Cautiously optimistic...
So, littleBro called me Sunday afternoon. I needed a little time to process it. I don't think I actually expected him to call; I just figured he probably wouldn't. It was a pleasant, if somewhat nerve wracking surprise.
It was awkward at first. I was nervous; I didn't know what to talk about. We've been distantly in contact since 2015, a slow thaw from the previous 10+ years of zero communication; but other than a few IMs on FaceCrack, there wasn't anything personal or meaningful. He and his wife post pictures of their kids, but they are like me in the way that everything they post on FaceCrack is fairly innocuous.
He started by asking about my kids, and actually sounded interested. "I want to know about them," he said. That specific phrasing, showing he had a personal interest got me.
So, I told him about the kids. Then he asked about my job and what I've been up to so I told him a little about my job and my company, then flipped it around and asked about him. I know he's an engineer, but other than that, I didn't really know what he does. So he told me that it was difficult when you go to work every day knowing that the world hates you - he works for an oil company - but you do it, you work your hardest to do a good job, keep people safe and deliver a product people want - but they hate you anyway. He said that they actually have therapists, like crisis councillors, for the employees because morale is so poor.
Regardless of what you think of the oil industry, it must really suck to be in that position. I remember how a friend once told me, "Have fun working for Satan!" when I started working for a warranty company. It was really disheartening - I can't imagine what it would be like working in the oil industry these days.
I asked about his kids, and I tell you man, I just soaked it up. One of the biggest regrets I have about not having a relationship with littleBro is missing out on being an aunt, and my kids missing out on having cousins. He told me all about their quirks and foibles, and his worries as a dad. It sounds like my eldest nephew is kind of an introvert and very concerned about his image. The middle child, my younger nephew is too smart for his own good - I laughed at the stories! LittleBro said that boy is either going to run a fortune 500 company or a crime syndicate, he's scary smart and analytical and finds all the loopholes and exceptions... he sounds delightful. The youngest, my niece, sounds like shes arty and crafty and maybe just a wee bit pampered, but also looking for attention from her big brother (oh, don't I remember what that was like!)
And then... things got very hard. They were good, but they were hard. He told me about some of the things he went through with my mom. And it was so horribly painful to hear, and to realize that I never knew, but it explains so much.
See, I had a very complicated relationship with my mother. It took me years to admit she was emotionally abusive and manipulative. She was somewhat physically abusive to me, but it was mostly limited to slaps on the arm (which was usually the easiest for her to reach) when I pissed her off. Sometimes across the face, but that was fairly rare. Mostly, though, I was my mom's emotional support, and it was mom and us kids against the step-monster.
LittleBro, though... the step-monster was his dad. So he was caught in the middle, and they used him as a weapon against each other. And when they were in the throes of nuclear meltdown level fights, neither were capable of mitigating the collateral damage they caused.
I can't believe that I forgot some of these things. I thought I could never forget. But ok, I guess not so much that I forgot as I don't think about this stuff all the time anymore. A decade of therapy did help!
LittleBro reminded me of how they used to scream and fight until he would throw up. Fuck, I can't believe that I forgot about that. My poor LittleBro, a 4 year old boy, a 6 year old, an 8 year old, and they would fight and scream and he would cry and beg them to stop, and then he would start throwing up and throwing up. I would be sit beside him in the bathroom, crying, and they wouldn't stop. My mom would scream at the monster, "Look what you're doing to your son!" But she didn't stop either.
Of course, I remember the times when she tried the 'just don't respond' strategy. He would just rage in and out of room, randomly screaming all day, getting even angrier because she wouldn't scream back, but that's a whole 'nother story.
The step monster became more and more abusive toward AlabamaBro as he got older. When he was around 14, he was running from monster, sobbing in terror as monster was going to beat him for not doing a chore. I remember jumping out of my room into the hallway in front of monster, trying to stop him and give my brother time to get away - I would have been 9 I guess? The monster just threw me out of the way like I was a rag, I remember feeling so helpless, I was trying to save my brother but I was less than a feather or a pebble. It did, at least, give him AlabamaBro enough time to run out the front door. Eventually monster calmed down and AlabamaBro came back inside. I imagine mom must have yelled at monster to leave big brother alone, but I don't really remember much after that.
So yeah. My brother ran outside, at night, after a shower in just his underwear. It was safer than staying inside with the monster.
Anyway, that summer, mom sent AlabamaBro to visit my dad. He never came back - hence he became AlabamaBro forevermore.
Fast forward a few year; monster was never quite as violent toward me as AlabamaBro - mostly verbal insults, shaming, humiliation, name calling, the lite version of the stuff he did to my mom. But it got worse as I got older. The threats were more sever. He pushed me down the steps into the landing. Threatened to beat me. Made gross comments about me bringing my 'boyfriends' home now that I had a bedroom with an actual door in the basement. (I was maybe 12 or 13 when he made that comment I think?)
Finally, my mom sent me away to boarding school in grade 10. I was 14, and after that, except for school holidays, I never lived at home again.
LittleBro was all alone in the warzone. And I knew it, but I was just so damn grateful to not be there and so fucked up by the years of living in that hell, and so overwhelmed trying to get my own head on straight for the next decade, I never realized how much worse it was for him, because monster was his dad and there was an emotional investment there that I never had. And as much as I hated monster, and knew that monster could not have cared if I lived or died, monster did love his son. He had proclaimed as much repeatedly over the years and I believe, in his own fucked up way, in as much as he was capable of doing so, he loved LittleBro. And does to this day.
Well, the really painful part of this whole conversation came about when LittleBro mentioned that he had a hobby, he liked to fix ATVs. He'd never had a hobby before, and he enjoyed it. I told him I'd always thought he enjoyed riding horses, mom had all these pictures of him riding.
He vehemently stated he hated riding horses, he used to cry every time he was forced to. Monster would squeeze his arm, pinch him so tight, trying to make him stop crying. And then he said that our experiences of mom and dad were very different; he'd always felt that his dad loved him, as bad of a job he might have done of it, but that if he'd died, that that would have been ok with mom. He told me how when he was around 14 or 15, he made a comment to her one night when she'd been drinking - my mom was a full on heavy drinking alcoholic - anyway, they'd been fighting and he told her that she should have another drink.
Important to note here: monster always used to say this to her when they were fighting. "Have another drink," he'd sneer and then accuse her of cheating on him with other men, or if not men, other women. Call her a witch. No really, like a witch, spells and evil type witch. And attack her sisters and mother, calling them horrible things, whores and brainwashed and on and on and on. No matter what she said, it was back to telling her to have another drink.
She lost it on him completely and started beating on him, hitting him with both of her hands, punching, slapping as hard as she could, and all he could do was try to protect his head until it was over and she exhausted herself. He said from then on, she stopped taking care of him.
Now I think he must have told me that he made that comment to her once, many years ago. It sounded familiar. But he never told me that she attacked him. And right after that, she stopped caring for him at all. I knew that she'd stopped cooking for him and the monster - one of the few times I came home as an adult, I realized she didn't ever cook anymore, I asked her why. She said something about having done enough and they could take care of themselves, but I never really understood. It makes a lot more sense now.
Then littleBro really broke my heart.
He played hockey in HS and apparently, during a game, he'd gotten hurt. He was at the rink and town and called her at the farm to tell her. She told him that he should probably go to the doctor.
The town we lived in had no doctors. Closest one would be next town over, 6 miles away. So my littleBro had to figure out how to get there by himself. The doctor told him it was broken and he needed surgery, so he caller her. She told him that he better go to the hospital then. The closest hospital is the town in the opposite direction over 30 miles away, but for surgery, he'd probably need to go to the one in the town 60 miles away. So there he is, 17 years old, trying to figure out how to get to the hospital - again, by himself.
He'd been speaking in a matter of fact voice up till that point, with little dry chuckles as he told me the most horrific things. I know this coping mechanism, I use it myself sometimes when talking about my child hood and people gape in horror. I just chuckle and say, "It's fine, I'm over it,". He kept saying it was fine, he was fine, but suddenly it wasn't fine and his voice cracked and I could hear the grief and pain in as he said, "I didn't even think it was weird, I just had to figure out how to get to the hospital myself… what kind of mother lets her teenage kid go for surgery alone?"
He got really quiet for a moment, cleared his throat and got control of his emotions again. I was openly weeping and telling him how sorry I was and then he apologized to me, saying he didn't call me to upset me, and he shouldn't have said anything. Well, I nipped that in the bud and told him I wanted to know, I wanted to hear it all, I wish he'd told me 25 years ago when it was happening, but I'd take what I could get. And that it wasn't ok, and if I'd have known, I would have done something, I don't know, had him come out and live with me, something thought I know, realistically, that would never have worked. I told him I was sorry he had to go through it alone and I believed him because I know what mom was like - the monster abused her and beat her and terrified and threatened us all, but when mom got her rage on, she would hit too. I saw it get worse as we got older - I guess I just got out before I saw her turn on littleBro.
Ultimately, we talked for 2 1/2 hours and I think I cried for at least an hour of that time. But it was good. I had a headache the rest of the day and Monday felt kind of like an emotional hangover day. It took me a good chunk of yesterday evening and tonight to write this. It's long and rambly and I really don't honestly expect anyone to read it, but I needed to put it in words and process it.
This entry was originally posted at https://shaddyr.dreamwidth.org/420470.html. Please comment wherever you want.
It was awkward at first. I was nervous; I didn't know what to talk about. We've been distantly in contact since 2015, a slow thaw from the previous 10+ years of zero communication; but other than a few IMs on FaceCrack, there wasn't anything personal or meaningful. He and his wife post pictures of their kids, but they are like me in the way that everything they post on FaceCrack is fairly innocuous.
He started by asking about my kids, and actually sounded interested. "I want to know about them," he said. That specific phrasing, showing he had a personal interest got me.
So, I told him about the kids. Then he asked about my job and what I've been up to so I told him a little about my job and my company, then flipped it around and asked about him. I know he's an engineer, but other than that, I didn't really know what he does. So he told me that it was difficult when you go to work every day knowing that the world hates you - he works for an oil company - but you do it, you work your hardest to do a good job, keep people safe and deliver a product people want - but they hate you anyway. He said that they actually have therapists, like crisis councillors, for the employees because morale is so poor.
Regardless of what you think of the oil industry, it must really suck to be in that position. I remember how a friend once told me, "Have fun working for Satan!" when I started working for a warranty company. It was really disheartening - I can't imagine what it would be like working in the oil industry these days.
I asked about his kids, and I tell you man, I just soaked it up. One of the biggest regrets I have about not having a relationship with littleBro is missing out on being an aunt, and my kids missing out on having cousins. He told me all about their quirks and foibles, and his worries as a dad. It sounds like my eldest nephew is kind of an introvert and very concerned about his image. The middle child, my younger nephew is too smart for his own good - I laughed at the stories! LittleBro said that boy is either going to run a fortune 500 company or a crime syndicate, he's scary smart and analytical and finds all the loopholes and exceptions... he sounds delightful. The youngest, my niece, sounds like shes arty and crafty and maybe just a wee bit pampered, but also looking for attention from her big brother (oh, don't I remember what that was like!)
And then... things got very hard. They were good, but they were hard. He told me about some of the things he went through with my mom. And it was so horribly painful to hear, and to realize that I never knew, but it explains so much.
See, I had a very complicated relationship with my mother. It took me years to admit she was emotionally abusive and manipulative. She was somewhat physically abusive to me, but it was mostly limited to slaps on the arm (which was usually the easiest for her to reach) when I pissed her off. Sometimes across the face, but that was fairly rare. Mostly, though, I was my mom's emotional support, and it was mom and us kids against the step-monster.
LittleBro, though... the step-monster was his dad. So he was caught in the middle, and they used him as a weapon against each other. And when they were in the throes of nuclear meltdown level fights, neither were capable of mitigating the collateral damage they caused.
I can't believe that I forgot some of these things. I thought I could never forget. But ok, I guess not so much that I forgot as I don't think about this stuff all the time anymore. A decade of therapy did help!
LittleBro reminded me of how they used to scream and fight until he would throw up. Fuck, I can't believe that I forgot about that. My poor LittleBro, a 4 year old boy, a 6 year old, an 8 year old, and they would fight and scream and he would cry and beg them to stop, and then he would start throwing up and throwing up. I would be sit beside him in the bathroom, crying, and they wouldn't stop. My mom would scream at the monster, "Look what you're doing to your son!" But she didn't stop either.
Of course, I remember the times when she tried the 'just don't respond' strategy. He would just rage in and out of room, randomly screaming all day, getting even angrier because she wouldn't scream back, but that's a whole 'nother story.
The step monster became more and more abusive toward AlabamaBro as he got older. When he was around 14, he was running from monster, sobbing in terror as monster was going to beat him for not doing a chore. I remember jumping out of my room into the hallway in front of monster, trying to stop him and give my brother time to get away - I would have been 9 I guess? The monster just threw me out of the way like I was a rag, I remember feeling so helpless, I was trying to save my brother but I was less than a feather or a pebble. It did, at least, give him AlabamaBro enough time to run out the front door. Eventually monster calmed down and AlabamaBro came back inside. I imagine mom must have yelled at monster to leave big brother alone, but I don't really remember much after that.
So yeah. My brother ran outside, at night, after a shower in just his underwear. It was safer than staying inside with the monster.
Anyway, that summer, mom sent AlabamaBro to visit my dad. He never came back - hence he became AlabamaBro forevermore.
Fast forward a few year; monster was never quite as violent toward me as AlabamaBro - mostly verbal insults, shaming, humiliation, name calling, the lite version of the stuff he did to my mom. But it got worse as I got older. The threats were more sever. He pushed me down the steps into the landing. Threatened to beat me. Made gross comments about me bringing my 'boyfriends' home now that I had a bedroom with an actual door in the basement. (I was maybe 12 or 13 when he made that comment I think?)
Finally, my mom sent me away to boarding school in grade 10. I was 14, and after that, except for school holidays, I never lived at home again.
LittleBro was all alone in the warzone. And I knew it, but I was just so damn grateful to not be there and so fucked up by the years of living in that hell, and so overwhelmed trying to get my own head on straight for the next decade, I never realized how much worse it was for him, because monster was his dad and there was an emotional investment there that I never had. And as much as I hated monster, and knew that monster could not have cared if I lived or died, monster did love his son. He had proclaimed as much repeatedly over the years and I believe, in his own fucked up way, in as much as he was capable of doing so, he loved LittleBro. And does to this day.
Well, the really painful part of this whole conversation came about when LittleBro mentioned that he had a hobby, he liked to fix ATVs. He'd never had a hobby before, and he enjoyed it. I told him I'd always thought he enjoyed riding horses, mom had all these pictures of him riding.
He vehemently stated he hated riding horses, he used to cry every time he was forced to. Monster would squeeze his arm, pinch him so tight, trying to make him stop crying. And then he said that our experiences of mom and dad were very different; he'd always felt that his dad loved him, as bad of a job he might have done of it, but that if he'd died, that that would have been ok with mom. He told me how when he was around 14 or 15, he made a comment to her one night when she'd been drinking - my mom was a full on heavy drinking alcoholic - anyway, they'd been fighting and he told her that she should have another drink.
Important to note here: monster always used to say this to her when they were fighting. "Have another drink," he'd sneer and then accuse her of cheating on him with other men, or if not men, other women. Call her a witch. No really, like a witch, spells and evil type witch. And attack her sisters and mother, calling them horrible things, whores and brainwashed and on and on and on. No matter what she said, it was back to telling her to have another drink.
She lost it on him completely and started beating on him, hitting him with both of her hands, punching, slapping as hard as she could, and all he could do was try to protect his head until it was over and she exhausted herself. He said from then on, she stopped taking care of him.
Now I think he must have told me that he made that comment to her once, many years ago. It sounded familiar. But he never told me that she attacked him. And right after that, she stopped caring for him at all. I knew that she'd stopped cooking for him and the monster - one of the few times I came home as an adult, I realized she didn't ever cook anymore, I asked her why. She said something about having done enough and they could take care of themselves, but I never really understood. It makes a lot more sense now.
Then littleBro really broke my heart.
He played hockey in HS and apparently, during a game, he'd gotten hurt. He was at the rink and town and called her at the farm to tell her. She told him that he should probably go to the doctor.
The town we lived in had no doctors. Closest one would be next town over, 6 miles away. So my littleBro had to figure out how to get there by himself. The doctor told him it was broken and he needed surgery, so he caller her. She told him that he better go to the hospital then. The closest hospital is the town in the opposite direction over 30 miles away, but for surgery, he'd probably need to go to the one in the town 60 miles away. So there he is, 17 years old, trying to figure out how to get to the hospital - again, by himself.
He'd been speaking in a matter of fact voice up till that point, with little dry chuckles as he told me the most horrific things. I know this coping mechanism, I use it myself sometimes when talking about my child hood and people gape in horror. I just chuckle and say, "It's fine, I'm over it,". He kept saying it was fine, he was fine, but suddenly it wasn't fine and his voice cracked and I could hear the grief and pain in as he said, "I didn't even think it was weird, I just had to figure out how to get to the hospital myself… what kind of mother lets her teenage kid go for surgery alone?"
He got really quiet for a moment, cleared his throat and got control of his emotions again. I was openly weeping and telling him how sorry I was and then he apologized to me, saying he didn't call me to upset me, and he shouldn't have said anything. Well, I nipped that in the bud and told him I wanted to know, I wanted to hear it all, I wish he'd told me 25 years ago when it was happening, but I'd take what I could get. And that it wasn't ok, and if I'd have known, I would have done something, I don't know, had him come out and live with me, something thought I know, realistically, that would never have worked. I told him I was sorry he had to go through it alone and I believed him because I know what mom was like - the monster abused her and beat her and terrified and threatened us all, but when mom got her rage on, she would hit too. I saw it get worse as we got older - I guess I just got out before I saw her turn on littleBro.
Ultimately, we talked for 2 1/2 hours and I think I cried for at least an hour of that time. But it was good. I had a headache the rest of the day and Monday felt kind of like an emotional hangover day. It took me a good chunk of yesterday evening and tonight to write this. It's long and rambly and I really don't honestly expect anyone to read it, but I needed to put it in words and process it.
This entry was originally posted at https://shaddyr.dreamwidth.org/420470.html. Please comment wherever you want.