The Weekend

When my mom died in 2006, me, my brother and sister-in-law had to sort through and pack up all of mom’s things within 3 weeks to avoid paying an additional month’s rent. My mom had a lot of really nice clothes. She was a tiny woman. At the time, there was no way any of her stuff was even close to fitting me. My sister-in-law is teeny and petite like my mom, and so she went through most of the clothes (with my blessing) and decided what to keep.

There were many things of my mom’s (her furniture, television, etc.) that I didn’t specifically have a use for and neither did my brother. So with my blessing, many of these items went to my sister-in-law’s family (her mom, her sons, etc.). The television that my brother had planned to take (because I said “sure, go ahead, we already have one”—they already had 3) wouldn’t fit in the space that they thought it would. So, they decided to give it to his wife’s ex-husband. I was told about this after the fact…and it rubbed me the wrong way. Granted, I was told this on the same day that we went to pick up my mom’s ashes from the funeral home, and we were all supposed to meet there together to pick them up, and pick out our urns, and they got there 5 minutes before I did and picked up the ashes, looked at the urns, so when I arrived, they were all set to go. I said “well, could I at least take a look at the urns?” I felt like I had been completely left out of or bypassed on things which were important to me. Most of my mom’s things I didn’t really have a huge desire to have, but there were a few things that had sentimental value to me. When my brother asked me about a wicker basket my mom had (sort of like a hope chest) and I said that yes, I did want that he countered with “oh, well we wanted that.” And so I deferred and said that was fine, they could have it if they really wanted it, but please not to ever get rid of it if they tired of it…that before it was given to anyone else or disposed of, I wanted it. It came out from my brother that he didn’t really care about having it, but his wife wanted it IF I DIDN’T WANT IT. Well, I did. But in his mind, his wife wanted it and that trumped whatever I wanted. His wife was fine with me having it, but my brother wasn’t. And so that night my brother and I came to blows when he told me on the phone that they’d given away mom’s TV to my sister-in-law’s ex-husband. I told him that mom would not have wanted us fighting over stuff, and I wasn’t going to fight with him. It got uglier and uglier as the evening wore on, and my brother said some pretty hurtful things, and I voiced many feelings which I had always kept inside. He and my mom both have/had that tendency to fight very dirty…something that I aspire NOT to do. I actually have come to realize has been a huge source of my pain trying to stifle the urge. When I was younger, when I felt angry and hurt by someone in my family, instead of striking back I would turn on myself…and would cut. Yes, I was a cutter…among other things.

Anyway…things got really ugly and I told my brother that I didn’t want to ever speak to him again. We did eventually get things resolved, but it didn’t do much to further establish any trust I have in my brother as a “safe” person. Saturday night, they came over for dinner. And my sister-in-law had brought over a couple of coats and a couple of sweaters that had been my mom’s. She thought that I might like them now that they would fit me. Had she never offered, I would have been absolutely fine with that…the fact that she did though, spoke volumes to me and I was so appreciative. As she is handing me the bag of clothes, my brother is asking his wife “are you sure you don’t want those???” I winced inside because it reminded me so much of the earlier conflict and how I felt like I didn’t matter to my own brother in matters of my mom. I let the comment go because the bottom line is that my sister-in-law “got it,” she understood what it meant to me, and so there was nothing really to be resolved. But it certainly kicked up those feelings again of not mattering to the people I think I should matter the most to.

Oh, and dinner Saturday night? I overcooked dinner in the Crock-pot…how does one do that????? The pork was too dry and so two bites into it I knew I was done as it was stuck and about 20 minutes later I puked it back up. I think it’s been close to a month since I last got sick from something. It’s not a fun thing, but it’s weirdly reassuring that my stoma is still apparently quite intact. And later this week I will have my 8 month labs drawn. I’m actually eager to see how they are the following week with Heart and Wellness.