Fraud or deliberate?

[i-m-Bri]

This morning it hit me that Thursday will be the first time I am with my family since I’ve come to better understand my experiences. A sadness crept over me. I’ve been planning on starting to talk with my mother. Ask her questions, answer hers. But there hasn’t been a good time. I've been really busy building my sculpture that's due Dec 6 (I haven't even been on MS)

I’m sad because with all of my new consciousness, I will be the same old Brian at the table, the guy no one really knows. Part of me was mad that I will just continue being the fraud I've always been. Another part of me will be watching myself. If I catch myself instinctually ducking a topic, or skillfully changing the subject I will breath and possible not.

I am also resolved that I will make a date to hang out with my mother between Christmas and New Years.

 

[Ceremony]

(((Brian))) Is it Ok to say, you're loved? When I read your words, I feel like I too can be. Hmmm... kinda heady to put you on a pedestal, but these months in 2018 have been one's of awe to me. I get tears of happiness for you, and hope to bolster your strength by telling you these things. I also fear, of course I fear, but you're not me, and when you wrote

Another part of me will be watching myself

I thought, that's Bri, that's what I've been seeing as he worked through discovery this year. He's seeing himself, and working plans. I want that too, it's not superhuman, it's just being.

You're loved Bri.

 

[C. E.]

Bri, I don't know if I shared with you my own journey with The Conversation. It was an amazing thing.

For now, though, maybe you should take your time. Consider that this Thanksgiving is perhaps just about being present. There are a lot of distractions on the holiday and it may not be the best time for a heart to heart. If you can find some quiet time between Christmas and New Years, that might be best.

Perhaps I am being presumptive to assume it will be a heart to heart talk. But who knows? The best advice I ever got on my journey is from someone who walked it before me - and so I will share it with you, Bri, before you take a similar walk. All those notions? The expectations of how it will go? The multiple choice answers you know you'll get? Throw them out the window my friend. Clean out all expectations, because it is quite possible that nothing will go as you think it will. When I confronted my mom, I was given that advice. But I still went in thinking there were only so many ways for her to answer to the hard questions I was going to put to her. And the answer she gave was nothing I ever imagined. And that opened a whole new door to my healing.

So many of us look back upon our past memories as facts. The instances - the physicalities - are often true. But we sometimes never fully appreciate how much fluff we fill those blank spaces in-between with, call them truths, and never question them. And we cement them further by building our life stories around them. I could literally write a chapter in my life about all the assumptions I made about my abuse that I lived with for years and never questioned. I allowed them to harden into truths that I never challenged. Until I did. And only then did I realize so many of my truths were lies I told myself just to give myself the illusion of knowing what I didn't.

 

[i-m-Bri]

Ceremony,
Yes, it's more then OK to say I am loved. Thank you, what a gift to wake up to. It does bolster my resolve and helps me stay focused.
Ceremony, keep working, keep trying. This is here for all of us.
I hope you know you are a kind soul worthy of love.

Eirik,
Present Thank you, that is what I want to be on Thanksgiving. I don't want to bring anything up, but I also don't want to be actively concealing. I want to be there and present.

I'm not sure what I want from the conversation, beyond just being truthful with her. There are questions she's asked me while I was growing up that I never answered. Man, they echo around in my head! I thought I would start there.
But also I want to learn from her. Who was I? Who did she see? What did she want for me, from me?

Great advice and I will keep it in the fore front as I do this.

Thank you

 

[Bluedogone]

Hi Bri,

Being in the presence of loved ones on holidays is a pretty standard tradition for me. Almost always ANY holiday for me is so full of all sorts of emotions that I learned several years ago to never pioneer in the area of disclosure on those occasions.

I have always felt, (with the exception of one of my sons) as far as close relatives are concerned, that I’ll carry my “secret” to my grave. I’m still leaning in that direction, but one Thanksgiving I decided that would be a great time to let my wife know how thankful I am for all the unanswered questions she never asks, and the reasons for some of my wierd conduct, and thankful for all the crap she’s had to deal with because of what happened years before I met her.

My idea went very well until I became a blubbering out of control idiot who couldn’t stop crying for what seemed like hours, but probably a few minutes. The whole ordeal did nothing to explain what I was trying to say, and left still more questions about my unexplained actions. So, for me, I avoid adding stress to already emotional family holidays.

If you can have this conversation without the baggage of emotion, good for you. Best wishes. I hope it brings the results you are seeking.

Blue

 

[i-m-Bri]

Bluedogone,

The whole ordeal did nothing to explain what I was trying to say, and left still more questions about my unexplained actions.

Man, I know exactly what that's like. I've struggled to share my story, but so much of it was fractured that I was incapable of making any sense.
I did try to talk to my mother 30 years ago. It didn't go well and I packed up the project. She told me she believed I was so emotional on High School because I was having an affair with one of the teachers "you know, am older man and a boy, like the greeks" WTF. I changed the subject and never returned to it. Back then I wasn't able to have a conversation, to much was cloaked in shame and the remnants of shock.

It may seem strange that I want to talk to that woman now. But I understand things so much clearer and I am firm in who I am, and what happened. I pulled away from my family when I was 5...they just just didn't know their sweet Brian wasn't there. I want my mother to know who she raised. I still have a mother, she's very old. I didn't take the chance with father before he passed. I don't want that happening with her.

 

[i-m-Bri]

Update:
I have a date to hang out with my mother after Christmas.
Yikes, I did it. I set it in motion.
Yikes, I better verbalize (to myself at least) what my expectations are...so I can throw them out Eirik!

Yesterday was uneventful on the surface. I was present and observed. I realized I never allowed her to blanket me in motherly comfort. I’m pretty sure it was there for the taking. Accepting it would have proven I was weak, exactly what I was hiding. Ha, for a kid who didn't believe he was a boy, I sure had the hallmark traits down pat.

 

[WG]

BDD, I know a the others in here have offered brilliant advice - it is the voice of experience. We in here all have it. What I would suggest is that you meet her in a neutral place to have the conversation. I know it will be emotionally charged so I don't suggest Applebee's on a Saturday afternoon. Or Starbucks for that matter. What I've done when someone needed to talk to me is go for a drive. They didn't have to look at me if they didn't want to, they could cry, vent, say whatever was on their heart and no one else was there but me. We would find somewhere to stop, sometimes a city park or just out someplace where no one could see us (park facing a wall or trees or brush). They felt safe and I felt like I could offer a response - or not - and it usually went well. Going for a walk, too, can be safe. You go where (and do what) feels safe TO YOU. You are the one this is all about and you have every right to control the situation - since control was something we didn't have as boys. We're grown-ass men now, and its OK to have some control. One more thing : if it seems that one or the other is doing all the talking, try this : use a timer of some sort. Cell phones or wrist watches do this job for us. Each person gets so much time, say 10 minutes, to talk and say what they want to at the moment. The other person cannot interrupt. Then when the allotted time is up, the other person has their time to speak. Same rules apply - no interrupting. Sometimes this works with those who are not talkers or, in the other instance, those who don't know when to shut-up.
Please, when you feel like you are able, tell us how this all went.
Don't know if any of this is helpful, but we all in here are hoping for a successful discussion.

 

[i-m-Bri]

WG,

Great advice, thank you. I will try to weave it in. I want the first one just to be an opening introduction to further conversations. I don't want to dump everything on her lap and leave he alone.

I talk to my therapist today. I am terrified. Almost physically sick at the thought of telling her about the playground of all things.

 

[i-m-Bri]

I had a short phone call with my Mom on Sunday. I am slowly processing it in the background (I am extremely busy which is why I haven't been around)

Sunday I learned what my parents thought was the reason for me dropping out of art school. I had heard bits and pieces, but always thought it was a failed joke dangling without resolve. I never wanted them to get to close. So I never took the bait.
But Sunday I engaged with my mother when she brought it up. She thought I left after 2 semesters because “I knew more than the teachers”. Turns out her and Dad just assumed it. They had to fill in the blanks too.
Good job Brian. Your own parents thought you were an uppity asshole. At the time, that was better then them knowing all the shame that crippled me.
The more I know myself the more painful it is that I hid so much away.

I gently corrected her. “No Mom, I left because I was too anxious to step into the classrooms”. Her response was strange and it’s lingering. She very quickly said “Glad that’s over with”. Nothing else, no questions. I don’t think she knew. I think she didn’t want to. I don’t know.

She gave me a gift. A way to start the conversation.

 

[Esterio]

Hi Bri

I am happy to hear you are trying to set the record straight with your Mom. I never did that with my Mom or Dad so they never knew why I was the way I was, they thought I was a bad kid. I wish I had been able to tell them them they would have got to know the real me instead of what they did. I hope that your time with your Mom goes well for both of you.

be safe my friend
Esterio

 

[C. E.]

Amazing the discoveries we make when we dare step down the path with minds as open as the universe.