18 Years...And It's Still There

I've lived with Yolie, and I've easily spent nearly every single day with her over the last 18 years, especially when one averages two or three trips a day between our homes, the hours alone would mount up stupendously. Yet for her to bare her soul, share her pain, and explain to folks like me, middle class over-protected kids of the Baby Boomer Era, the clueless ones who grew up in two-parent, uber-stable homes that they eventually rebelled against - for Yolie to put it all out there and risk it all emotionally still staggers me. She wants for us to simply understand.

Us parents...we'll never know, never, ever comprehend the depth of their pain. We just can't.

It's still painful for me to know the unfathomable depths, because these were my children that others mistreated, hurt, neglected and abused and as irrational as it may appear, I feel the middle class guilt of what others did to my children.

I get exasperated at Big Joe, plumb worn out from Edgar's emotional demands, irked at Vanessa's poor choices, I could go on and on, but some part of me usually comprehends that it isn't really about me, even though I'm the target...and I'm the target because I'm safe. It's not even about them...it's about the anger at what was done to them.

Somehow I listened, I trusted my caseworker not to steer me wrong as she explained the many nuances I'd face someday, as well as the blatant destruction and damage that'd be done.

Yolie's post is terribly painful, so emotionally painful I nearly asked her take it down, but fortunately she clearly tells us what we need to know. She's brilliant and can verbalize, in sharp contrast to those who simply self-destruct or punch in the walls.

Children who are not nurtured, children who've been abused and neglected, can and do survive successfully eventually, but I'm so slowly comprehending that the pain will always be there in some capacity, and there's so little I can do other than continue to be there and to love them through. Through everything.

As painful as it all is, at least Yolie feels emotionally safe enough with me to be brutally honest, and to know I'm still standing, still there for her, and continuing forward steadily as a family unit.