How messed up do I have to be to be treated the same?

 I had  an epiphany a couple of weeks ago. When this happened to me, it represented all the struggle and frustration I had been fighting against for the last three to four years. Please bear with me as I make this point.

I took my son, who has mental health issues and social disabilities, to a social working institution called Empower Tennessee. They claim to help people that struggle with things like autism and other handicaps to be able to become more productive citizens. They provide support and access to resources they may not have or even know about like applying for jobs or federal assistance. 

I took him in to have our initial meeting and evaluation. She sat us down and just talked to my son about who he was and some of the struggles he was facing. I sat silently waiting. Then she asked both of us to split a paper into four quadrants. She asked both of us to label each quadrant with one of these - What I want, What I need now, What I want in the future, and how do I get there. 

We made our lists in each quadrant and then she told my son to say out loud what his lists were and for me to circle what matched on my list. When he was done, she then began to talk about what she would do and what the organization can do for him. She then asked me to step out while they talked in private.

And then my son and I left. 

On the way home, I thought - This is why my house is so messed up right now. It is because I am not messed up enough. You Know?

So, what I think and feel and want is not important . . . or after that meeting, it felt that way. And I think I have been feeling that way for quite a while. Actually, I think I have been feeling that way for years. 

You see, I wrote that list down of what I thought my son's needs and wants and future and how to get to that future. But, what I thought and wanted and expressed was not important. It was not needed. She  . . . they . . . .only wanted what he thought. And they just wanted me to suck it up and drop everything to just give him it. And that is the realization I came to on the drive home. I am not messed up enough to be the one who is listened to. And I was starting to realize no one has been listening to me.

Basically, I am the one that will pay the bills and just go along with whatever these counselors and psychologists and therapists feel is necessary to get him right. I mean, he has been in therapy with at least two mental health professionals for over four years. He has had three suicide stays in hospitals. He has been diagnosed with Autism and severe anxiety and depression. He has started college twice and one time with a program specifically designed for autism and he quit. He has even had a stay in jail for a horrible "episode." And through it all, I have paid for it and taken him to all the programs and escorted him to class for a week or two and help him with applications and appointments and . . . and. . . and  

For years I have done that for him. 

After my experience in Empower Tennessee, I finally realized that no one really cares what I want and how I feel or how this is affecting the rest of the household. We are not the ones that are messed up, you see? And now that I am suffering mental health issues from years of this, I am now understanding why and how I got to this point in my life. 

Our house is not a peaceful house. We argue a lot. It is tense and it is wound up. I have a lot of resentment towards my son. He is not working towards becoming an independent adult and I truly feel he will not if I don't push or try to force him. He will spend weeks doing pretty much nothing but lay around, nap, and social media. 

And when we push him to be more and do more or we pull back with our time and money because he demands so much of us when he is bored and not being productive, he will have these episodes where he yells at us and fights us. He will get into rages where he will be accusing us of not loving him, verbally abusing him, hating him, not understanding his disability, and kicking him out or giving him over to someone to be their problem. This inevitably always ends up with threats of killing or harming himself or cutting us from his life. 

And I have decided that I am drawing the line. No more. My mental health and my peace of mind are gone. My physical health is starting to be affected. I have been pouring my whole life into this problem and I have been neglecting my wife and my other son. It is time. I cannot have him in my house anymore and I am unable to provide what he needs. He will not leave us on his own. He will stay with us and choose the dysfunctional life in favor of leaving us. He will rage and argue and yell and cuss at us and threaten us with stuff that cuts through our emotional wellbeing forever if nothing is done.

Because he already has. For years. . .

Because he is the one that is "messed up," and I am the one not messed up enough. That is why I can't get the help I actually need, and I am expected to just agree with everything and pay for it. 

How much more do I have to give up?

 How much more do I have to give up? I mean, seriously it's been 4 years and I've been dumping just about everything I've got into this whole thing.

I've applied to....... I've gone to with....... I've visited him in the mental hospital (all three times). The bills from that...... the time going back and forth. . . . One time they wouldn't tell me where he was since he was an adult. . . .That's when I really understood what a medical power of attorney was...... I've taken him to his IOP twice a week for weeks and it was an hour drive each way after working all day. I've gotten him into programs at college that he ran from, so I had to drop him from school and retract his scholarships. I help him apply to trade school and supported him as he struggled with going and staying. I got him help through vocational rehabilitation to help him get a job, but they have stopped working with him because he is difficult........ And the meds and therapists for years....... And. . . . and. . . .God, I don't remember all of it. . . .

All throughout this I have been coaching and driving him and showing him the way to and from and I have been with him during his appointments and giving him pep talks and . . . .I even took him to college and walked the campus showing him his where classes were. I escorted him from one class to another for a week because he had anxiety attacks. . . . and then he quit anyway. All that time. All that effort. All the expenses. All the mental strain. 

Seriously...... How much more? I've given so much already, and it has all been thrown to the wayside. 

I don't know how much more or how much longer I can keep putting into trying to get my son to move along on his path to becoming an adult. The problem is not so much that he is not progressing but more of how much stress he puts on us. 

We are being picked apart. Finances, time, and mental health are all being picked apart and piece by piece we are whittling down to becoming nothing. Seriously..... how much of us do we need to lose before we call it all off and retreat? When and how far is that line in the sand?

I have been giving up a lot to move him along and nothing is working. He is so scared of leaving and is so attached and dependent on us that he goes to extremes whenever he is challenged and pushed to cut ties with us. And each time I am losing more and more. I am not sure if my health or my marriage can take much more of this. 

And that truly scares the hell of me. 

If I lose my wife........

God, I can't even have a flicker of that thought or I will just break.....

How much do I have left for this before it all become too much and it tears everything down? I am not sure, but I will keep going until one or the other happens. I know one thing. . . . it cannot stay the way it is now. 

It may be over soon.

It is set. I have drawn the line in my mind, and I am not going back.... No matter what will come of it. 

I am thinking of all kinds of worse case scenarios (which includes losing my wife and that terrifies me) but I have made up my mind and once I do that..... Well, once I do that, I will break my heart and soul and still go through with it. 

Last I wrote, I had decided to go in a lay it all out to my son's psychiatrist. And I did. I was hysterical and raving mad for almost an hour. It was ..... Well, it was not pretty, and I didn't feel much in control. But my shaking came to a crescendo and afterwards it calmed down to going away. 

There was no going back after that. That day was the day that I set in motion the events I am not going to go back on. 

I said out loud that he has to get out of my house..... And I said it in front of him. 

What I was planning to say ...... I did say...... all those things and more. 

Thank God my wife went with me and mediated us afterwards. She didn't go in with us, but she knew I was going to do something drastic...... Something desperate. And she was there after.... My blessing..... My comfort. She drove home while I unwound..... While I decompressed. . . . While I shrank into my own mind and feelings.

I then contacted my mental health insurance and got a therapist for me. The very first session was about how to get him out of my house. I set the line. I have set my mind to it and no matter how much shame..... No matter how much guilt..... No matter how much pain I will endure before or after it is done..... No matter what I may end up losing..... I am going to hold that line against all of it. 

And it will hurt......I will suffer...... It is inevitable. 

How much it will hurt and how much I suffer still remains a mystery. In my mind I am going to lose it all. But hey, being melodramatic is kinda part of this gig, right? 

The therapist seemed to understand what needed to be done and said that he would send me names and numbers of places that will take him. And that will be the fuse. That is the missing piece that will set everything into motion. 

And I hate every thought that is coming into my mind and heart because of it. 

And so that is where I am at right now. Waiting for that fuse. And once I get it, I will light it. And once it's lit, the clock is ticking to when it will all blow. 

So, it is a short waiting game now. 

This is far from over. But then, it seems like it will be too fast. 

I can't parent him anymore.

 I've come to the conclusion that I can't parent him anymore. As long as he's in our house we will not be able to help him move forward and become an independent person. He is in the mindset that we will provide and support his life and pay for everything for him forever so that he doesn't have to grow up and be an adult. 

He jumped out of my truck last week. 

Yeah..... He was yelling at me throwing curses and screaming how horrible I was.......and then ......all of a sudden, he was rolling on the road. And I am at the end of what I can do for him. I have no more resources ......no more ideas........ no more programs ......no more forms .......no more strength.... no more .......mental...... health.

I'm done. I have no more strength to keep going or doing the same thing like I have been for years...... 

For ....... 

Years.

I have tremors. 

They won't go away now. They're constant and unending. I think they might be permanent this time. God! I hope not! I try to stop them. I try to mentally hold myself still, but I just can't. My mind is hyper focused on this whole ordeal. I'm in a point of my life where I have a child that's scared of life and scared of being on his own and scared of being alone and scared of.......of.......of..... Everything. And that is not exaggerating..... he is scared of everything.

And I've tried everything and nothing has worked to get him..... I don't know .....normal?

And I'm planning tomorrow to go back with him with this counselor, the psychiatrist, and see if I can.... I don't know be free from this nightmare I'm in. Is it a nightmare? I mean, I don't have dreams really. I don't remember them. But the shaking that I have... the stress that I'm constantly under.... this worry about what's he going to say next. How is he going to insult us .....what is he going to blame us for ..... how he is going to tell us that it's all our fault when all he does is sit and do nothing and wait for us to do everything. 

He gets done with his counselors and he comes home, and he tells us that we are the problem. We are narcissistic. We're abusive. We're manipulative. We're horrible to him. But how can that be so? 

He has a house to live in and he has a car to use and he has a phone to use and he goes with us places and we get things that he wants and we get things that he needs and we encourage him and we try and tell him that he can do things when he doesn't think he can and we try and make suggestions and we try and show him the best way to get places because we know he can't .........he can't...... We try. We try to be good parents. We try to be loving and encouraging, and we try to motivate him. But it wasn't enough. It is never enough. And he tells us all the time .... Screams..... That we are not doing enough.

I can go on and on I suppose. But he's 22 years old and he lives in our house like he's a five-year-old and needs everything provided to him. He needs all this constant attention and... and he needs us to care for him and and take care of him. The only problem is that he has an adult mouth, and he has adult words, and he hurts us with them. He uses words like weapons. He accuses us of abusing him. He accuses us of being horrible parents. He accuses us of being the problem. He accuses us of treating him like he doesn't have a disability. 

And......

And.... I don't know...... my shaking....... My tremors....... The stress and anxiety. My blood pressure. And I went to the hospital with a blood pressure that was dangerous..... Like cause a stroke dangerous.

We are not the problem. We can't be......

We are the solution for him. But he doesn't trust us. He doesn't want to learn from us. He doesn't believe that we're wise and have his best interest in mind. He doesn't believe that we truly care about his success. So, what do you say to that? I guess there's nothing else I can do for him. I'm done with parenting him because he doesn't want me to parent him if he doesn't believe what I'm saying, and he doesn't trust me and he doesn't think that I have his best interest in mind. And so that's it. He's basically living in our house, but he doesn't want to be our son anymore and he doesn't want us to be his parents. 

But, Of course, he wants us to pay for everything still...

We wouldn't want that part of us being parents to stop, now would we?

Honestly, all he sees is that we want him to be scared of life when that is untrue. We want him to face his fears, and we want him to deal with them so that they're not so scary anymore in that he can be happy and not let those fears control his life like they are right now. 

And when we push him to face those fears he bites back, and he fights back with words. He yells and he screams, and he calls names, and he accuses and he threatens and he . . . he hits us in our emotions and our fears and our insecurities. And he's so masterful at pulling them out and put them in front of us and making us doubt. He finds that it's hard to make us change what we're going to do because we're strong-willed people and we're very intelligent and he can't make us believe that all this stuff is horrible when it's not. It's the proverbial "for your own good" or "tough love." He wants us to just change what we believe to be true and best for him to his view, but we can't when we just don't agree with him. 

I just can't parent him anymore. He will not trust what I say or do what I suggest. All he does is refuse but still wants me to provide everything for him and I just can't do that. I have a family. I have another son and a wife, and he wants me to throw all that aside and just do what he wants and focus on him and make him the biggest priority in my life and he's not. And isn't that horrible to say? I mean who should be a priority in my life? I have two sons and a wife. None of them can be a priority.  I have to be a father and a husband to more than one person. But he doesn't see it that way ......won't see it that way ......can't see it that way.. . . unable to see it that way. And then what he says to me, that I am a horrible parent because I am not prioritizing him.... my own son ..... it's like knives and actually hurts some days. 

And I can't stop shaking.......

And it's tomorrow. I'm going to lay it all out on the table. I'm going to try and see if I can do one more thing. I'm going to say some very hurtful things to him that are that are logical to a reasonable person. I'm going to say things that is going to hurt him and I'm going to say things that's going to make him angry because he'll think I'm lying and he'll think that I'm trying to make him look like a horrible person. All he will hear is that I don't want to be his dad...... That I want to abandon him. And all I'm trying to do is save my sanity really. I'm trying to get my family back to peace ......with no yelling . .  no accusations .....no threats .....no hell on Earth. 

I going to tell the psychiatrist that I can no longer parent him and that I need him out of my house. I'm going to say that I need him out of my house while he is there and listening. I going to say that I am not going to stop being his dad but that I have reached the absolute end of what I can do for him as a parent. He is rejecting all my efforts in favor for what he feels will help him when he has no idea what works or how to take care of himself. I'm going to ask to be given names or numbers of any resource that I have not thought of to accomplished this. I going to tell her that my life and mental health and physical health is in jeopardy. . . . . that he is killing me with stress. That I will die of a stroke or heart attack or my health will decline if he continues and stays in our home. I'm going to say that I can't afford both money and physically and my family to have him stay. I'm going to basically say that after years of dumping all my strength and resources into getting him to be independent and not petrified of living in the world on his own, I have come the end of the road of what is within my ability to parent him any longer and that I have to hand him off to someone else. I still want to be his dad, but I just don't have what it takes to be a dad for him. My love and Care and efforts are just not enough. I need more and different outside help than what I have found and paid for the last several years. Because I am no longer able to do it myself anymore. 

I am beyond my ability. 

I guess it was always beyond my ability if I look back at all of what I tried to do. 

He will hear this and he won't hear that he is doing is hurting the well-being of the members of his family. He will only hear that I don't want him. He will only hear that money is more important than him. He will only hear that I don't love him anymore. He will only hear that he is the sole blame of our problems and that he is a target. He will hear that I am trying to betray him.

And he will attack us out of anger and pain and betrayal. 

And I'm expecting it not to work. And then I'm going to have to have that drive home with him. And who knows what it'll be like but I'm sure it will be out of control and horrible and that may be the final end. And after we get home, I expect him to turn everything I said into knives that he will try to bury in my heart. He will strip the meaning of what I was trying to say and throw the reinterpreted pieces of what I said at me like bombs. If we walk out of that office with no other resource for me to access, that will be it. I have multiplied everything tenfold and not taken even a half step forward.

And you know what? I don't know how much I can do anymore. I don't know how much I can withstand of this yelling and the accusations and abuse from him. It's going to end up killing me. It's going to shorten my life. I mean I went to the hospital after he jumped out of the car because I was under so much stress that my blood pressure was high enough to give me a stroke. And what would have happened after that? I would have been brain dead? Partially paralyzed? Unable to provide anything for my wife and my other son? And where would I have been then? 

God, this is such a shit show. 

But it's time to draw a line...... And then hold it. 

Celebrating a divorce is no celebration.

I saw a group of celebrating girls that made me a bit put off when I was in Nashville this past weekend. Usually, a pack of girls like this celebrating in Nashville is a bachelorette party for a lucky soon to be bride. I am not even going to get started on what I think of those girls but I will say that there may be a lot of weddings that are called off when and if the groom to be saw what they did or acted like or looked like while they "celebrated"..... but I digress from what I really want to talk about. 

The group I saw were celebrating a divorce of one of their members being final. Yep, They were partying because their friend got divorced. 

And I just feel that we as a society have really lost so much moral integrity if this is an accepted or even supported behavior for such a loss as a failed marriage. 

Of course, it would be the girls that are so brazenly overt about publicly shaming the former husband and celebrating the breaking of a marriage but make no mistake, men will celebrate too over this same thing but not make it so public. 

I just can't stand it and I had to turn away in sadness and disgust at the thought of how happy and outwardly giddy these girls were. And you know what? This is not the first time I have seen this. What is it about celebrating the end of something that was suppose to be one of the most fulfilling endeavors of a person's life? I just can't think of anything that can be as destructive and dystopian than a marriage failing and two people that supposedly did love each other at some point of time in the past are now broken apart. 

It makes you think. . . .so what the hell happened?

You will hear and see a lot of reasons for a marriage to fail. There are some very very legitimate reasons like abuse or substance abuse or one of the spouses commits a heinous crime, or adultery or they don't feel their children are safe with the other. But then there are reasons that just make you wonder like when people say they are just not happy or that they didn't expect to end up where they are in life or that they fall out of love or that their spouse has just changed into someone they don't love anymore or they have "out grown" their marriage. These are the reasons that bother me the most. These are reasons that happen to some from not understanding what a marriage is and how life beats the hell out of married people. And I guess that is what it is for some. When life beats the hell out of your marriage you have two choices - take it on together fighting back or call it quits. 

Probably the most damaging thing to marriages happens before marriage even is on a person's radar. And that is, I don't think people really understand what it is to be married. This is where I may lose a bunch of people, but I truly feel that the concept of marriage as it is described and talked about in the Bible is what makes marriages infallible. I would double down and say that even if you are not Christian or are religious at all, that if you just treat the concept of marriage as it is described in the Bible as a framework for what marriage should be, you will be successful. 

First and foremost, a marriage is described as "one flesh." It is written several times that children will leave their parents and join in marriage as one flesh. This "one flesh" idea really means two separate people are separate but are still one person. If you know me, you know my wife. When you interact with me, my personality and my mindset and my choices revolve around not just me but also my wife. It is true in reverse. It is not that she or I dominate or control the other, it is more the fact that we have bonded and intertwined ourselves to the point where people don't think of us as separate. When a person thinks of me, they think of me as a married man. I would be surprised if any person that has known me for any length of time would not have mentioned my wife when talking about me. And that is the point of marriage and being married. They see us as two sides of the same coin. They see us as one person. 

You see, my wife and I are so bonded and connected to each other it is like we are the same person. But, at the same time, we still retain our individuality. It is almost like we have a dual personality, and we will refer to our spouses often when talking or doing. The best way to describe it is when a couple that are truly married both in mind and soul, they are like the trinity of God. God, husband, and wife are together as one entity, but we all exist as individuals too. It is hard to understand the Trinity of God for the average person but for a married couple, they can imagine how that can be true since they themselves think they are one person when it comes to their marriage. 

This is why divorce is so devastating to a person or .. . . .it should be. 

A marriage that ends in divorce is akin to a person dying. In this case it is even more so since the death of the marriage leaves behind only pieces of what once was two bonded and stable people. After the divorce there is only pain and bitterness and anger and vindictiveness. These things are not what our society needs to be spread throughout our community. 

And this type of heart that celebrating divorce comes from ....

 Well,

It comes from pain.

It comes from anger.

It comes from bitterness. 

It comes from a person who is feeling loss. 

Celebrating divorce is no celebration. 

It is a coping mechanism for what they know will be coming. What is coming is shame and guilt and loss and loneliness. What is coming is understanding that the dreams of having that "other half" your entire life will not be there. What is coming is either the acceptance of never having a marriage again or the will to try and find another and hoping against hope that it will be what the other was not. Deep down though . . . what is the likelihood a second go around will be more than the first? or the second? or the third? Statistics don't lie. It is basically not in the cards if it didn't work the first time.

I can't describe what a loss it is to see a marriage fail. Any marriage. No matter what the reason is. It means that somewhere either one or both of them missed the meaning of what being married is supposed to be. They were in love and they were excited about spending their lives together. They were ready you take on the world and make a Happy life with each other. What happened to that? Where and why did that mentality and drive die? Somewhere along the way they missed how vital it is to protect and nurture and know how tight a bond it needs to be.

And at the end, I need to be super clear about what I am saying. Do not stay married if there is abuse or danger or violence or drugs or the children are in danger. Anyone who has read my journals should know that I will not advocate for staying married if there is danger in the marriage. 

What I am getting at is that people need to be more aware of what marriage is and how deep of a spiritual and soulful covenant it is. They need to discover and internalized this before they consider marriage. We are talking about bonding to the point where you feel like you and your spouse are one person with a complementary dual personality. It is not a spur of the moment thing or whimsical or "lets give it a try." People need to know what they will want and what type of person they need to truly be able to bond in the way that I am describing. Then they have to look at what living life is and be able to understand that the pitfalls of life will attack and erode what strengthens a marriage. Then they have to set their minds to never let all of the actions and words and habits that bonded them into wanting to be married slip away in lack of effort. If you think you can find that "spark" in someone else after being married so long, then look no further than your spouse. It was there in the beginning, and you can have it again . . . . even easier than finding it outside of the marriage!

I just can't think of a worse event that leaves a person worse off in life than being divorced. It meant that they were happy at one time and now their dream of being with someone for life has been broken. It is especially tragic when one of the spouses is blind-sided by the other. But then, isn't that most often? These people are the ones that are truly broken for life. 

And then there are those who go out and celebrate only to suffer later when the reality of how it affects them really sets in. And for some it may take years but make no mistake. . . .that realization is coming. Make no mistake. 

Celebrating divorce is no celebration. 

"Are you Against Trans?"

"Are you against trans?"

I said, "What do you mean 'against'?"

"What do you think of trans people?"

I thought for a moment and then replied, "I believe that a biological man is a man and a biological woman is a woman. I disagree that a man can literally be a woman or vice versa just because they say so or they say something to the effect that they are in a foreign body or that they just feel like the opposite sex."

They then said with a finality in their voice, "So, you are transphobic then."

I asked, "What do you mean when you say the word 'transphobic'?"

"Well, you don't like trans people."

"Oh, Okay . . . then no," I said. " I am not transphobic."

"But you just said you hated them, " they argued.

"No," I said slowly with a hint of a question, "That is not what I said."

"Yes, you did," starting to work themselves up. I could tell they were getting ready to pick a fight.

"No . . .  I said that I didn't believe that a person can be a different biological sex just because they say so or if they say they feel like they are a different sex. I never said I hated them. You know, I can disagree with a person's philosophy or feelings and still not hate them for their views. Right? "

"Then you are transphobic."

I started to understand now where they are coming from. "Look. When a person says that word - 'transphobic', they are talking about a fear that is in another person that causes them to want to harm or commit acts of violence on the group of people solely because of some belief those people hold.. . .  I . . . do . . . not. . . . feel that way.

"I don't hate these people. I don't want harm to come to them. I don't want to hurt them at all. I don't want anyone else to hurt them either. I am not grossed out by them or want to avoid them or shun them in anyway whatsoever. But, I am a science guy, and I just don't believe that a person can literally become the opposite sex just because they don't think they are the one they were born as or because they say they are in the wrong body. That is just absurd. I think it is impossible for a man to say they are literally woman because the only thing about their body that is a woman is their thoughts and feelings. They can say it all they want but, in reality, every single cell they are made up of is screaming 'male!' because they have Y chromosomes in them. They will never ever truly feel what a woman feels like no matter how much they argue to the contrary. It is unreasonable for a person to force me to believe and agree to something that is not true. I mean, it is not even a belief because there are measurable observable differences between men and women. To me, it is impossible for a man to literally be a woman or vis versa because of what I know about genetics and biology."

"Then you are against them."

"There is that word again . . . 'Against.' It depends on what you mean by the word 'Against'," I said again. "Am I against them being able to express whatever image that fits the way they feel? Nope. Am I against who they choose to love and have relationships with? Nope. Will I vote against them being able to marry the opposite biological sex or even the same biological sex? Nope. 

"You see, these are freedoms that don't get in the way of my freedoms and there is no reason to stop them from those choices or discriminate against them in these instances. 

"On the other hand, am I against a trans person using a bathroom that is not their biological sex? Yes. It does not matter to me at all personally, but it does invade people's personal privacy. And the law protects your privacy. There are also other choices for using the bathroom like stalls and unisex bathrooms to use as accommodations to not being able to use your 'preferred' bathroom and locker rooms. I am against gender affirming surgeries for anyone that is under the age of 21 because they are still children and need to mature to the point where their bodies and brains are fully developed. These treatments are irreversible, and children are fickle when their brains are not fully developed. Dress and act how you want but don't allow children to permanently change their bodies when they are not even fully grown yet. After 21, go for it. I don't care, it is your body and your money and you are an adult. "

 I saw that if I disagreed with some of these crazy ideas . . .  that if I didn't accept trans people and what they believed wholly and completely that I was against them in all respects and "transphobic". But I grew up in an age where differing views were just that, differing views. We are all people and have our own thoughts and beliefs. To call someone a "phobic" anything just because they disagree with you is just crazy talk. Like I said to this person, I can have differing views and still treat you as a human being. Seriously. I am not going to stop being kind and considerate of you just because I am not going to agree that you are a woman when you are literally a man. 

"Look," I said.

"I can disagree with them and reject their philosophy as false and still understand that they have freedoms given to them and are free to make their own choices. I also can disagree and want them to not get in the way of other people's freedoms - like personal privacy of the sexes and deciding on behalf of children to have sex changing surgeries. Hell, I can disagree with their beliefs and still be friends and kind to them. Disagreeing with a person does not mean you hate them. It just means you disagree with them. It does not mean you want to harm or hurt them. There is a difference. Until people can go back to understanding that, the better off our whole society will be."

Mom

    I was talking to mom the other day and she said something that really hit me hard in the gut. She said that since she didn't have a college degree or went to school that she felt that she was not as accomplished or successful as dad or any of her children. And my first thought is that she had no idea what she has done in her life that carried as much (if not... More!) importance to the world as the rest of us. 

    My mom set her lot in life to be a homemaker and there was a time in which this was kind of looked down upon. But you know what? Look at how our society is like now with all these working women. Look at how feminism and economy has driven the mother out of the house into the work place. I don't think the average person has any idea of how pivotal that change in our social values, that being a stay at home mom being frowned upon, has on the health of our society. 

    This entry though is about my mom. And even amongst all the moms in the world, she really is one of a kind. 

     I have been fortunate to experience parents that are very different from each other in their approach to raising their kids. I have posted about dad already and this one will be about mom. As I was growing up, ma was a stay-at-home mom and she not only took care of my brother, two sisters, and I, she also sitted for about ten to 13 other kids during the summer. So, she was a mom to lots of other kids. Ma understood the uniqueness of each of us and also took a lot of time to work out how each of us "ticked."

    My brother needed a firm hand and needed a lot of tools to control and regulate his anger and emotions. Ma really had a knack on him with that. My sisters had a lot of restrictions on them. One needed to understand that being strong willed and stubborn did not mean that you could just go all wild and do what you wanted. The other struggled with esteem and motivation which required a whole other set of tools to deal with. 

    And then there was me. I was the black sheep of the kids. Seriously, ma said that she would have thought I was switched at birth if my brother and I were not the only ones in the nursery at the time. I was the one that had a brain that never stopped thinking and wondering and exploring. I think Ma loved to just watch me do my thing and really enjoyed seeing how my mind worked. She is often heard saying, "Before you get mad at him, you need to ask him why he was doing what he was doing. Because he always had a reason and his reasons usually made sensed to a little boy even if they were not right." That is where my mom really was set apart from other moms. She knew her kids and she knew that they all had different needs and boundaries. And I can't thank her and appreciate her enough for never putting me in a mold. She let us carve out the mold that suited us best. 

    As I grew older, I found that ma (and dad too) was always going to listen and hear me out.  I would call her at all times of the day. She would listen to me vent and yell and cuss and cry my frustrations out. She would listen to all my excitement and giddiness for some nerdy thing or other. She never rushed or avoided us at all. She always had the time and now that I look back, I really needed that. I needed her a lot to bump me onto the right path and to guide my thinking and actions so that I could figure out my world. I needed her to listen and not mock anything I was curious about until I learned how to find out stuff for myself. 

My mom is a unicorn now and I don't think there are enough of us left that know the value of a mom like her. It is very rare to have a mom that is kind, intuitive, nurturing, loving, and best of all . . . . present. And that is truly a missing part of our society that is telling when you look at our youth today.