monstro-You are quite right I brought this thread on myself. Thanks to those who had helpful feedback.
JERRY! JERRY! JERRY!
Fixing all caps
You’re welcome.
Just to follow up, if they didn’t pay or support you through the process, then there’s not a lot of “obligation” on that score.
I think you’ve got some basic questions to answer yourself as to whether you want you parents in your life, and when graduation rolls around who you want to have there.
Sounds like good times.
I have the bladder the size of a pea. So, I’d be paying full price for the first pitcher.
Not to come across as a stalker, but this thread is where etv78 explained the terrible deed done to him by his dad, beginning with post #6. Post #6 was considered somewhat incoherent by many, but was helpfully summarized in post #40 and post #42. He received a lot of good advice in that thread.
etv78, I mean this in all sincerity: you need to take a really hard look at your relationship with your family and a long hard look at yourself as a person. I’m not one to judge you for not having a good relationship with your parents – I (along with all my siblings) are estranged from my father, and most people don’t understand that this was a considered decision that I have never regretted. At the same time, there comes a point where your parents being dicks isn’t an excuse anymore.
If you honestly and truly have issues with one or both of your parents that are irreconcilable, where being a loving family member to them is truly impossible in your heart of hearts, then you need to cut off that relationship.
If you honestly and truly can’t take that step because you want a relationship with them, then you need to stop with the petty drama bullshit.
I understand that there can be toxic relationships. You’re an adult now – you can opt out of that relationship. If you choose to stay then you are taking responsibility for that choice and you need to take responsibility for being a fucking person. It is not a “reward” to invite family to a graduation and that kind of thinking is honestly pretty messed.
I have my own issues that stem from a very toxic relationship with my father and I have no doubt that some of the ways that my life hasn’t worked out as perfectly as I hoped and dreamt that the groundwork was laid when I was a child. I know very well that the emotional toll of my childhood years is a big part of who I am today, and one of the things that holds me back in some regards. However, once I became an adult, I dealt with that relationship the best way I knew how – I tried to fix it, and eventually cut it off because of the lack of better options. I did not sit around trying to modify his behavior by punishing and rewarding him for dis/pleasing me, or to try to even the score for years ago. I’ll be really honest with you – this kind of shit is exactly why our relationship was toxic to begin with. It’s vindictive and mean and horrible. And you know what? He blamed his parents for being mean to him when he was a kid, too. And they were. They weren’t very good parents and they practiced the same kind of nasty favoritism and emotional manipulation that he did. I’m sure a lot of his faults base in his childhood, too. But you know what? Fuck that as an excuse. I’m my own person and so is he, and it’s just not good enough to point at your parents forever, bleating “It’s their fault when I fail!” If I let my past affect me in a negative way, it’s my problem. It’s not up to anyone else to fix me. It’s my responsibility. Yeah, it sucks that I didn’t have a normal relationship with my dad, and it sucks that a lot of my memories of him are painful. Welcome to planet Earth where things don’t always go your way.
Anyway, I don’t know if you’ll take this in the spirit that it’s meant – I don’t mean to slap you down or side with your parents, for all I know they’re really fucked up people – but I just think you need to wake up and take a long, hard look at yourself and your own actions. You can’t control your parents and you never will, but you can control yourself. I can completely and totally understand if you do not have an emotional bond with your parents and if you don’t want them in your life – really and truly, I do. But whatever they did, you don’t get a free pass to cut them off as a punishment if you decide you want a relationship with them (and yes, this is your decision). Sorry, but that’s just fucked up and cruel, and the worst kind of spite.
How does holding your urine result in needing to be in a nursing home for years? Wouldn’t you just piss yourself after a while?
Maybe he did it more than once and ended up ruining his bladder or something? I don’t know.
IANA etv78, but he explains a bit here. My guess is that without timely catheterization, the bladder burst.
Ah, I thought he meant that causing his bladder to get too full lead to problems that would require catheterization.
That must have been quite an argument, to risk ten years in a nursing home!
Not 10 years in a nursing home. Ask the person who lived in nursing homes for 4 years
Tycho Brahe.
I think you’re worrying a little too early about this. Why not save your energies for your studies, and only consider who to invite once you’ve passed all your classes and been told that you will be graduating.
Otherwise, if you spend too much time and effort on threads and debates like these, you might find you never end up earning a graduation ceremony at all.
Then we’d be responsible for setting him back another 5 years.
By all means if you don’t want to reward them, then definitely invite them to your graduation. Graduation ceremonies are tedious mind numbing bores. Not being invited would probably be considered a reward.
D’oh! :smack:
I mixed up the years in the nursing home with the years he took to go back to school. My bad!
Well, he sure showed his brother, huh?
I wasn’t clear on this before: I’m roughly 1 school year from finishing. (May 2012)