, they have to be kept apart.  

    A loving father and an Abusive father are polar opposites….so trying to keep this dueling energies alive inside is impossible, one wins out.

    I let the father go for my sanity…

    Doesn't it seem insane, that by letting go of the loving one, I found my sanity.

    But, look back into our childhood home and tell me the efforts that were made to be a father…or loving grandparents.  Can you really really really….say that, when it was all set up to trap the next victim.  

    You all are preempting my voice, my questioning, my relentless blogging on this….to let go, move on….and be happy.   Is it possible?  Can you forstall forever what it has done to you?

    It is my belief, that your lives are set up to bring your truth to you.  It is begging now for your attention. It is more relentless than I.  It will badger you and hunt you down. There is no escaping your truth.  Abuse neglected WILL show up again and again and again, Until you change how you deal.  

    Preempting it is only forstalling the inevitable.

    Did your mother escape the evil?  Did her marriage thrive and flourish by 'moving on' again and again from evil?

    How are many any different than her.  Knowing you are dealing with an abuser, but doing many things for him anyway?  You are doing a role, just like her.







  • Not as I do

    I can see there is a niche market for cards; cards that fit the imperfect situation.

    It has been interesting to be the subject that is hard to deal with, yet again.

    Being a child of a known pedophile isn't an easy road to hoe….and it doesn't get easier when he dies.  Now, folks don't have a clue what to do, again.

    I will speak from my point of view, which is the tone of this whole blog.  It may or may not be the same for my siblings.  In fact, I am pretty sure I will step on toes and crinkle or bend them.

    What I have used as my own meter to know what people were up to, was to watch for actions. Words became meaningless, when words were the camouflage my mother drapped over abuse in our home.  

    I looked up the word "Camouflage".

    "Hide or disguise the presence of (a person, animal, or object) by means of camouflage."

    And if you just looked at actions minus the words what would you see in the way people are acting?

    What is their story on mute?

    A few have given me their words to ride along with actions, and feel the words MUST be with the Action OR the Action will be misread.

    Really?

    I sat with this.  I wondered how much of my actions need words?  How much of my life could be mis-represented and that you need an explanation for it?  Even if I said not a word on this blog, my actions are clear, loud and present.

    Is it not the same for them?

    What is a residual affect from waking up in an abusive home…after years of blindness, is that you want to see actions that you have previously missed.

    What I am finding discerning is that my mother's tool is being used on me…meaning words are given that don't match the action and yet I am 'suppose' to believe.

    That is the awkward family part…where words are to be more valuable than actions.

    And then there is this other awkward place, where friends don't know what to do…normal sympathy cards seem inappropriate and they are left not even wanting to bring it up.  Silence is the action choosen.

    Silence on my end feels equally as awkward as a sympathy card.

    My father did die.  I am once again an awkward moment.  I am finding that his death is just like when we first heard of his pedophilia, awkward not knowing what to say, so silence is chosen.

    Silence to me feels extremely empty.  Even the sympathy cards show movement and caring.

    I can see how there needs to be an imperfect card selection for folks like me…and a book on what would be helpful in these situations.  I do understand, for the general society rules don't apply.

    What I want you to know how it feels on this side of silence…and on this side of watching actions.  I feel like I now see the world like a child, how their candor and simple mindedness of seeing and feeling…of how explanations fall on deaf ears….

    Just as children do not believe what you say, but they believe what you do.

    Isn't there that old saying "do as I say not as I do"….

    Actions speak Louder than Words…






  • Wounded Child

    A thought that rolled around in my head last night was the sentiment "We are dealing with abuse, for we are taking care of him (Ray).  Which does imply that you are aware of who he is. But, are you aware of how it impacted you to do this?  How it wasn't caring for your abused and wounded self to step in and take care of your abuser?

    Dealing with the abuser and dealing with the affects being abused had on your life, are two totally different animals. They do not share the same space at all.

    I lifted not one finger, not one pinky to deal with the abuser. NOT one.  I have not lifted one finger to deal with his accomplice either.  

    Dealing with the abusers is in my opinion, is reaping more abuse.

    I am not even sure if it matters Why you thought it was something you Had to do….the mere fact that you were dealing with the abuser for so many years had to have an impact on your life.

    Again, dealing with abuse for me, was to deal with me.  To deal with learning how to say no.  With learning how to disappoint another in order to do so, and to not lift a finger in dealing with the abuser.

    I have been dealing with the affects of abuse in me and have paid no mind to where the abusers were, their lives…etc.  I felt to the dept of my being, that the first 46 years was me dealing with the abusers….and that they would not get one second of my next 40 years.

    Interesting to see how this mix-up was read.  No wonder they felt they were dealing with abuse…for they were in the lives of the abusers AFTER knowing about the abuse.  

    I dealt with the abusers BEFORE I knew who and what their lives were about.

    I guess this concerns me greatly that some feel that dealing is dealing with the abusers….while neglecting the cost and toll it has taken on their lives. That they feel that it is their duty….somehow.  Or I guess I can't know why they were dealing with the abusers while I was dealing with the affects of abuse on me.

    This again is a completely different mode of operation or starting point.

    I wonder how many other families this sentiment is running through, where dealing with abuse means 'taking care of the abusers needs etc'?

    I had said a long while back that the shoes I tossed aside were quickly filled.  I just didn't realize that they called it dealing with abuse.  I thought they were dealing with their parents.

    What does that mean when you can't stop dealing with the abusers?

    At what point does your life matter more than that of the abusers?

    And, an even scarier question….what does it mean when you are 'okay' dealing with the abusers, when you don't feel it is harmful to you?

    Wow…it is no wonder we didn't get along.  I was dealing with abuse while they were dealing with the abusers.  Yikes.  Now, that has to be one hell of a ride.  It is amazing that most never opted off.  Is that a clear sign of being abused….taking care of the abusers?

    I guess.  I did it for 46 years….and it didn't matter the cost. I gave up my life in order to deal with abusers.  I did it until I knew who I was dealing with…

    In fact, each decision that I have made after learning who they were…was decided upon how it impacted me.  I didn't lean or move an inch if it was for their comfort or their preference etc.  All my choices were made to make sure I was no longer dealing with the abusers.

    This is where I believe we parted ways…

    It would have been pure hell for me to deal with the abusers.

    While it hasn't been a walk in the park to deal with the affects of abuse, at least my abuse had stopped.  

    My brother marveled and was discouraged with My Line in cement.  I now know what the line is.  The line is taking care of the abusers on one side and taking care of your self on the other.

    One side will lower your self worth, the other will raise it.

    One has no choice, and the other complete freedom.

    One is a prison of obligation and service to others at the cost of your peace, love and joy of self. Oh, I could go on and on.

    I see clearly now where I went over the line and never looked back.

    To me, I saw that one side was caring for the wounded abused girl and the other side was caring for the abusers.  

    In order to keep caring for my little wounded girl I had to never cross that line…and I didn't.  

    No matter what….no matter who….my one and only priority has been to heal my wounded child….







  • Not Shady!

    In the past week, I sold my jeep and found another one…online. I called the place and began speaking to the salesman…Shadi.  Yep, Shady is what I called him.  I gave him a rough time about a "Used Car Salesman called Shady"….how he didn't inspire trust…we had fun with the name and we came up with a price on a right hand drive jeep for me.  A beautiful 2011 four door that I loved, online.

    So, I go to the banker and say I am buying this jeep from a man called Shady and that I haven't seen it, but I want a loan.  We do our business…she feels the need to ask if I am sure….We pull up the website it looks legit….and Shady and I have a friendship…so I feel good and confident…. and even my very conservative husband agrees for us to send Shady money, lots of it and then wait for them to ship us the jeep. 

    At one point, they will have it all….my money and my jeep and they are 13 hours away….but hey, I trust Shady.

    So, when the check is in my hand, I head straight to the Post Office and send it out Certified. That was on Friday.  Today is Wednesday….and no check has arrived at Shady's place.  

    He calls and says "Miss Beth….so, the check is in the mail, Hey?"

    I say, Honest Shady, I did put it in the mail….I am a mail lady….so now he gets his day to rib me.  Except it isn't as funny…for my money is lost…or hasn't arrived, is taking the long route….I don't know….and how long will Mr. Shady sit on this jeep with a buyer who keeps saying "the check is in the mail"  Honest.

    I actually sent him an email apologizing and said it was my Karma coming back to me…and that if it all falls apart…I understand...and all will know, is I will have to blame it on the US Mail, not Shady!



  • He is a dad

    I was caught off guard by how many went to Dallas when my father passed on…from what I can gather, and it may be a false reading, but 9 siblings and my mother gathered at his death.

    I know there were various reasons for making the pilgrimage to see his body…as many as there are of individual experiences each hold of him, but yet it still surprised me.  It broke the hope I had tucked neatly away…in a place called "For Now".

    Many years ago, I put aside our vast differences as being temporary….that at some point we would find a spot to stand on.  I left them on a shelf called "For Now".

    What they can't feel is how I feel as they gathered in a collective mourning about this man.

    They can't know how in keeping the father close and near in their memories that it makes the distance between us grow.  

    The more they speak of him in fatherly tones, the less I am believed.

    The credibility of a victim gets weakened each time.

    What I felt today or really late in the night was the crushing blow of the children gathering around the father…how until the end their loyalty was given.

    It is their rights, it is their choices, it is what brought them peace and closure….and in doing so closed me out again.

    I know it is not their intention, nor is it mine to continually be at odds, but they see a father and I see an abuser…and our actions are clearly saying so.

    I am not here to take away one memory or caring sentiment they carry about him, but I am here to tell them how it feels as a child/adult who has suffered abuse by his hands.

    Each time they call him dad, I am not believed…the abuse becomes the lie…and I a liar.  

    And when will they hold him accountable for his actions?

    When he is seen as an innocent dad, I am seen as one crazy cold hearted bitch…who rattles on and on about the affects of abuse.

    It continues to shock and awe me…as it crushes all hope.  He will become an even bigger kinder man now that he is gone.  Wow.  And I, one who is screaming of his abuse…will get labeled crazy and insane.  Wow and Wow again. 

    I woke in the night with coughs that turned into gags…it felt like my insides were revolting.  It was then, the impact of their gathering collided inside of me.  It was like the final separation…all hope was heaved out.

    This is what drives the abused insane….is the normal treatment of the abusers….how he continuall is not treated as an abuser…and how each time they do, it is another slap of disbelief.

    You truly cannot believe he is dad and an abuser….you only get to pick one.

    Nor can you see me as a sister and a crazy one….you only can see one.

    I am the crazy one and he they hold with kind memories.

    Really.  He that was on trial for sexual abuse is held in kind memories.  And I, who did what again????  I who echoed the voice of the little girl who stood and told the world who he was…am crazy???

    I blows my mind….I have a problem and he is a dad.



  • Abuse Died with Ray

    When I began writing, it was in a journal….silently.  I wrote to find out who I was, what I believed upon and who my choices served. I wrote and I wrote and I wrote.  

    At the time I was completely lost onto myself… and in writing the truth appears.  I began to know me…who I was and who I wanted to be.  I was able to excavate my past to re-direct my future…and in doing so, I have kept the volume on about abuse and its linger affects…when many would love for me to shut down the blog and let the abuse die in peace.

    My intentions were to first let my children know me…and secondly, to let others know how it feels to right oneself after abuse.

    In my mother's family, she had two sisters who we never knew, and yet they did not leave their story behind for us to read someday.  I wanted my reasons for being outside of the family to be known.  I wanted to leave my story behind.  

    I wanted to put down how I felt and why.  How I saw myself from many vantage points, how my life, my truth, my history, and the family legacy, and all that affected who I am today…..and how each relationship carried a twisted up part, Me.

    This blog has been about me and the long term affects of having been raised in abuse and a cult like religion and then trying to turn it all around.

    My family wants the abuse to die with Ray Huhta.  They want it to be of the past. 

    Abuse cannot be tied up and tossed away, it isn't that simple.  It isn't like a lamp in a room, you can toss out and be rid of it.  In fact, abuse doesn't live in one act, it doesn't live in one moment of anger, sexual desire, or hit. Abuse lives in the person's behaviors, habits, patterns and the way the see themselves and how they treat others.

    Abuse in the Huhta family will not be dead because Ray is.  

    It is alive and kicking in each of the people that he abused, that knew he abused and want to focus instead on his good. That is where abuse lives.  It isn't in one act.  It is in the way we deal with the act or not deal.

    It is in the way the act makes us believe differently about the world and the people who 'love us' and we call family.  

    Abuse cannot be put in a box and tossed away.  Abuse is in the little decisions we make, the small choices….whether we speak out or remain silent. Who we support and who we stand against…Abuse is in the DNA of who you are IF you were raised in a home of abuse.

    Many would love for me to shut down this blog, to get back into line, to let the abuse go.  Like that would make a difference to abuse.  It won't. Abuse is traveling in each of our lives every day.  It is how we feel about ourselves.  How we interact in relationships. How we operate in our truth and integrity or how we live behind a facade.

    If only Abuse in the Huhta's would die with Ray.  If magically all the girls whose lives he messed up, would magically turn to love peace and joy. If their self worth was restored. If their power magically turned on….

    Instead all that died was the man who did damage to many little girls. LITTLE girls…who then grew up with this twisted piece inside of them. That is where abuse now lives.  It is inside of the girls he touched.  In the way they feel about themselves.

    If only I could get people to understand that abuse isn't in Ray….once he touched the little girls, he changed their lives forever. They will never not be un-abused. That is where the abuse is.

    These girls are now living their lives with this inside of them.  Something changed within them.  And if you were his daughter….its affects are deeper and if he raped you, deeper still.

    I am but one little girl.

    I have wrote and wrote and wrote….to right my world.  

    Abuse didn't die…when Ray's body left this earth.

    Abuse is alive and well…its impact is in the lives of the girls.  In how they see men, how they act in physical sexual relationships…how they manage intimacy and truth and their own voice and empowered actions.

    OH MY God….if only abuse died with Ray.


  • Harder than being abused.

    A few days ago I talked about "Family No Matter What" and how this sentiment is what keeps families bound together; no matter what treatment goes on within the home.   That it is seen as respectable and loving to uphold the family AND NOT LOOK at WHAT happened.  

    Keep your eyes focused on family, on sister, brother, Mom and Dad…

    Don't look at who carries the title, but look only at the title and do your due dilegence to keep it holy.  Do NoT disgrace the title with what happened.  Instead, bless it away, forgive the sin, and wipe the label clean.  It is your job as a loyal family member.

    I became disloyal to the family.  I did not wipe the abuse away.   

    My greatest crime against the Huhta's is my lack of being a good family member.

    I am seen as a worst criminal than my father, for this.

    This is the ultimate sin of all…for blood is thicker than water, and that family is family…you have no right to tear it apart.

    Me. 

    Not my father, but me.

    Why is my father not seen as the ultimate family wrecking machine?  Or my mother for allowing this wrecking to go on?

    How did I become the one to stand back from and to disassociate from?

    How did I become the main problem for the family in this?

    Oh yeah, my disloyalty to family.  Really?  Really?  You want me to be loyal to Ray and to Doris for watching this train wreck happen again and again.  You want me to be loyal to a religion and it preacher who knew and blessed it away, again and again. Really?  I am the problem?  How?  By standing up and walking away from the wreckage a wreck myself and working for 7 years to get myself seeing straight and thinking clearly, after the twisted backwards course I was set upon.  I, Beth Ann am your problem?

    One brother said I took the easy way out…that I just up and left the family due to its members being so damaged.  

    Is there an easy way after abuse???

    I am not sure there is.

    What I want most of my family to know, is that no matter your choice, no matter if it matches mine or not, I know to the depth of my being, that each of you are choosing to do that which brings you the most peace inside.

    Each choice you make is driven by your inner compass.  Each decision you make and each effort to stay clear from me is what brings you the most comfort inside. You are all using your free will to live the life you want.  It is not driven by the outside, but rather your inside.

    My inside and your insides just do not match.

    What brings you peace brings me disease.

    What brings you comfort…is extremely uncomfortable for me.

    Family means more to each of you…and your willingness to uphold it, is far from where my priorities lie.

    My priorities have been and will always be to make choices in each moment that are about the consequences each will bring.  I am consciously creating now, where in the past I was blindly making choices based upon another's feelings.  Now, I totally get that each choice I make comes with a complete package of consequences.

    It is my intentions to make choices that my children will be able to see were reflective of the truth and that I made the choices based upon what was right for me, not what the outside wanted or needed.

    Going against family is actually harder than being abused.

  • Stand in Harms Way

    I have been twisting my situation around and around in my head; the awkwardness of being estranged and having your parent die and how others are unsure of what this means to us.

    I finally got it.

    Death is a separation and usually an unwanted separation and hence we offer our sympathies.  But, when a person purposefully separates; desiring distance, especially from a parent or other family members, it is a forced death of sorts.

    Now, we don't know what to do when someone kills a relationship on purpose…

    The unnatural killing of family ties, is not something we are inclined to understand, for it goes against the grain of nature.  And once separated and the relationship is dead, and then the death of the body occurs, it is like being asked to grieve a second time….for an already dead person.

    I am not certain if this makes sense to anyone other than those who have experienced estrangement and how it leaves us in this weird place….a re-death.

    Not only is it uncomfortable for many to understand the estrangement and total death of a relationship, it is equally uncomfortable to bring up this old death again when the body dies….now what to say???

    To me it is just another new awkward moment.

    It is like the death is re-occurring, for it is happening for the first time for those who were not estranged…but, for me…it has already happened.

    I killed our relationship due to his behaviors…he died way back when….It was not a physical death, but a death nonetheless.  I felt its grief, the pain, all…while no one then could feel it like me…unless they too were ending their relationship with him.

    Mine wasn't just putting distance and not seeing him.  Mine was to completely turn my heart and mind, to dislodge the image of father, replacing it with an abuser.  My father died when the file was completely turned. I became a girl without a dad.

    I did this to save my sanity, to stop the insane father image that wasn't there.  In order to have the truth and reality match, I had no choice.

    While he died inside of me, he lived outside. He continued to live, but I didn't see him no more. 

    Now, my insides match the outsides.

    For me, it feels more peaceful not to have a ghost of my dead relationship still moving about the planet…and maybe even the teeny bits of hope of him changing now too have died. For once he is dead all hope dies too.

    I now understand the unease and awkwardness….for it truly is unnatural to kill family relationships.  But, what most need to remind themselves it should be natural when an unnatural act has happened.

    My father took the first unnatural step…and my mother followed, unnaturally as well. 

    So, while it seems unnatural to move away…it is actually a very natural response to harm.  It is more unnatural to stand in harms way.


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