Day 325 The Perfect Mom Project

My life is full of the best laid plans. I had planned to visit my Aunt Nina yesterday, but I could not get a hold of her by phone yesterday morning, so I decided I did not want to make the forty minute drive to find out she was going on an outing or doing an activity. Mark went to see her last night to pay her bills and let her know that I would be coming by today, and that is what I did. I fastened on my big girl britches this morning and climbed in the car, stopping along the way at a local orchard to buy her some cherries to eat. When I arrived at the senior community my aunt was somewhat cold and distant, but I was not going to be deterred. I am tired of being intimidated by my aunt. I am tired of feeling like I have to "behave". Let's face it I am 50 years old, not 10.

 I have spent most of my life worried that I am letting someone down, mostly my Mom when I was younger, then more recently my Dad and my Aunt. There is no way to make anyone else happy, that is their own choice. It seems, at least in the case of my Dad and my Aunt that a bar or standard was set and no matter what I do or did, I could never meet it successfully. I have to stop and I have to stop now. There is no chance of me ever being what my Aunt needs or wants, because that would require me to be someone that I am not. In the case of my Dad, I could not be the kind of person that agreed with him about everything he said. For both of them (my Aunt and Dad) expected me to make them the center of who I am.

 In the last few days I have come to realize that in order to please others you must sometimes give away a piece of who you are. For some people like my husband Mark and my children I give myself away freely and with others, like my Dad, I was always putting my toe in the pool to see if it would be cold and painful first. Most times it was cold, painful and sometimes hurtful. Sadly, in the last months of his life my Dad hurt and shocked me so badly that I lost all willingness to share any of myself with him. With my Aunt it is different, I am reserved and I basically shut down when I am with her. I focus as much as I can on her and her needs and ignore her rude and thoughtless comments. She is 92, she is not going to change and I do not want her to. I would like to grow a back bone and stand tall when she is hurtful and thoughtless. That is how it works. It is just like I tell my girls pretty much all the time…you cannot change others, you can only change yourself. That means I have some work to do before I return to visit my Aunt next Friday. I will be consuming lots of calcium to build a very strong back bone. It is time that I take hold of the sails of my life and turn them towards a brighter light.