November 27, 2010

• Let it go!

  I am in Kentucky with my boyfriend visiting his family for the Thanksgiving holiday. They are wonderful, hospitable people and it is always nice to see them.

  I have had my first anxiety attack in a long time last night so I decided to go back through the course of the day to see the items that may have triggered it. Ultimately, I know that I have some unresolved feelings about the course of my life. I am grateful, in fact very Thankful this Thanksgiving that my life has been the productive and happy experience that it is so what brought on the attack?

  Today we drove to the house of my boyfriend’s brother. The family was celebrating Thanksgiving a day late so that everyone could be together. It was the first time I had a chance to meet there daughter that I have heard so much about. She was no less than all of the fantastic things everyone said about her. She is beautiful, magnanimous, smart and a delight to speak with. She brought with her her boyfriend, an equal delight to meet. I am guessing that they are both in the late 20′s (27 maybe) and are enjoying a deep relationship.

  As we drove to my honey’s parent’s house where we are staying, the discussion began. Let’s not kid ourselves here, it was the undercurrent the entire day. The discussion of if and or when these two will get married and begin a long and happy life together. If this is what they choose, I applaud them.

  I remember this. My family put a tremendous amount of pressure on my to get married to a nice guy and to settle down and start a family. Every time I saw my grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc it was the topic of discussion. My value was to work toward this goal and that was all. The expectation was that my goals were in line with this and anything less than finding a man and getting married was unacceptable. Now not only did I have to do this but divorce was an expression of failure so I also had to be profoundly lucky to pull all this off.

  Well, I didn’t pull it off so by the time I got into my 30′s I was sort of the freak. I had one cousin that was a bit older than I was that also had not gotten married. The difference of course was that she is gay and tried to hide it from the family so as to not be ostracized. I can’t blame her for wanting to hold that from the old school Italians, they would never be able to see her for the beautiful person that she is.

  I was treated differently and then the conversation included things like, “well it still isn’t too late for you”. Now that was just sad. It was a fantastic way of making me feel like a flower that had completely lost its bloom.

  Finally when at 36 I got married they saw it as sort of a miracle. Almost like the scene in the movie “My Big Fat Greek Wedding” where the family says “we never thought it would happen for you”. I expected however my “moment” to give me back some of the feelings of being special again. There are a few memories that no matter how hard I try I will never forget. Sadly most of these memories are surrounding my wedding. One was the day I bought my wedding dress (well the first one but that is for another blog) and the other was the day of my wedding. It was an absolutely horrible day. Three people were wonderful, my best friends Ellenina and Steve and my father.

  Now I am an introvert so just the notion of walking down the aisle is awful but I mustered my way through the entire ceremony then for photos then to the reception. We had two toasts. Here was the hard part, I wasn’t even mentioned. Two toasts, and no one thought enough about me to even recognize that I was sitting there. Didn’t I finally earn any credit for doing what I was suppose to do?

  I am not trying to fool anyone. I knew that I was making a mistake. Ellenina was with me while I had a woman doing my makeup the day of my wedding and could see how absolutely miserable I was. She attempted to look on the bright side (as she always does) and told me that “at least you will travel” (my ex is a pilot and I always want to see the world).

  Fast forward YEARS later. I have a younger cousin. She is spectacularly beautiful. Additionally she is smart, funny and absolutely has her shit together. I love her. I admire her. And I tried although it is impossible, to protect her from the family bullshit. She constantly got the same tirade that I did about getting married. She was dating a good man for years and finally they moved in together. Every time my mother got into the discussion of “when are they finally going to get married” I would go ballistic. WHY WHY WHY put that pressure on her? WHY WHY WHY still cling to that horrific stereotype? LEAVE HER ALONE.

  She DID marry him 11 months ago. She looked blissfully happy and the wedding was a fantastic celebration. She even sang a little karaoke (she isn’t an introvert). Now for years she did talk to me about the pressure she was under from the family. I hated it for her as I understood it well.

  Now my parents generation are all still with us thankfully but the grandparents, great aunts and uncles are mostly gone. We have reduced the pressure on some of the women in our family and some are not as affected by it (such as my sister). Still, I cringe at what I heard today. I don’t believe they are reducing her value if she is single as I have experience. I genuinely believe that everyone just wants her to be happy but I am still somehow stuck carrying the baggage of what I was supposed to do.

  I am not married. I get asked frequently from members of my Rotary club, when I am getting married. I don’t know. I don’t know that I will every marry again. That is ok, it doesn’t make me less of a person. I don’t have any children and I never will. This still doesn’t make me less of a person. Sometimes life doesn’t turn out the way you or your family expect. If it didn’t I wouldn’t be where I am today and that is in a pretty good place. I have some health issues that I am working through and I can guarantee you that if I had to do this with my ex husband he would do great harm rather than any good. My current situation allows me to be and learn and heal without serving the needs of a stereotype of someone else. I would like to be ready and to marry again someday. I have the highest regard for a good team that can support each other through the curve balls that life will throw at you. I would love to be a legal part of a team some day. But I wish that for now, I could leave the baggage of that stereotype at the door. My family just wanted what they understood to be the best for me. They didn’t mean to harm me. But the feeling still continue today. I am older now and perhaps have lost a few petals, but certainly not my bloom. If the occasion in my life is right to marry, I will until then I want to try to shed this baggage. It is too heavy. The side effects of my medicine is anxiety attacks. They come suddenly and grip hard. They don’t necessarily come out of the blue. This one was telling me something. Let go.

  • 11:09 am
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