Jilli, Indexed mentioned bustles yesterday.

{{Calli}}

amych, damn, sorry about your flood. That bites. I also see that we are once again each other. I wish that translated to more productivity on my part. I should just bite the bullet after all these years and change my board name to something that starts with a Q or something. Qamyth.

Apologies in advance for this: I wrote to my brother to see when a good time would be to come visit, and it took him several days to write me back. The response I got basically made me want to crawl into a hole and never come out. In a nutshell:

1) The treatments make him feel crappy, so he doesn't want me to come visit. At all. Or maybe someday, but what I know from experience taking care of our mom (which he had no part in, thankyouverymuch), it only goes downhill from here. He thinks he feels crappy now? Wait until he's had a few more moths of chemo/radiation. But I don't want to tell him that, if his doctors haven't.

2) He can't talk on the phone anymore, so email is going to have to be our primary mode of communication. However,

3) My SiL had, in his words, "the worst day of her life" last week, when her father was buried, and he says that she will likely never get over it, and she was deeply hurt that neither I nor Middle Brother called her, nor sent a card. Now, I did send a card, but it hasn't gotten to her yet, mainly because I wanted to send a Mass card with it, and it took me a few days to get my shit together to send it. And, excuses excuses, but I didn't call because the only time I have spoken to her on the phone, possibly IN MY LIFE was when she called to say that my bro had come out of his biopsy okay, and she was (admittedly stressed) but was so short with me that it could barely be classified as a conversation. She has never spoken to me on the phone during the awkward two-minute convos that I have had with my brother on Christmases and birthdays and Thanksgivings sporadically over the years, and while we have always gotten along very well when we have seen each other in person...idk, I just didn't call, and never imagined that it would have this massive impact on her.

And forgive me the drama, but NONE of them were there for my "worst days ever" like when I had to drop out of college at 18 to take care of my mother when she had cancer (sure, they came by for awkward visits on Saturdays for an hour or two, but they were grown and had families and had other priorities), or when I had to singlehandedly plan her funeral because our dad was too incapacitated with grief, or the years in my twenties that I spent in therapy because I kept reaching out to my brothers, hoping we would FINALLY be a family, because I needed and wanted a fucking family, but they had their own families and didn't have time for me, and I finally had to learn how to let go and expect nothing from them, or when our dad died, and we three awkwardly got together and then didn't get together again for TEN YEARS. I mean the brief phone calls were nice, the birthday cards were nice, the twice-yearly emails were nice, the annual-or-slightly-less dinners (because I went to THEM, they never, in the entire twenty years that I have lived in NC have visited me, even though my SiL has a brother stationed at Pope AFB and you'd better fucking believe that they have visited HIM) were fine.

How in the HELL was I supposed to expect, oh fuck it. You can't argue with a family that is as stressed and grief-stricken as theirs. All I can do is what I did: say I am so, so sorry for what I have done and what I have failed to do. I got her cell number from my brother and left her a long voice mail. I told my brother that I am coming to NY some time this fall, and I hope that he'll let me come visit, if only for a few hours. And everything else, I need to let go, like I apparently pretended that I did years ago. THIS IS NOT ABOUT ME. If it ever was, that was a long time ago. It's not going to be about me, and I need to get a great, big grip. I'm not even sure what this post is about, except reminding myself of that. It took a minute to get there. (continued...)

( continues...) Sorry for the self-indulgence. His email just really knocked me for a loop.

Well, it is about you to the extent that you are hurt. Don't denigrate the real pain you feel just because people who are in a bad place currently didn't think about how dumping on you would make you feel.

Oh amyth, I'm sorry. I think you're right, this (the email that is) is about him, not you. And who knows what unspoken worries are behind his words. But that said, it's never gonna be OK to have your own experience negated in that way.

Sending hugs to you

Oh, amyth. I am so, so sorry. It sounds like stress is making her do the wacky, but that doesn't make you feel better. Family is hard.

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Unrelatedly, Hil, what town are you in? We might be visiting PA sometime this year for stepson visits, and if you are close enough, it might be nice to visit.

amyth, of course you are upset with a such a heap of crap. And it sucks how things we think we've resolved come up again and again to surprise us. It hurts to reach out and be rebuffed, no matter how many times it's happened before, and then to be criticized for not reaching out in the right way! My mind continues to boggle with how they have treated you and continued to treat you. I get that they are suffering and grieving, but you have done absolutely nothing wrong.

Look around you - you are the hub, the linchpin of a wonderful group of friends. I know that doesn't remove the hurt your bio fam is causing you, but I hope it can help reassure you of what I know: you are one of the most caring, intelligent, funny, strong, and kickass people I have ever been lucky enough to meet. I don't know what I'm going to do without you being on the other side of the cubicle wall.

Goddamn it, amyth, I'm irrationally angry for you. I know they are going through their own crises, but it's petty and mean and small-minded, especially considering their treatment of you all of these years.

Please know that family =/= blood. We love you. And what smonster said--well, with the exception of you being on the other side of the cubicle wall. I've never had the pleasure; otherwise, my office would probably be a helluva lot more fun.

I would just like to repeat everything smonster said, word for word. amyth, you are an incredibly compassionate and loving person, and I am so sorry that your brother and his family can't see that. Seriously, I feel damn lucky to know you and to count you as a friend.

And of course right now he and your SIL are in crazy amounts of grief and pain, and not at all thinking about how their words and actions might affect you. That doesn't make it OK, it just makes it understandable. Or explicable, at least. But it is still hurtful to be criticized, and you don't deserve it.

I'm also sorry that your brother is saying he doesn't want you to visit; that's got to be hurtful too. And, er, not that it's really related to your situation with your family, but *I* want you to visit! You are someone I like having around, whether I'm feeling happy or sad or anything else. I hope your brother changes his mind.

Amyth, I know it hurts right now, but I want to speak on behalf of your brother. My father came and visited me last year because he was worried about me and because he loved me.

I get that.

I, however? Really really wanted to be alone with my illness. Him loving me didn't lessen that a whit. I know it was impossible for him to understand, and since he was my father I couldn't lock my door against him, but I still wish he'd respected me enough to let me be alone then.

I know you want to love him the way that makes most sense to you right now, but for him it's all about him, and it's hard to ask him to see outside that. I know it hurts, but it's the pride of the ill in question.