The Caretaker

I got quite a bit of reading done yesterday while sitting by the pond at The Farm. Codependent No More . That book is the first task I've assigned myself since I never finished it months ago when I started it. I feel like I'm ready now to actually internalize what I read, to make forward steps, to really try.

So I started over from the beginning even though I had previously made it through half of the book. I had already highlighted things that resonated with me:

I saw people who felt responsible for the entire world , but they refused to take responsibility for leading and living their own lives.

I saw people who constantly gave to others but didn't know how to receive. I saw people give until they were angry, exhausted, and emptied of everything . I saw some give until they gave up.

I worked with women who were experts at taking care of everyone around them, yet these women doubted their ability to take care of themselves.

...Yet these codependents who had such great insight into others couldn't see themselves. They didn't know what they were feeling. They weren't sure what they thought. And they didn't know what, if anything, they could do to solve their problems.

...

I thought of all the people I "help" whenever they need it. I remembered SIL and her drama and how I dropped whatever I was doing whenever she had a crisis, how I always felt drained and unappreciated afterward. I thought of others who I worried sick over. My sister because I couldn't help her enough. She was being evicted and didn't come to anyone for help until the last minute, when it was really too late for us to do much of anything. Having to rush over there, rent her a moving truck, pick all her crap up off the yard of the apartments because she couldn't pack everything herself in time and they threw it out, not having made any plans of what she was going to do or where she was going to go with her three kids and five animals, having too much faith in God saying, "Something will come through." I felt out of control and sick to my stomach because I couldn't 'rescue' her. I lived in a tiny apartment then, I had no room for her and couldn't take her animals and we were out of time. I felt as if her problems were my problems.

I continued reading and then I thought of Habibi and the current homeschooling issue. It broke my heart to see him struggling in school, to hear him say he hated school (in first grade!), to see his self-esteem go further and further down. We couldn't afford to enroll him in a Montessori school where I felt he would excel and really enjoy it but I felt I had to do something. I had been asking My Belle questions about homeschooling and she kept telling me I could do it. I had doubts. I ended up thinking those doubts were a result of low self-esteem, I started comparing myself to My Belle, who's been doing it for something like three years with all three of her kids, and I thought of what Habibi needed. I did briefly consider myself, my qualifications and limitations but in the end Habibi's needs took precedence. (Isn't that what a good mother is supposed to do?) Besides, The Ex became excited about it and said he'd be involved too, which he hasn't been.

I thought about it again, without the guilt factor or perfection factor, and realized that not only did we not have the money to properly home school him, but that I'm not that kind of mother. I don't want to spend every waking moment with my children every single day of the year. I'm not structured and organized, nor a person of routine when left to my own devices. And the more things that came to mind, I was certain I needed to put him back into regular school. And regardless of everything else, I was going to have to get a job in order for me to get to where I want to be, so he'd have to go back because of that too.

I also quit comparing myself to My Belle because I realized it's impossible to do. I don't see what goes on in her house. I don't know how she really feels about it, her private thoughts. It's true, she could really love it. But it's also a possibility that she feels resentment at times too and that she's doing it for other reasons, like I was. How many phone calls have I talked to her where she was about to pull her hair out? How many times have I heard her complain that she has no time for herself, that her husband doesn't do what he agreed to do? And how many times have we gone out together where she drinks too much?

I am not My Belle. I am not one of those PTA moms. And that's OK.