Family shmamily
Dec. 3rd, 2019 04:54 amOccasionally I am known to dispense nuggets of wisdom, even if unintentionally. This is something I sent to someone on FB who was complaining about their family hating them:
Family are like neighbors; sometimes the only thing you have in common with either is proximity. And like neighbors, you don't have to give a shit about family, especially if they don't give a shit about you. Go out into the world and find a new family, like I did, even if you have to assemble it one person at a time. The family you choose is always superior to the one that sheer dumb luck strapped you with, even if you got lucky enough to have amazing blood family.
Furthermore, if your blood family doesn't give a shit about you, that says more about them than it does about you. It says their taste in humans sucks ass, which means their opinion of you is about as useful as an ashtray on a motorcycle. And if it's perfectly acceptable to divorce a spouse because they're a bad fit for you, it should be at least equally acceptable to "divorce" your blood family for the same kinds of reasons. Anyone who tries to tell you that you owe your family something because your parents happened to have the spunk and egg that made you, and did the bare minimum of feeding and clothing and sheltering their kid, or y'all grew up together... well if they tell you your bio-family deserves your respect or whatever for any of that, you can rest assured that those people don't know their ass from a hole in the ground. You didn't ask them to do any of that. They made their choice to have a kid, and however much or little they did for you after that is their choice and not yours. If a relationship is a bad fit, it's a bad fit, and ending that relationship should never be shamed for any reason.
TL;DR anybody who doesn't like you for everything you are, feel free to tell them to fuck off, and go find somebody who *does* like you for everything you are. You don't owe them shit. But you owe it to yourself to cut toxic people out of your life.
Family are like neighbors; sometimes the only thing you have in common with either is proximity. And like neighbors, you don't have to give a shit about family, especially if they don't give a shit about you. Go out into the world and find a new family, like I did, even if you have to assemble it one person at a time. The family you choose is always superior to the one that sheer dumb luck strapped you with, even if you got lucky enough to have amazing blood family.
Furthermore, if your blood family doesn't give a shit about you, that says more about them than it does about you. It says their taste in humans sucks ass, which means their opinion of you is about as useful as an ashtray on a motorcycle. And if it's perfectly acceptable to divorce a spouse because they're a bad fit for you, it should be at least equally acceptable to "divorce" your blood family for the same kinds of reasons. Anyone who tries to tell you that you owe your family something because your parents happened to have the spunk and egg that made you, and did the bare minimum of feeding and clothing and sheltering their kid, or y'all grew up together... well if they tell you your bio-family deserves your respect or whatever for any of that, you can rest assured that those people don't know their ass from a hole in the ground. You didn't ask them to do any of that. They made their choice to have a kid, and however much or little they did for you after that is their choice and not yours. If a relationship is a bad fit, it's a bad fit, and ending that relationship should never be shamed for any reason.
TL;DR anybody who doesn't like you for everything you are, feel free to tell them to fuck off, and go find somebody who *does* like you for everything you are. You don't owe them shit. But you owe it to yourself to cut toxic people out of your life.