2023-12-19 - 6:16 p.m.
Forgiveness is hard.
The words are like daggers in my mind. Cutting through all the good memories leaving nothing unharmed. I hear the words, the inflection of the voice that said them. See the expression when they were delivered. And months later while trying to come to terms with reorganizing how they see and feel about you they double down and affirm you didn't mishear.
You hear them saying you'll regret all the lost time but in the same breath minimizing and dismissing the hurt they've caused.
I feel like a horrible person because I can't take my mother telling me they fundamentally think bad things about me. They called me a bully with fear in their eyes. They said when I'm with my siblings I'm worse. She isn't the only one who thinks so. There are others who agree.
The bad things are truly easier to believe. I'm questioning my whole existence. How have I lived this long and no told me what kind of person I am?
Why does someone who doesn't think well of me want to have any sort of a relationship. I am the bad guy for needing space. But they have the culpability for raising this awful person they despise. No ownership for not brining concerns to the fore long ago. Bringing up incidents from decades ago.
I could forgive it all though without the words "I'm not the only one who thinks so." As they confirmed my dead father is who they were referencing.
I feel the knife twisting with words that can't ever be taken back as they double down saying I'm sorry my words made you feel that way that wasn't my intent. What was the intent of invoking the dead to make your point?
I can't sleep. I don't want to log in to work. I just want to lay in bed all day. I know something is wrong with me.
If two people think ill of me how many more of them exist? What kind of awful do you have to be for your parents to dislike you?
I received Christmas presents from her. I can't bring myself to text or call. I hover over the words I could say but can't press the button. I fear any response. Good or bad. Because I don't know what is behind them. Is this part of me being a bully too?
I want to wash my brain. Make it like the conversation never happened. But the sad part was I was coming terms, the original conversation happened in August, but I was not effervescent when talking to them in the days and months after. I couldn't fake it. But I was responding. I was still making an effort until the conversation in November when they had poke. When they had to know why. When they couldn't let it go and confirmed the invocation of my dead father was not in my imagination.
When is enough enough?
Why am I not enough?
