I was told last night that I am, in TD's opinion, a guest. No kidding. Over a year, much time and effort on my part, and this is what I get. At least this is how it sounded initially, and I'm not yet totally convinced this isn't her thought/wish/perspective.
We were all sitting on the couch, laughing and playing following an impressive pouting episode over dessert. Food, eating, what's for dinner, dessert, "yes you need to eat", etc are all common catalysts for pouting episodes in our house. They are impressive in both their intensity and their duration. TD doesn't like anything that doesn't come from McDonalds or another restaurant. We don't eat out much, hence the pouting. So there we are, recovered from the pouting, and having fun. She decided this was a great time to tickle me, we're laughing, being silly, and NG smacks her on the butt (playing). She says something to the effect of "no butt smacking in front of the guest".
Now I ignored it the first time, tried to laugh it off, and then she said it again. And again. And perhaps another time. As this went on, I literally withdrew. My heart was broken. After all of my effort and things going well, I'm relegated to the role of houseguest. I moved to the other end of the couch, got my laptop, and disengaged. Think turtle in shell. NG, being the sweet and tuned-in guy he is, says "Whatcha doin all the way over there??" to which I replied "This is where guests sit."
TD looks at me with this odd expression on her face, NG does not look pleased, and I'm just trying not to cry. All I could think was "Here we go. A week and a half before the wedding and she's decided I'm disposable. This is the shoe dropping I've been waiting for. She's going to flip out at the wedding, her mother's going to encourage her hating me, and NGs going to be caught in the middle. Guess who loses when that happens? Me." It was not a pretty mental picture.
Then I started to think about my boss. I know that sounds weird, but she has daughters my age and very healthy relationships with them, and they're healthy because they talk. If someone's upset, they talk about it, when bad things happen, they talk about it, if someone's feelings are hurt, they talk about it. That's new for me, my family didn't do that. In an effort to be healthier, I said "TD when you called me a guest that really hurt my feelings and made me feel like you don't want me here." Then SHE started crying and went to her room. The kid part of me thought "Why does she get to cry when I'M the one with the hurt feelings?????? That's SO not fair!"
NG gave her a minute then went in to talk to her. He reiterated that we're getting married next week, and if something's wrong, she needs to talk to us about it. I just stayed put, I didn't know what else to do. I tried to talk to her after he did and she wouldn't talk to me. About 30m later she came in to our room where I was folding laundry (even in the midst of drama, laundry has to be done) and gave me a huge hug with big fat tears. She said she was sorry, she didn't mean it the way it sounded, and that she's glad I'm here. I told her I wasn't going anywhere, in a good way, and I was thanked her for her apology. I told her I loved her, and later when she was in bed she called "good night (me), I love you!". Very sweet.
I imagine in the long run that will be a defining moment for our family and our relationship. In processing it over the day, I think it was a test. Or a pop quiz since it didn't appear pre-meditated or contrived. I think I passed, and we passed as a family. It was a big test for me, that's for sure. I'm prone to not addressing things, my family is one to ignore and let things fester, so it was a really big deal for me to tell a 9yo that she hurt my feelings, to address it on the spot then process it with NG later. He was impressed with my reaction, I thought he did a fine job talking to her and backing me up (simultaneously), and all is almost right with the world again. It's going to take me a couple of days to fully recover from that one, it hit me pretty hard. Getting married after you've lost your mom, even if it was 9 years ago, is hard. Getting shit from a 9yo doesn't help that. My threshold for emotional situations isn't exactly at it's highest.
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