Forgetting

One of the things I have learned since last February is that some people never forget. And they are willing to bring whatever it is up and slap you in the face with it at the oddest times.

What is amazing to me is that my siblings remember things about me that I am sure are not correct. I think situations have been exagerated over the years, emotions made sharper, things not understood correctly because they were seen through the eyes of small or young children. My childhood is long gone. It happened a lifetime ago. I have no desire to go back and revisit it time after time after time. I had a wonderful childhood. Not perfect by any means, but wonderful none-the-less. As the oldest I ended up needing to watch over my siblings after school when my mother went to work full time. Apparently I was hell on earth to them, at least the 3 next after me. My youngest sister doesn't remember me that way, but she was only in first or second grade then, maybe 3rd? See, I don't remember the specifics unless I sit down and do the math (so and so was such and such an age in this year, blah blah blah). But, oh, they do remember - or think they do! I have no idea what I did - I'm sure that whips and belts and hot irons and other forms of torture were not involved, altho I do remember yelling a lot so they would clean up their mess before mom got home. I usually had my nose in a book, or later, was talking to my boyfriend on the phone while they tore the house up. My job was to make sure it was clean when mom got home and to cook dinner every night. I enjoyed cooking dinner (I wonder if they remember that I was the one who actually made food so they didn't "starve"??). I did not enjoy cajoling them into putting toys away, cushions back on the couch and cleaning up whatever mess they had made. I sure didn't want to clean up after them!!

This summer I learned that 40+ years later the 3 middle ones still resent (and two I think actually hate) me. I've wondered for years and years why whenever family slides came out at holidays why all of the snide remarks about me were made. Mel even commented on it to me once. As is my usual response when something I don't understand, but has the potential of hurting me emotionally, happens, I would try to gloss over it, laugh about it, or ignore it. Well, this summer the s**t hit the fan, so to speak - two of the middle siblings went after my own kids in a very vicious way, along with going after my parents for mostly unknown reasons. I have theories about those siblings' mental health and spiritual conditions, but that is just it - theories.

To make a sick and sad story very, very short - I hope I never see or talk to those two siblings again as long as I live. Never. Never! The third one - well, let's just say that trust issues may never be resolved between us. I do not trust that sibling now, not even a little bit.

My heart weeps over this. I have not been able to write about it because it hurts so badly. I've never been close to those three, for obvious reasons (see second paragraph) and now, well, I hope they drop off the edge of the earth and never come back.

I am sure that this is part of the reason it has been so hard for me to come back to Ukraine this time. I am still dealing with anger issues. I am still dealing with hurts, deep and very painful hurts. I am still fearful that the two may try to emotionally attack my kids or parents again, even though my parents actually got advice on what to do if it happens again from a lawyer who specializes in Elder Law.

Just recently I was reminded of something else that I did that another person has not forgotten. It happened 5 or 6 years ago and I haven't thought about it once - not once - since the initial happening and apologizing and groveling for forgiveness. Not once has it crossed my mind. When it was thrown in my face again during a conversation, I couldn't even remember what the person was talking about for several seconds. It's like I had to dig through layers and layers to uncover what this person was talking about. I'd filed it in the "ooops, that was a big mistake, don't ever do it again, now don't dwell on it and make yourself miserable, forget it" file in my brain. Since that conversation, however, it's been rattling around in my brain, accusing me and making me feel like so much mud on the bottom of someone's shoe again.

Sigh.

Sometimes I LONG for heaven with a longing that is akin to the need to breathe. I know God has forgiven my sin, washed it away through the blood of Jesus Christ, that it is removed from me as far as the East is from the West, that He will remember it no more. People here on earth, tho, seem to love to keep notebooks full of all the wrongs and hurts they have received. They dwell on them, grow them into unrecognizable blobs and then blast them out again sometime in the future.

My personality type tends to live in the "here and now" and apparently forgets more easliy than other types. Not perfectly by any means. Not immediately by any means. Sometimes in the middle of the night I will remember something someone did, or something that I did, and I will burn with shame or embarrassment. But I always tell myself - "LET IT GO! Forget it! Put it out of your mind!" If it was sin on my part, I remind myself that God has forgiven me (and I'd asked for forgiveness from the other person if needed, and had received it). If it was sin on another persons part, I remind myself that God must deal with them. But whichever it is - I let it go. Otherwise - I would be destroyed emotionally and probably physically because things like that do effect our physical bodies.

Knowing that last sentence is true, very true, I know that somehow I need to come to the point where I can forgive my siblings. Oh! The anger is still there! I don't want to forgive them! I want them to suffer! I want them to suffer 100% more than I have, than my kids have, than my parents have. I want them to grovel in agony on the ground. That's what I want. Instead, it is me who is being hurt all over again.

So - let it go. Forgive (so hard to write that word - it does not want to come out of my fingertips!) and forget.

No - this is not something that can be forgotten. It must be remembered - I just have to take the fangs out of the memory.

Dear God - I cannot do this "on my own." Only by Your power, only by Your Holy Spirit living and working through me can it happen. Help me!! I don't want to forgive them!

Wow. I just realized that I am living The Lord of the Rings and could easily become just like my Golum siblings!!! Ei yi yi! I have to let that Ring go. Now. Forever.