questions of family dysfunctions

The other day, while we were doing dishes, because the dishwasher broke, Giggles started asking me about my brothers, out of the blue. The questions were surprising, in that she has never met my brothers, and that I never talk about my brothers, because they are not a part of my life and have not been for a very, very long time.

I often talk about the chores my sister and I had to do when we were kids, especially when my kids are assigned new household chores and they bitch and moan that they are so traumatized, because there is so much work they must do. We are evil, harsh task masters apparently, since we make them vacuum, empty the dishwasher, fold and put away their clothes and, the worst of the worst chores ever, clean their room. What are we thinking, being such mean parents and all?

But when Giggles asked about what chores my brothers had to do, it made me realize that I have very little memories of my brothers from when I was her age. This is partly because they are 11 and 14 years older than me and spent much of their time out of the house, doing god only knew what. Some of my memories are of them beating the hell out of each other to the point where heads were smashed through sheetrock. For some inexplicable reason they could barely be in the same room before arguments broke out, both verbal or physical. Meatheads.

When I was Giggles' age, I hero worshipped my oldest brother. When he went into the Navy, I missed him terribly and waited for him to come home. I have the fewest memories of my other brother. That makes sense as he avoided being home, because he and my mother argued constantly. He is probably the most volatile of all four of us. As I got older and spent time with them individually, we grew further apart as our interests and lifestyles diverged.

My brothers didn't come to the hospital when my mother was dying, not being the usual hypochondriac complainer that she was in life, but DYING, slowly and painfully from MRSA. Nor did they come to her funeral. Neither visited my father, after Mom died, or when he was sick in the hospital, when the bladder cancer was so bad, we knew he wouldn't recover. They didn't come to Dad's funeral either. These actions, or lack of actions? This is what made me write them off completely. They are not my brothers. They are men who lived in the same house as I did, for a time. They are strangers.

There were four of us raised by the same parents. Due to the span of 14 years from the first child to the last, we experienced life with our parents somewhat differently. Our lives weren't perfect, whose is, really? Were we neglected? I can't say that we were, but the emotional roller coaster of our mother left us all somewhat adrift and fending for ourselves. None of us were abused, physically or emotionally. We all experienced life with parents who didn't have money to spare, but we always had a home, food and clothes. They might not have been the best, and we all might have felt there were better ways, but for fuck sake, take responsibility for your own life after you are out on your own and living the life you choose. The boys raised by my parents continued to blame their troubles on how they were raised, even into their adulthood.

Is it my parents fault that my oldest brother couldn't stop smoking pot and his marriage failed? Is it my parents fault that my other brother married a mentally unstable woman who stole from people and had addiction issues? To continually blame whatever went wrong in your life on how you were raised, shows a decided lack of maturity and intelligence. Own your life.

My mother was a hypochondriac, manic depressive who craved attention and was prone to melodrama and my father was an enabler who devoted everything to making her happy. Somehow, in spite of that, my sister and I remained close to our parents, accepting their foibles as what they were. We grew up, have stable marriages, are raising our kids and have managed, thus far, to live relatively stable, productive lives and not blame our parents for the things that have not worked out. And we remain closer than ever.

My daughter is fascinated, in some ways, of the concept of having siblings that are not present in my life. The examples she sees in the relationships between me and my sister, my husband with his brother and sister, the relationship I have developed with my husband's brother and sister, are positive and interwoven in every day contact. Her relationship with her brother, fraught with the usual sibling grievances of "he won't leave me alone or she's bugging me" do not undermine the foundation of love and involvement they have in each others lives. I've seen first hand how they jump to each others defense, back each other up with friends and spend time together every day, either playing or disagreeing with each other. As she asked her questions, I could see she was seeking an understanding of how I could have brothers, yet not have brothers. She asked why they didn't come to her grandparents funerals. My husbands siblings attended those funerals, and frankly didn't particularly like my mother. That's okay, I like my siblings by marriage just fine, regardless. She asked what they do for work. Frankly, I couldn't tell her as I don't know. The reality is that I could walk past either of my brothers on the sidewalk and I'm not sure I would recognize them now.

I can't explain to her, as I don't fully understand it myself, how two men can turn their backs on their parents and sisters. Or maybe I do, as I have turned my back on them. I easily accept that I won't forgive them for not being in contact with my parents when they were sick and dying. I find those actions unforgivable. Maybe I'm too close to it, but that closeness allows me the insight to know that the foundation in which we were all raised was very similar, and how we chose to react to it, grow from it and make something of it, is what counts in the end.