My Mormon relatives insist that I am responsible for their decisions. They say, “But you Chose this to happen to you!” Somehow, they overlook the fact that they, themselves, are the ones making things happen. For years I thought this was some weird Mormon doctrine that I been initiated into. But about a month ago, doing research for a book, a Mormon counselor told me this was not an official Mormon teaching, but Sociopathic behavior. (I’m describing this in more detail in another blog)
Back in 1999 I got a place with my brother Robert and became his live-in caregiver. He had been homeless for a long time. We got a place together in 1997 but he had another mental breakdown and ended up on the streets again. Since he also had AIDS, this was very painful for me to watch him struggling. I was able to find a place for myself, a small granny unit with no kitchen or bathroom, but his mental problems made it impossible for me to take him in. I could barely take care of myself.
Eventually, my landlady lost her house, and so did I. Her landlord wanted to tear down her house and granny units and but a row of townhouses on the large lot. My friend Aaron let me stay at his mom’s house with him for a month.
Robert had ended up in an AIDS hospice and had stabilized mentally. It was really depressing visiting him there because the other patents were so excited for my brother to have a visitor. It seems everybody else had just been left there to die by their families. They were all so happy for my brother that every time I came to visit him. It was so depressing to watch.
Part of the reason I was helping my brother, besides he was a great guy with a big heart, was that everybody else in the family seemed willing to leave him in the hospice like the other AIDS patients. Also, I knew if I was in the same situation, that nobody would be willing to help me. So I chose to help my brother, knowing the favor would never be returned.
Househunting to us a couple months but we found a townhouse in Santa Rosa near a shopping center and bus lines. We were there about a year before the landlord evicted everybody to remodel the entire block of townhouses and raise the rent. We looked for a new place frantically, and remembered how hard it had been the last time. Many places required a $35 credit check fee with the application. At a certain point, we simply couldn’t afford to apply to any more potential places.
We finally found a house, in the Roseland area of Santa Rosa. It was a dumpy little house but we ended up living there for 13 years, longer than either of us had ever lived anywhere. The shop where I had been working sold off to a company in Idaho. I got another job, That one closed, too. I got another job, and that place went out of business. In the 20 years I lived in Santa Rosa I worked at 8 different companies that no longer exist.
I had been applying to Sonoma State University, about 10 miles away, for several years. They were heavily impacted, and at one point instituted a lottery. Even though I had applied early, I didn’t win the admissions lottery. So I attended Santa Rosa Junior College in the meantime. I decided to save money by taking all my General Education classes there to save money. SRJC had budget cuts, and required classes were offered infrequently, and usually at overlapping times. I ended up going to the junior college for 4 years to finish my 2-year degree.
Finally, after 6 years of applying, I was accepted into SSU’s English Department contingent on passing my next semester’s classes. I took an English Literature class at SRJC that would count toward my degree at SSU, but with much lower tuition. At the start of Spring 2014 semester Robert developed a cough. I tried to get him to see a doctor, without nagging him. On Easter he checked himself into the hospital with pneumonia.
A couple weeks later my Mormon mom and sister showed up and immediately started packing my things up. Some of these were important papers I needed access to, and I kept asking them to leave my things alone. “But I’m helping!” they would whine. I had a spot where I worked on my homework every night after school. My can of pens would get “tidied up” every day and I would have to hunt for them. My homework would be gone in the morning, and I would get to school without realizing it.
During my last weeks of our 16-week semester, I would be tying my shoes in the morning and both of these Mormon ladies would bring in stuff from the other room. “What this? Do you need it?” Thing like my airbrush equipment, accessories for my video equipment, things that were expensive to buy, things that I needed. I would tell them it was important to me, and ask them to put it back. “Are you sure? Because I can throw it away for you!”
It is hard to explain what it is like, while you having two people interrogating you about your belongings in your own home while you are trying to get ready for school. It was like having two bratty 4-year-olds destroying my house. Again and again both of them, at the same time, would be grabbing my things from the other room and offering to throw them away for me - and then argue with me.
I tried explaining to them how stressful this was, but they would say, “But you Choose to feel that way! I’m not responsible for your feelings!” When I tried explaining how important my English Literature class was, and how I needed to pass it, they would interrupt and tell me, “You don’t NEED to pass that class - you can just take it over again!” I would try to explain how I hadn’t failed the class yet, but they would just interrupt me again and again to argue with me.
I tried to explain that I had paid for these 16-week classes, and couldn’t afford to take them over again when I hadn’t failed them yet. Whatever I said they would interrupt to contradict. I tried pointing out how unfair it was for them to sabotage my college education after I had spent the last 14 years taking care of my sick brother, and they would interrupt me to say, “But that was your choice! We’re not responsible for your decisions!” Somehow, they would deny responsibility from sabotaging my academic career by deflecting it to my decision to take care of my dying brother. Instead of making things easier for me, it was like they were punishing me for taking care of my brother.
I asked them to stop hundreds, thousands of times.
“But I’m helping!”
“No, you are not helping. You are just making a mess for me to clean up by myself.”
“But that’s your choice if you want to clean up! I’m not responsible for your decisions!”
“Well, can you just stop?”
“But I can’t think of anything else to do!”
“Can you try to think of something helpful?”
“But I can’t think of anything!”
“I don’t mean right now, I mean while I’m at school. Could you TRY to think of something helpful to do?”
“But I can’t think of anything!”
“Well, if you can’t think of anything helpful, could you stop packing my things up until Finals are over?”
“But I can’t think of anything else to do!”
I could think of helpful things to do, but they would interrupt me and argue about how it was my choice to feel that way. It was disturbing to see how much energy they could expend in talking over me, contradicting me, “tidying up” my pens, boxing up my homework and painfully wasting my time. And yet they absolutely could not think of anything helpful to do.
To Be Continued..
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