I'VE BEEN WONDERING....

When are we finally grownup?

Is there a date, a time, a place in our lives where we know that we have grown up? Being more than 'adults'.

Adult sounds like we have reached that time in our lives when we are "grown up". And I know that isn't necessarily true. Not for me anyway.

I think I mean the time when you are grown up enough to accept all the things that have happened in your life. Does that ever arrive?

It hasn't knocked at my door yet.

I have survived many difficult issues in my life. Surgeries, death of dear friends, death of family, death of my husband, death of my dear father. And loss of my mother to Alzheimer's.

But I still don't feel grown up.

But I do feel beat up.

I imagine it all goes back to the Mother-Daughter relationship in my life.

Did you have a wonderful relationship with your Mother? Did you appreciate it? Did you tell her?
I didn't have any of that. I didn't have that loving Mother-Daughter relationship...not ever..in my life.

It has always been a mystery to me..our relationship. Even before my sister came along there wasn't much between us. I really don't remember anything about my mother until my younger sister came along when I was 5 years old. And my memories are of her holding , cuddling and loving my sister. No memory of her kind words directed my way. I felt that I was just in the way.

And that was the way it was all my life. She didn't seem to realize I needed her, wanted her love and attention. And I believe that is why my dad took me under his wing and tried to make up for what my mother was lacking. We spent hours in the evenings talking and sharing our days together. I am so thankful for what my dad was to me.

And then he said the words that I always knew were there. Always hanging in the air, hidden away in the closest like a hated old sweater never to be worn again. But being kept with the hope of renewal.

"I don't know why your Mother never liked you."

I was 35 years old.

That is the moment the adult in me left the room. I have always felt that my mother didn't like me but I have never heard those words spoken out loud. They sounded so sharp and painful and they could never be taken back.

That is when I realized I have never felt like an adult. How can you claim to be an adult when you are still craving so much from your childhood.
I never let my father know what those spoken words did to my heart that day. He didn't know I had lived with them in my heart all these years. He had no idea they were the words that were stealing my Adulthood from me.

I carefully put those words back where I had been keeping them..in the back of my mind.
And that is where they will live out their life..alone, in silence, in the dark recesses of my mind never to be spoken again.
I have found happiness in my life but it was long in coming. I was passed 50 when I decided that I would marry again. And a wonderful man came into my life at just the right time. He is kind and gentle, soft spoken, loving, fun and he has brought me more joy than I could ever have imagined in my life.
Yes, my dad would have been so excited about my new life..and good friends with my husband.
No, I do not feel that I am an adult yet. But when I decide what I want to be when I do grow up I will let you know and you can decide if I am really an Adult then.
Until then, I am loving this wonderful life.