Home Again

I’m home again. Literally and emotionally. And yet echoes of my trip back east remain. How much of one’s life does one give up to try to save another? What if it is one’s adult child? How does one know when changing what is can’t be done? How does one sort out emotional blackmail from real probabilities? How does one make peace with what may have to be?

On the plus side: This time I could say “no” to the convoluted schemes. This time I could refuse the emotional blackmail. This time I could see things I hadn’t grasped before. With and about my ex-husband. But...the questions about my son are still there. The issues are still real. The grief is still raw.

Life doesn’t always come with simple answers. Despite my optimism I know that all too well. My own life is the only life I really have any control over. I know that too. And yet...and yet there is a part of me that wants to heal other’s hurts—even when it’s someone who has hurt me. Even when I know that the odds are I won’t be able to help someone see how they are hurting themselves. There is grief in having to let go and fear in letting go that one is letting go too soon—that if one were just clever enough, just had a little more patience, just loved a little more unconditionally the person could find their way.

But then that’s how we grew up, isn’t it? Trying to fix the hurts and pain so that our parents could stop hurting us.

So the question becomes: Is this the same kind of tilting at windmills or is there really hope of getting my son to change his behavior? And how far do I go trying to make it happen? What will happen if I can’t? How much of my ex’s dire predictions are true and how much an attempt to manipulate me?

As I said, difficult questions and emotions.

Here’s hoping all of you are having easier weeks than this one was for me. Sending blessings and safe and gentle (((((((hugs)))))))),
April_optimist