Repetitive ramblings that are suppose to make me feel better

It actually happened. Not that I really believed that my grandma died and as morbid as it sounds I still thought I heard her talking as if it was all just another scene. Then I watched her be wheeled out in a zipped up body bag. It is now the end of a brutal chapter.

I thought I would feel better about this. I figured everyone else would have their moments and I would be the one they thought was soulless because I wouldn’t even be able to shed a tear, but that has not been the case.

I watched my cousins be told last night and as they came across the room and hugged me and wouldn’t let go I thought I would be the strong one. I thought I would finally feel safe and as if I would not have to protect them and hide them behind me anymore.

I have been saying for years that I just wish she would die. I wanted to burn down her house that she no longer lives in. I was hoping that they would help me forget and move on and feel better. But nothing works. I still feel awful and am drowning myself in coping mechanisms that only allow relief for the night. Is anything going to make this all go away?

My grandma called me a liar and told me that I made everything up and that she did not do anything. As angry as I was for her denying my feelings and memories I really wish I could. Was that what she was trying to do? Was she in her death bed years ago trying to help me let her go by trying to make me think it never happened?

My grandfather sought out for redemption in his final days as this big monster with walls higher than China sat down and told me that he was proud of me for something (wish I could remember) and then cried and hugged me and apologized. Thinking about it just makes me tear up. I wanted to bury the past with him and blame him but knew he was different and I was just content. I no longer understood or could explain and I was ok with that.

I wish I felt content about this. I wanted to make peace years ago with her but she just did not allow it. And now on Friday we will bury her, bury emotions, and bury memories. I hope.

Finished Business?

Almost two years ago I wrote about my rocky past involving my grandparents and all of the anger I have felt from that situation (titled “Unfinished Business”). I also wrote about how I was unsure if I wanted to confront the issue and speak my peace. To continue those thoughts I marched into my grandmother’s hospital room that night and told her that I remembered and she told me I was a liar. She told me that I made it all up and that the bruises were fictitious discoloring of the skin. If only I knew I had that great of an imagination all along!

I told her she could try to convince me into forgetting and pretending like it would never happen but that she could not erase the recent events of her mistreating my mother. I told her she would never talk to my mother like that again or lay a hand on anyone in my life. She told me I was being absurd. Then other family members walked in and I walked out of that room and out of her life.

I said what I wanted to but it didn’t matter. It did not make a difference in my life or with my feelings. It did not change our relationship and I just kept on ignoring her until two weeks ago today.

It was a Tuesday afternoon and I got a phone call from my mom asking me to go to the emergency room because my grandmother was being taken there by EMS. She just asked me to see if she was being transported to Fort Wayne so my mom would not have to drive her for nothing so I reluctantly agreed for my mom’s sake. When I got there they did not know if she was going to stay all night or not and I suddenly realized I was going to have to spend the entire night in her room waiting for news. My aunt said she was too tired to stay, my cousin had to get home to her kids, and my mom was sick and not allowed in the hospital because of the swine flu.

I stayed and was civil, but maintained surface level conversation and avoided all eye contact (even though she is blind it made me feel better that I stayed distant). I cancelled all my plans and ended up with her all night and taking her home until my aunt got home to take care of her. The next day was her 76th birthday and I even went to lunch with her and my family. She suddenly felt better just like the other dozen times she had seemed to fake near death experiences.

My mom applauded me for helping out but she knew it caused a lot of turmoil for me. I did not like taking care of her. Who would like to take care of a person who denies you your right of emotions and life changing memories? I was the most angry and hateful that I have been in years. I even pushed my cousin down and cursed at her when she tried to hug me.

Since then my grandma had been hospitalized and put in the nursing home for a 30 day recovery process in which my parents would ask me to come visit and I continually said no. I wouldn’t even make up excuses anymore, I just said no. Even Saturday night my parents asked me to come to the nursing home just so I could make dinner plans with them there than leave to go eat and I would not even do that. I wanted nothing to do with her.

Yesterday my mom came over and I could see the concern and hurt in her eyes. She even asked the staff at the nursing home if my grandmother was going through the dying process and they looked shock that she would even ask and told her no. But this was a new look in my mother’s eyes.

Generally I am awful at answering my phone, I just don’t like to, but yesterday I answered every phone call from everyone in my family. Even if I knew I barely had reception I answered it. I just had this feeling that at any moment someone would be calling me and telling me that my grandma had passed on. I don’t know why I had this feeling and I was really apathetic about it honestly, but that is what I thought every time. But every time it was about something else.

Until this morning.

My grandmother passed away. Like really passed away. Jokes are over. And it really happened. I had to go see with my own eyes, and even when I walked within a few feet of her to grab a Kleenex I swore I heard her talk. I thought it was just another game. She is more strong willed and stubborn than me so I just could not believe it. Then I saw her wrapped up and carried out in a zipped up body bag.

So what do I do now? I talked previously about how I buried a lot of pain with my grandfather and blamed him for everything until she proved to me that she was not blameless what so ever. Is it really over though? Can my guard really go down now? Is it safe to live fearless of her hurting me again?

I honestly have been hoping she would just die. For years now that was what I wanted because I could not see her without being immediately angry and mad. I didn’t want to deal with the continual emotions of wondering if she would make it through this sickness or this hospital visit. I thought I would feel better when I got the call that she was really gone. I thought I would feel relief. But I don’t.

I tried to make peace though, I wanted to forgive her, and even at one point I was mad at my mom for not letting my grandmother live with us and for putting her in a nursing home temporarily. None of those mattered because she wouldn’t accept that. Even my grandfather apologized the summer before he died as he cried and hugged me. She couldn’t even do that.

So why do I care? Why am I sitting at Starbucks looking like a fool crying about this? Why wasn’t this a good life changing moment in my life? Why did she die in the room that coincidentally is my lucky number? How do I move on? Can I really forget and move on now? Will I ever get a single answer to any of these questions?

Sometimes I Doubt God

This statement should not come as a surprise because 1) I am human and 2) if you have read any of my previous blogs or talked to me once it has probably came up. Today this was also the title of the sermon at church where our worship pastor got in front of the entire congregation and talked about confessions of a pastor.

He talked about how church is the place for those who doubt God and where we should come with our struggles, our addictions, and our reasons on why we hate God because it is the safe place to be. I use to believe that. Now I go to church and avoid eye contact with particular people who make my presence or the presence of my family seem like a bother. I am suppose to go to the people sitting around me in the auditorium when I am just unsure about life and need a little confidence booster. I am suppose to go to the same people who also sit there and say that my family and I are not good enough to even be sitting there because we have sinned. Maybe I should just carry around stones so they can throw them because the people I meet outside of church would not do that, they have sinned just like me. Perfect people are only in the church I guess.

How am I not supposed to doubt God and the church when this is all I can think about when I am sitting next to these hypocrites? I know this is not what my pastor wants and I saw his wife cry today at the mention of how I feel when I walk in those doors. Will it ever change though?
Sometimes I doubt God more because life just sucks for me most days. I can’t make it through even a Hallmark movie as I sit and wish that my life could turn out like that, or that my past could have been as blessed as some. Sometimes, ok most of the time, I doubt God because he would not have created a life like the one I see in the mirror.

I look in the mirror and I don’t see a lot. I see a lot of potential, but the potential is bruised, maimed, and hidden because life just isn’t what I expected. That is the definition of doubt anyways. No one doubts what they want to see, they only doubt when their expectations go unmet.

Two weeks ago I got my first birthday cake and presents since I was in single digits. Last night I watched an incredibly proud father not even able to keep in his excitement and joy when listening to his son’s cd because of how amazing it was. Today I watched a lady try to offer me food and money and a hug as I sat there and cried.

Isn’t my family supposed to do those things? Aren’t my parents suppose to tell me when I do something good and that they are proud of? Or wish me happy birthday? Or give me a sandwich when I am hungry?

I watch my friend as he has been changing and is becoming more and more like the man he wants to be and I cannot help but be jealous. When can I reach that moment where I can no longer doubt but be able to see the change in my life and the beautiful moments even amidst the ugly?

The party life has sucked me in. It lives up to its expectations. I go home feeling important because I had friends around all night, they may not remember my name in the morning but at least they remembered for awhile. I wake up feeling awful and going through my day and return to it at night where it greets me with open arms and temporarily lets me forget about the bruises, the maiming, and the hidden topics.

I don’t want that and I know that the potential God has put in me is much more than that. But sometimes I doubt God honestly because I need some earthly representation that is gonna step up and not try to make up and rub in the fact that I have had some absent people in my life. And sometimes I doubt God because I know I am gonna have to face the facts, mend some wounds, and try and pretend like things in the past didn’t happen so I can genuinely love without being extravagant or becoming tired and weary.