Father's Day reflections

My father was close to my age now, when I was born. Indeed, growing up I experienced him as an old man, a grandfather type figure. He was quiet and gentle and laughed nervously. He has been dead for 25 years and yet this morning when I awoke, I thought about him. My parents were divorced when I was four and from then on until I left home at eighteen, I lived with my mother and step-father, visiting my father on the weekends and sometimes taking a small trip or vacation together. My step-father was juvenile and communicated through teasing and joking. His relationship with my mother was volatile and passionate. I did not think of him as a father figure, but, rather, was afraid to bother him with my presence, how much I ate or talked, for all the teasing that would ensue. I felt trivialized and small with him. Neither man were role models or father figures for me. And so, I chose my brother. Although he was only six years older than me, he was adored by my mother and I decided, very early on, that it was wise to adore what she adored. It just made life easier somehow, or so I thought. He became for me the epitome of manhood. His beliefs became mine. Indeed, his entire way of thinking about life was imported into my brain, poured into my veins. He was my greatest influence. I spent all my life longing for him to notice and acknowledge me. Poor things - both of us. My brother was as unaware that I gave him that role as I was. What a disaster for our relationship. Me with all sorts of wild and needy expectations, and he with his life, plodding along unaware. Not a good recipe for survival!

Father's Day is complicated for me. Split into three men from my childhood, each influencing me in different ways. In fact, I never experienced the warm, unconditional, supportive love of a father and if I yearn for it, as of course I do from time to time, I do not really know what I am actually yearning for. Is it a movie or television type father figure, or a character from a novel? Most likely. Naturally, relationships with men have been extremely complicated for me throughout my life. At first, I saw them as either prince charming or the devil. I learned very early on to be coquettish and cute, flirtatious and playful, and to sacrifice my needs in order for a man to like me. In addition I transferred the adoration of my brother to all other men. They must all be superior to me in every way: especially in intelligence, but also, and more importantly, by being more rational, and, even, more vulnerable. A trilogy of men in my childhood psyche: one, old and gentle, with large wrinkled hands, unapproachable in a way, who seemed startled, even jumping back if I tried to hug or kiss him; another teasing and distant; and the third, intelligent, rational, purist, and conditional in the extreme. None of them belonging to me or with whom I felt belonging or emotionally safe. Today, I am orphaned of all three. Father and step-father have died. And, I have lost my brother in my reinvention, re-alteration process, although I am not sure I ever had him in the first place, as many of my relationships with men in my life, were illusions, fantasies or dreams concocted in my brain to help me survive.

When I became a feminist in 1992, a world of complexity and emotional choices opened up to me. I wandered through the feminist door in wonder and relief as I began to shed the requirements I had set for myself and relearn the world of human relationships. Men became whole and complex, human and approachable, as I struggled with being authentic and myself without fear. There were, of course, years of confusion as I transitioned out of the old and into the new ways of perceiving my emotional psycho-socialization process. I explored my identity, sexuality, spirituality, in short, my entire concept of my - self. The search and struggle is not nearly over. There is still so much relearning to do because I came to this stage quite late in my life. It feels promising and hopeful to me, though, because I know - indeed, I deeply sense - that there is still more to discover and uncover about my self, and my reality, even as time is running, flying out ...

A year ago at Mining Nuggets: Saturday stories

Comments

[tamarika]

Tamar,
Thank you for sharing the story of your familial journey here too, and for your kind words to me. It sounds like you are getting to know yourself deeper and deeper. It helps, doesn't it, to make different life choices?

Todah, todah!

[tamar]

Your answer is so full, so rich that I have copied it to a file where I can study it offline. Your honest sharing is breathtaking. And the parallels in our experiences/responses/hurts/resolutions... equally so. As an example: mother "stealng" all men (mine said, on my second husband -- she surely thought the same of the first husband -- "we have so much more in common than you and he!"). The truth is I picked guys she would have adored!

My belatedly beginning to release my sister from the grip in which i held her (and to which she never consented, judging from her behavior many decades...) recently freed me to write on my blog a happy birthday wish to my mother. All that anger toward sis i let spill onto the mountains of anger/hurt/regret/love for mother. Now that i am better sorting out the women, i can see better my "good" mother. Funny how vision of one kind improves as the other kind declines with age;-)

hamon todot, achoti!

nesiya tova/nehederet!

[tamarika]

Tamar,
It has always been a struggle for me, my relationship with my brother. In the beginning it was because I was adoring him for my mother's sake. For example, when he left home for college when I was twelve, my mother was so distraught she came home from the aiport and I watched her rearrange the furniture all over the house. That evening, she quite dramatically gave me a wrapped up gift. When I opened it, I discovered a large framed photograph of him. I dutifully displayed it for years wherever I was. That I did for her. As the years went by I would seek out acknowledgement from him but it was never forthcoming. Not his fault really. Just the kind of understated person he is, I think. I just always felt that I needed more from him. Over the years, too, he would cut off from me for extended periods of time because he was angry with how I treated my mother - always based on her version of events and never taking the trouble to find out mine.

Now, finally, after I wrote my book, he got word to me that I was not okay with what I had written (understatement!) - and started to distance himself from me again. And so I wrote and told him how I had been feeling over the years, hoping to let him know me in a different, more authentic way, hoping to open a conversation. But instead, and I took the chance knowing it would happen, he has cut me out again. In fact, for my mother's 90th birthday this year, I was pretty much told I could not come because he would be there - so while everyone (and I mean everyone) was there celebrating with her ... me and my son were not. I cried for a week. But then realised ... I am an orphan, and somehow that gave me some peace.

In fact, we have never been able to create our own relationship, my brother and I. I have had to understand and accept(and I know it sounds insane) that he belongs body and soul to my mother. She "owns" the men in my family. And I have decided (quite awhile ago), psychologically, emotionally that is, to surrender them to her ... all of them ... except my own son, of course. For him ... for him and me ... I fought. No one knows about how I did that. Just me and my therapist :>)

As a result, my son has a great relationship with my mother without losing his deep connection with me. But I had to fight for that within me and it took hard, emotional therapy work.

Thank you for asking that question. I appreciate your interest.

[tamar]

Deeply meaningful sharing. Thank you. Question: what do you mean when you write, "I have lost my brother in my reinvention, re-alteration process?"

i have lost my sister as I evolved and discovered either new aspects of her or noticed what was always there... or nascent. She is not available and hasn't been for years. Alive though dead in ways, for me.

Hence my question to you.

[tamarika]

And Jean, *your* comment brought tears to my eyes! I don't know how you manage, always, to touch at the core of what I am saying and what is going on for me. Yes! That *is* the only kind of happy ending that is real: meaningful relationships. Like yours and mine.