Most bloggers do not write about their family. It is personal stuff and you have to be very honest and out front with your life once you begin. I am anonymous just so that I can write about people who, I hope, will also remain anonymous while I try to sort out their lives.
You will realize from this post that my family, while loving and generous of spirit, are terrible communicators. They tend to avoid the painful reality of life. It might be because they know that we cannot do anything about the painful decisions of others or it might be that sharing doesn't really ease their concerns, or perhaps they are embarrassed by the "perfect" lives that they think all the rest of us have. All of these people I have learned about below, are not blood relatives...not that that makes any difference.
I learned on this past family trip the following news. Some of it was explained only after embarrassing comments on my part because I did not know what the H*** was going on!.
My step-niece (who has no health insurance and no husband) thought she was pregnant, thought she miscarried three months later, then gave birth to a baby in her mother's house, all alone one afternoon early this summer. She had been raised on a horse farm and actually explained to me all the precautions she took, including adjusting for the fact that the water heater pilot light had broken that morning, in order to deliver this baby all by herself! The child was born safely for the mother (28 years old). After a helicopter flight to the hospital when the child had trouble breathing they discovered that the child has an incomplete brain and is missing part of the back lobes. This appears to be a genetic disorder that will mean my step-niece should not have any other children. There are those who know only too well all the terrible issues with this situation. All I know is that currently the child is off of oxygen and is eating and growing and is very precious. This mother's life has changed forever. The father of this child has four children in a current marriage and an illegitimate child from another relationship. TMI.
My step-niece's brother, a marine just back from Iraq, was goofing around with other marines this past spring and appears to have ruptured a disk and now requires spinal fusion. Thus his life is now also changed forever, probably ending his hope to enter the police force when he is released from service.
My other step-nephew from another family came with his 7-year-old daughter to a family BBQ and it wasn't until later in the evening that someone bothered to mention he has been divorced for over a year. That was when I stopped asking him if his wife was working late!
All of the rest of the gang seems to be living reasonably normal lives with normal challenges.
Isn't it amazing what people forget or choose not to tell you? We went out to dinner with my cousin and her husband tonight and got an earful about her brother and his children.
ReplyDeleteI hope that baby will do okay.
So, are you not really Tabor? or does the family not know you write a blog? Just wondering. My children know of my blog, but, I do not think they read it too much, the key word being "think". So, I will not mention any secrets on my blog....lol
ReplyDeleteI write openly about our family disease Alcoholism and all the side effects. I write of my children, my G'daughter with Asberber's Syndrome, my disfunctional family, my functional family.....and everything else inbetween. I write about my own learning disabilities, and my struggles recovering from a stroke. And I pray for all my friends with cancer.
ReplyDeleteIf you write and talk openly, there are no elephants in the living room when you have a family like mine.
RYN: Big only in width. LOL
I haven't written about my family as of yet, but I probably will in the future.
ReplyDeleteOne of my very best friends was divorced almost a year before I found out. I kept inviting she and her husband to baseball games, hockey games, out to dinner with the hubby and me and she kept making excuses as to why they couldn't go. Finally, we had lunch one day and I still felt like something was off. I finally asked her if I had done something to make her mad and that's when she told me about the divorce. She said she didn't tell me because she didn't want to be talking about it. Only three other people knew at the time. I'm still baffled by that one. Oh, and they hadn't even been married a full year when the divorce ocurred. TMI
I sometimes write about family but usually tiptoe around things that would tick off my wife even though she hardly ever looks at my blog because it is too weird for her. I do usually avoid writing about work because I'd probably get myself fired.
ReplyDeleteSometimes we have to hear of the troubles of others to really appreciate how lucky we are. The baby has certainly altered the life of it's mother forever.
ReplyDeleteI am probably too open in my blog and tell all. I think I should learn to be more discrete.
That first story is the stuff novels are made of. My heart goes out to her and the baby.
ReplyDeleteAlthough I'm an open book (with on a page or two torn out) there is stuff in my family that I know enough not to write about.
So now I wonder what is true and what is not? Is Xman a real boy? Do you show photos of places you have actually been or do you just copy them? My stories are true on my blog I just don't disclose real living location or real name. Is that what you do?
ReplyDeleteActually everything from photos to places to events on my blog is true. Only the names are changed to protect the guilty, the innocent and any pending lawsuits!
ReplyDeleteI know a friend who also gave birth to her son all by herself.
ReplyDeleteShe had her first baby when she was in college and her family supported her when her boyfriend denied his responsibilities as a father. But when she got pregnant for the second time with the same man, she didn't tell anything to her family due to humiliation. She kept her pregnancy a secret to everyone. Can you imagine that? The family only knew about it when the neighbors told them that they heard a baby crying from their house.
Her son was healthy, though. He is now 5 years old and is going to a kindergarten. :)
Wow.. giving birth all alone like that take guts. More guts than brains, I'm afraid. I hope things turn out as well as they possibly can for this wee one.
ReplyDeleteYou're right tabor, it's so difficult to blog about family, especially when there is a chance that they might just read. Makes you extra careful and out goes the authenticity in the writing.
ReplyDeleteYour observations could be anyone's--meet someone after a while and they'd have undergone significant changes. I would go to my native village once in a year, in my childhood days, but now it's been seven years since my last visit. I hear, people and places have undergone such a drastic change that I'll have to begin afresh acquainting with them once I go there, later this year.