Ok I need to blog about this so it is written down and hopefully I'll stick to it.

I need to stop talking poorly about David's parents...at least in front of David.

I forget how hurtful it can be even if the things I'm saying are true. They are his parents, and even if he holds the same opinion about them as I do, it is okay for him to speak as such and it is not okay for me to.

It's not that I plan to never speak my opinions of them again. But I feel I'm doing it frequently and achieving no purpose. I'm not even trying to achieve a purpose except to just remind him. And I know I don't really need to remind him. He knows. I think I want to remind him just in case though because after what happened with his mom last time we visited, I want him to fully understand that I'm so turned off by her that we are no way staying with them again. I don't even want to have a discussion about it. So I think I remind him just to make sure we don't have that discussion.

I will try to stop now. He definitely understands. She was ridiculously out of line and must learn that she cannot keep people close to her while behaving that way. I don't think there will be much discussion. Also, this discussion won't even be an issue for an unknown amount of time. I have no idea when I'll be visiting so Cal again.

David has vocalized to me that it sucks to hear all the things I have to say about his mom though he knows they're true. And I completely empathize with him. I recognized awhile ago that even though I held poor opinions of my dad, I very much disliked it when others voiced those same opinions to me. The daughter in me wants to say "hey, that's my dad!" If I still feel that way about my dad who I barely ever talk to or see, then David must feel it a lot stronger about his parents who he's relatively close to. I don't know how they raised such a sweet boy. Oops. Supposed to be stopping. Ok that was it.

This reminds me of a picture from childhood that still causes struggle in me. A few years ago, I was looking at my mom's old photos. There was a picture of me at about 2 years old being held by my dad. I remember thinking, "wow, I was so tiny. My dad used to be able to hold me. And now I'm stronger than him." He looked like he loved me in that picture, like he never wanted to hurt me. I know that's still true. Mainly all the hurt he caused me was because he hurt my mom. He was selfish and ignored the fact that it was hurting his relationship with his daughters. Ugh, I'm so conflicted about him.