Catch-up: Family

Ok, lets play catch up on my life so far. This will help things make a little more sense.

Basic Outline: I am the oldest child out of 3 kids. I am the only girl. My parents had me the summer before their senior year in high school. I was born in Vancouver, Washington. When I was 2 yrs old my parents got married, my dad joined the Army and our first duty station was in Tennessee. When I was 4 yrs old my first brother was born, his name is Jacob. Then we moved to Germany, that is when my second brother was born, Justin, it was only 13 months after Jacob was born. After living in Germany for 3 years we moved to Savannah, Georgia and stayed there for 6 years. 3 months into my 7th grade year we moved to Wichita, Kansas because my dad got out of the Army.

Relationship Outline: I had a wonderful childhood, I honestly don't remember any bad from it other than the occassional spanking from dad, lol. We went to church rarely, it was honestly only when my mom felt like taking us. Once we moved to Ks we did start going to church reguarly but it wasn't something I really understood. I truely believe now that was because I wasn't really put into any situations turning me to God and my faith wasn't ever tested and since I hadn't really grown up knowing him I just couldn't fully comprhend Him. So I believed in Him with a lacking of knowing his Grace. My dad was gone a lot due to the military which left us kids with our mom most of the time. I don't blame my dad or anything, it was his job, a job in which you have no choice in anything and that job is what gave us such a great life and so many opportunities. So in spending so much time with our mom by default I had a better relationship with her than my dad. Don't get me wrong, I was his buddy, I was a total daddy's girl. I just felt that I was able to talk to my mom about more personal things than him. Being a girl may also have played a part in that. When he got out of the military I was in the pre-teen years and lets face it, parents are uncool as it is then especially dads in a girl's eye. So having the opportunity to get closer to my dad just wasn't appealling at the time. Sorry dad. Oh disclaimer here...keep in mind that I know all this now, when I was younger I had no idea what the bigger picture really was. I never even considered an alternative motive behind anything. Ok back to where I was. When I talked to my mom about boys, she warned me about them and just wanted me to be happy like any other parent. Then when I got old enough to start seriously dating my mom always seemed pretty cool with it and my dad of course hated it. So when I wanted to go out, my mom was usually fine with it, it was just a matter of what my dad said about it. So the conversation usally went as follows; "Mom, can I go out tonight please, I'm going with (insert name) and where going (insert place) and I will be back by curfew." "That's fine with me if it's okay with your dad"..."Dad (insert following conversation)" "Well I'll have to discuss it with your mom first." "Oh I already did and she said its fine" "Well I'll have to discuss it with your mom" "Dad! She said yes (oh by this point, I had quite the attitude) !" "Fine then no, I don't like your attitude and you don't know when to stop asking. You should have left it alone." Ok so this may not be word for word but this is the general senario with the ending result of me being mad at my dad and thinking my mom was the cool one. This happened pretty much everytime I went to her first. She knew exactly what would happen and exactly what I would be thinking in the end. Things like this continued well into my teen years. And then I started to have a serious relationship with someone who ended up being my future husband. My dad saw what was going to happen before it even began and mom just used that situation to her advantage. Now my relationship with James (future husband) is not what she was using with me, she was however using it with my dad and me. Ah, here it comes. So I grew to dislike my dad more and more. This was not something that was noticeable from the outside looking in. This wasn't something like screaming matches in the house. Actually I never really showed it until something didn't go my way, the way mom said was ok. So my house was never a warzone or anything like that. So to sum this up my mom was always more my friend than my mom. Which of course was exactly what I wanted then, not what I needed. Phase 2: Things started seeming odd between my parents. My mom was always talking bad about my dad, talking about all the little things about him that she hated. She even took us to see my aunt in St. Louis once (oh this was my dad's sister of all ppl too, haha) and one night we were on my way back from ice cream or something like that and my mom wanted to talk to my aunt more. We had to take two cars bc of all of us plus my aunts family so my mom's car was just my mom, my aunt and me. My aunt then suggested maybe taking me home first and my mom said oh no big deal she already knows all this. Um, not to this extent I didn't. However, the conversation grew and it was basically a bitching session about my dad. My aunt always being the rational one, tried to calm my mom, tried to justify her feelings at the same time trying to defend my dad. When we got back home I was just overwhelmed, confused, baffled at everything. I immediately went to go see James and my dad was ticked about that bc one I didn't ask and two it had been a week since he'd seen us so I should have came home first. Him and I got into a huge fight over the phone, probably bc I ignored his first few calls. I was so mad when I got home, I ended up getting myself grounded and probably screaming I hate you. I was talking to my mom later and told her that I just wanted her to leave dad and I would live with her and be happy again. That right there, that conversation made me feel guilty even now. I don't know how much later but my mom soon told us that she filed for divorce and I lost it. I was so upset that my family was being ripped apart like this and I thought it was all my fault. I told her to do this! If I hadn't been born my parents wouldn't have even gotten married! This was all my doing! I went to school the next day crying all day long. I think my counselor called me out of my classes and I hung out in her office all day bc I just couldn't keep it together. All of sudden things just started clicking. My mom already had another person in her life, she moved on so much quicker than I ever thought she would have. My dad was hurting so bad. Oh I felt so terrible for him. I hated how hurt he was. I blamed myself more for his pain. He didn't deserve this at all. He worshiped my mother. He was that cheesey romantic type to her. He planned scavenger hunt dates for her. Always came home with a card or flowers for her. And now I realize that he was an amazing dad. He seriously never did anything wrong, he just did what he was supposed to. He was a parent first and friend last. My mom ended up putting her new bf first, nothing my brothers and I did or said to her mattered. She totally blew us off, over and over again. We were all hurt but my little brothers never said anything. I think they really enjoyed the freedom they were given by default of her not being around. We were at her bf's house everynight we were with her. We were forced to eat the nastiest food ever, forced to spend time at his house even if we had homework to do or other plans. It got ridiculous. I finally had enough and she just wouldn't listen. It was as if I was a total burden to her new life. There was just no talking to her. So I took a ton of time to write up this 3 page letter about how I felt. I left it with her and went to my dad's house with all my stuff. I didn't want to live with her even though it was only a few days a week and every other weekend. Once she read it she called, the very first thing out of her mouth I will never forget. She said she was hurt. She was hurt! That letter was all about me and how I felt. For once I was speaking out on my feeling and she didn't care at all! She threatened to call the cops but I wasn't going to budge. Eventually she got a judge to tell her to tell me that my drivers license will be taken away if I don't divide my time up just as the custody agreement ordered. I felt that this was so unfair. My dad kept telling me over and over that she is my mom and I really do have to go back to her house. But seriously, I love you dad, but not even he could make me and I think he knew that. I went back once I got scared into losing my dl but nothing changed, she kept doing the same things so I left again. I realized they can't take my license aways, I have nothing on my driving record to make them do that and this isn't grounds for that. And they didn't. What I did made my brothers realize that nothing was keeping them there either. My mom soon was to marry this guy, 8 months after my parents divorce was finialized, and she to this day denies leaving my dad for him, ha. She made my brothers not only go to her wedding but participate in it and they did not want to. Her fiance acted as if he was their dad, bossing them around and being a total ass and he had no right. So both of my brothers came up with the idea that I would go to the church parking lot and pick them up before the wedding started and they would ditch it. So we did! I called my dad once I got them and he told us we were nuts and we needed to be prepared for the outcome of this. We went to KFC and went bowling like all night long. I dropped them off at mom's house at about midnight. Boom! End of relationship with my mom. And apparently it was all my fault. At the same time of all this James and I were expecting a daughter and planning on getting married. Well go figure her second marriage failed. And when my oldest daughter,Hope, was about turn 2 she contacted me via myspace. We slowly started talking again. I came to Ks to visit for about 2 weeks during our move from Utah to Virginia. That was the first time she saw Hope. Things were going ok. I still had a lot of built up emotion and resentment from the past. I still felt that is was time to forgive my mom, whether she admitted or not, whether we talked about it or not, I had to forgive her. Not for her, but for me! I moved to Virginia and continued to talk to her here and there and slowly built some sort of a relationship back up. Nothing like it was in my early high school years, that was something that I knew may never happen and I wasn't looking for it to.