Quote:
Originally Posted by OldTaylor
Independence: the Lone Ranger's Tonto comes to mind. It appears to me that your sister has looked elsewhere for love. This means, in her case, that your Dad has successfully launched (at least for as long as marriage lasts) a daughter into society. Your being at hand and by his side is convenient but not quite the jewel in his crown the launch has made. "Yes!" He says to you, "help me be a successful father and parent." And you do. He is focused on his own success, what time is there for yours. A time comes when we must "fly the coup," so to speak, least someone find out that we have overextended our welcome. Yes. We have stumbled upon the true meaning of the once hip rebuke, "get a life." This raises the issue of the love for one's family or parents and their friends as an opposite to the love that acquires for us our own set of friends and family. What causes us to seek parental love as a preference to searching out our own personal love? Might all of this say that dad has given up on us? Still, we won't marry or remain single to please dad but for our own satisfaction. We arrange our entry into society so that society itself is pleased with our arrival. Such an arrangement is most likely to capture our parents as well.
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I think you misunderstood my situation. I left home at 18, went to college and grad school, became a professor, and have always had an independent life. We all fly home for X-mas every year, and as my father has Parkinson’s and my mother is bedridden with MS, I do all of the cooking and cleaning and wrapping because they are physically unable to. My sister claims to be “too busy” and doesn’t help. My sister, however, (despite being college educated) has never held a job for more than 6 months and is supported by her fiancé. So it’s not the case that my sister had launched and I have not. I did, as another poster pointed out, recently leave my job in another state in order to move back home and take care of my dad when he went into the hospital. It was either I move in with him or he (and my mom) go to a nursing home. I have, however, got a publishing deal for my book and interviewed for a professor position at an even more prestigious University where my dad lives and am waiting to hear back in January. So, even though I did move home to take care of my parents in July, I still have an independent life. And, since I figured out that some of my dad’s worst symptoms were actually being caused by an allergic reaction to his medication (which his doctor missed) and he is improving significantly, it’s possible he will recover to the point I may no longer need to live with him. I still own my own house (which I’m renting out while I live with my parents), so if my dad recovers I will move back in to my own house.
Edit to add: It’s also relevant that my family did not celebrate when I got domestic partnered before gay marriage was legal. Granted, I have since ended that relationship and am single again, but I was formally partnered for 6 years. Because my sister is straight and is having a wedding, there is a huge celebration for her that I never had. I did not have a wedding because, at the time, my family would not have come (nor would here). That’s different now— my family has come around— but for years they treated my partner and my sister’s then boyfriend (not the one she is marrying now) very unequally.