COMMENT BELOW, I want to know. I was once told that the version of you people, like family, have in their minds is associated with when they had a large presence in your life. I moved away from my hometown area for over a decade, and it didn’t dawn on me how the lack of participation and witnessing the things that happened to me over those years would impact the version of me my family sees. It wasn’t until I had a challenging conversation with me Mom that it makes sense; my family only remembers me as who I was before I moved away. And who I am now, because of the life I’ve lived, is lost upon them. How do you navigate communicating to those who are close to you “who” you actually are? How have you addressed the discrepancy of who you are vs how others perceive you?
"I had a really interesting conversation with my therapist recently. The way that it sort of played out in reality, I thought was worth sharing " In my mom's eyes, she'll always think of me as the kid. As an adult man, when I call my mom, her knee jerk reaction is the same reaction she's always had.
"My reality and that of the people that I care about and I think care about me don't always overlap in the same way " How do you handle those conversations? And come out with a sense of clarity or feeling like it wasn't sucking the energy from you?
Hey, Cadre sphere. I had a really interesting conversation with my therapist recently. And the way that it sort of played out in reality, I thought was worth sharing. And I'm really curious other people's thoughts and experiences with stuff like this. So when I was 18 years old, I moved out. I went to college and then spent maybe one summer after that living at home once again. But other than that, have been out of the house for over a decade at the point I had this first conversation. And then when I moved out of the state of where I grew up and you know, lived in multiple states over the years, obviously things happen that my family is not privy to.
No one's there to witness it, and they really only get the secondhand account from me or from other people in my family that I might tell. So if I told like my mom about something bad that happened, my sister might find out and then, you know, folklore happens thereafter through the telephone game. But my therapist made this point to me, especially during what was a really heated political climate this year, right in election year, and differences in opinions when it comes to, you know, you versus your loved ones.
And she said how? Because I haven't been an adult, really an adult in front of my family, and I've lived this life on my own, you know, sort of behind the scenes, just coming home intermittently, that the version of me that they are familiar with is the version of me they last saw. So, for example, in my mom's eyes, she'll always think of me as the kid or as the 18 year old that I was before I left home. And then the older that I get, even though now I live closer to family, that's the image of me that she has.
Because all this lived experience and all these good and bad things that have happened to me over the years, she wasn't witness to, she wasn't protecting me. She wasn't a part of those events or conversations. It was just me figuring things out for myself. So, you know, I always thought about that and it makes sense because even now, as an adult man, when I call my mom and complain about something or whatever, her knee jerk reaction is the same reaction she's always had. Even when I was a kid. You know, she's like, what can I do to help?
What do you need? And you know, really, I'm not necessarily asking for anything. I can take care of myself. I have my, you know, my routines and I have my resources and things. Sometimes I'm just telling her things to tell her things. So there was a really, really Negative thing that happened to myself, my aunt, and a friend. All three of us identifying as homosexual after the election had happened. And my family and me have very different opinions on how we vote and wanted different outcomes for what this month brought.
So after this event sort of escalated and I was really emotionally charged and my mom was on the polar opposite side of opinion of things, me and her got into a relatively heated conversation and I, I guess, put her in her place, or I just sort of snapped and had said, like, you don't know what it's like to walk into a room and immediately know that everyone thinks you're different and no one wants you there. And she tried to combat. And she tried to, in her way, sympathize. I don't really think there was empathy that could come from not having that experience, but it wasn't.
Frankly, it wasn't good enough. You know, her rebuttal to me saying that I shot down, and I was like, that's not the same thing. I was like, you don't understand where I'm coming from. And even though when I was in my teenage years, I had plenty of negative experiences of, like, stigma and harassment, being a gay man, because I came out when I was 15 years old, but in my adult life and being on my own, like, things are heightened and the world has changed and evolved and gone back and forth in terms of progress and regression.
So it just, it validated what my therapist said that, you know, in her eyes, she doesn't know all the things that have happened to me and therefore why I feel a certain way and why I have these formed opinions and because of the experiences that I've had and because she knows only the life that she has, and she only knows the life where she was my caretaker. So I'm curious how for anybody else, you know, please comment below and let me know what your experience has been like this. But from the amount of effort I spend code switching and masking in different environments, like at home and at work and with friends, to get into, like, a really emotionally heated state and sort of be confronted with the reality that my reality and that of the people that I care about and I think care about me don't always overlap in the same way.
So how do you handle those conversations or how do you go into those types of events and situations and. And come out with a sense of clarity or feeling like it wasn't sucking the energy from you? I'm genuinely curious.
