LETTING GO of HURT & ANGER

At one time or another, we all get hurt and are made angry in this life by someone or by circumstances and we all have to deal with that anger or hurt as best as we can. In most cases we learn to get over it, forgive the thing that made us angry, forget the hurt and get back to doing our own thing in life. But sometimes a person is hurt so badly or made so very angry that getting over it is a lot easier said than done. In a lot of cases hurt and anger are two seperate issues but then other times hurt and anger go hand in hand and when that is the case, getting over it and getting on with our lives can sometimes be very hard. In some cases that can be more than just very hard, it can sometimes be impossible. I found myself in that situation recently and the hurt and the anger has nearly destroyed me. I came to a place where I either had to learn to let go of it or become a very angry, bitter, lonely old woman. I was/AM not willing to sacrifice myself and those I love, to hurt and anger caused by someone who so obviously did not care enough about me in the first place to stop the madness. Here is my story. The names have NOT been changes to protect anyone. If someone gets hurt or made angry by my telling this story then I can only consider that langiappe. For me, it's time to get on with my life, leaving the hurt, the anger and the bitterness where I put it several days ago...in God's hands for Him to deal with. I have held onto it for as long as I can. It's time now to let it go.

When I maried Bud in 1988, Arlene was not speaking to me. She was still angry with me for falling in love with her daddy and being honest about it. I suppose it was alright with her as long as the two of us were sneaking around town, but as soon as I told her and everyone else the truth, she got embarrassed because it was HER father that I was sneaking around with and I guess she was afraid that she would somehow get blamed for the mess, so she completely cut me out of her life. I put up with being ignored by her for five years while she sent Christmas cards to my home, called my home and the whole time acted as if I did not exist. Eventually, she "forgave" me, although some 12 years later I am still not sure what I was forgiven for. But I let it go. Oh, there was a while there that I was afraid to trust her, but little by little my trust returned and I placed it back in her and we were able to go on with our friendship. That made Bud very happy and for his sake I am glad that for the rest of his life, he saw his daughter as a loyal, devoted friend who did all she could to show her love for me and her devotion to our friendship. Her true colors did not come through until after my husband died and the sad part is that I was actually surprised when it happened. But then that only points out my own faults as to my gullibility and the amount of trust I put in a person that says they are my friend.

When Bud had that fatal heart attack and was put on life support, Arlene came to South Carolina along with Kristi and Brett. I knew that my kids were there for me and at the time I assumed that was the same reason Arlene was there; in reality, I'm not sure why she came, but she did and she did stay with me when I was at the hospital and sat up with me at night. On Wednesday morning, May 6th we got up very early and discussed what we had ahead of us that day. I knew that I had to terminate the life support that my husband was on as it was not his wish in any way to live on life support. I allowed it only for as long as it took the rest of the kids to get to town, if they wished to come. Mark never did want to come, so that morning she and I talked about removing the life support. We also talked about the fact that Bud had a will, he just never signed it. The two of us decided that I would sign the will and say nothing. That way, everything would come to me, as it should have, instead of having to be split seven ways and Braxton and I end up not having enough to live on. She is the one who pointed out that everyone else had jobs, careers and a way to make money; I am disabled and have this child. I had no way of securing a living and she was aware that I needed every bit of money I could lay my hands on. So, the secision was made. I explained to her that the will that Bud and I made out did not mention any of the children except Braxton because he is the only minor child that Bud and I share. At the time, she was one hundred percent in agreement with me, even though I know that forging a signature on a will, even if I was one hundred percent of my husband's intentions, is wrong. I had her blessing and I figured as long as I had that, the blessing of one of my closest and best friends, I had nothing to worry about. The thought of doing it behind her back never even occured to me because friends just don't do that to one another and certainly Arlene and I never had any secrets from one another. I could trust her with my life! I was positive of that.

Now, jump to one week after Bud's funeral and I got back home to South Carolina after his burial. Cindy was spending time with me helping me to get things in order, figure out what I had and how I was going to run the rest of my life. I don't remember exactly what day of the week it was, but I know it was a weekday and during the middle part of the day, Arlene called me. She was crying like a child asking me, "Why didn't my daddy leave me anything in his will?" I was stunned. So stunned, in fact that I asked her to repeat herself and she again asked in her pitiful tearful voice, "Why didn't my daddy leave me anything in his will?" My response to that was something like, "Excuse me? Arlene, what are you talking about?" She went on like the two of us never had a conversation about any will at all and kept wanting me to answer the question why her daddy did not name her in his will and leave her some "thing" specifically. I remember that I finally asked her if she remembered any part of our conversation concerning her father's will while she was at my house. I don't think I ever got an answer to that question, but she did tell me that she and Mark had been talking and she decided that we would do everything "to the letter of the law." She told me that if I had a will it would be looked at in court and the court would determine if it was a valid will or not. I knew right then and there that was a threat and that there was no way that I could produce a will signed by Bud. I had already admitted to her that Bud died before he signed his will and I realized that I had trusted one time too many. I tore the will up as soon as I got off the phone with her. I think that's when my anger began festering. And for the next 3 years this anger grew into this sore-like thing, full of stinky, horrible puss and it slowly began to eat away at my insides.

When I found myself living in a tiny apartment a few blocks from her just three months after Bud died; after she had promised me that she would be there for me and help me to get through this horrible loss and time in my life, I realized that she was not there. On three seperate occasions I was asked to leave her house, by John and all three times she stood quietly by and held the door. I was so hurt to find myself so alone and then to have her physically turn her back on me was like pouring salt in the already open wound. I was going through the worst time in my life and the one person that I was sure that I could count on to share my grief with was just not there for me. I was devistated with hurt. The few times we were together she made it was so akward and uncomfortable that I was forced to leave because of the way she made me feel. It was like I was grieving the loss of two people very close to me andvery important in my live; my husband and my best friend. Finally, I moved to North Carolina to escape not only her but the rest of the people that had promised to help me through this horrible time, but then turned out not to be there for me after all. Yeah, I guess I was acting about as selfish then as it sounds, but look where I was! And I am leaving out so many details about how I was left alone by those that I thought loved and cared about me and so many promises of being able to count on people that turned out not to be there. In the end, while I was living in New Orleans, my kids, mostly Kristi and Brett were there for me and Faye was there for me. Other than that, I was on my own and yes, I was also very hurt by that fact alone that it caused physical pain. I didn't even know I was angry yet.

After I had moved and lived through the consequenses and fallout from that, I went back to New Orleans that first summer after Bud died. That was when Arlene told me to my face that it was just too hard to see me because seeing me reminded her too much of her daddy. I need to interject here that during the sisteen years that Bud and I were together, each one of Bud's children had come to me at one time or another and told me that if it had not been for me they would not have known their father, would not have had time with their father and would not have had the opportunity to get to know their father as a friend. Each of the four of them had said "thank you" for what I had done for them. And each time I let whomever it was know that it was very important to me to bring them and Bud closer to gether and I was happy to have the opportunity to be a part of bringing them together. I never wanted to come between Bud and any of his kids; I only wanted to help them all have the best relationship that they could have. I guess that's why when all of a sudden I was not good enough, not trustworthy enough and at one time was even not a good enough mother for Braxton threw me so badly and hurt me so much. Ultimately, it's made me so angry that I could not see straight sometimes.

After I went back home after that visit I put Arlene out of my mind. In fact, it wasn't as hard to do as I had thought it was going to be. I guess I had decided that she had made her decision and I definitly did not want a friend who had trouble just being in my presence, so it was no large task to tell her goodbye and put the entire friendship away after I got home. Of course this was also after I had a 1200 mile drive home and I cried every mile of it, I think.

Three months later, on my birthday I got a card and a letter from her telling me how sorry she was for the horrible was she had reated me. She told me that she would understand if I never forgave her for the terrible thing she had done to me and she went on to say again how sorry she was and out right asked if I could ever forgive her. She said that she was finished mourning her father and could see things clearly now and was ready to be my friend again. Idiot that I am, I forgave her right away and once again we picked up where we had left off as if nothing had ever happened.

During all thin time, probate was still happening and I had learned that the money from the sale of the house was going to have to be split seven ways between me and all of Bud's children and the grandchildren who's parents had already died. Not only was I angry about this, but I was blaming every bit of this on Mark and only Mark. When Arlene and I would talk and this subject would come up I would let her know how I felt andshe would sit back and allow Mark to get the entire blame for the way things were turning out. Not one time did she ever accept any of the responsibility for things proceeding "to the letter of the law." And believe me, we were definitly doing things by the book and it cost me $2500.00 to make sure it was done that way. None of them paid a lawyer, but when Mark wanted information he did not hesitite to get on the phone with MY lawyer or MY friends. My anger at times knew no bounds and the more time that passed the more vocal I got; especially when I began getting emails and phone calls from people wanting to know, "when they were going to get THEIR money." The last time Arlene and I talked I guess I went too far in vocalizing my anger at Mark and made the mistake of including her in the term "people" when, in fact, she was one of the main culprits in the way the scenerio went. I told her that I thought it was a damn shame that this family was in this kind of mess because of $2,000. Each of them ended up getting $2084.17 and I told her that was a piss ass amount for them to be taking from Braxton and I when that was not Bud's intentions at all. None of them had worked for what we had, they were all relatively young and healthy and able to make a good decent living and two thousand dollars was not going to make or break any one of them, but to have all that money together meant the difference between Braxton and I having our own home to live in or to continue sharing someone elses. On more than one occasion I asked Arlene if anyone else had the right to come in after John died and tell her what she can and cannot do with his things and what was hers and what was not. Naturally, she told me that no one had the right to tell her what she could do or not do with John's things and that she and John worked for what they had and no one else was entitled to any part of it. I asked her what made me any different than her. Her answer was, "I don't know, it just is," I knew even before that she was not my friend, not when money was concerned, but when she said this it was like the icing on the cake for me. Of course this last conversation we had was around Thanksgiving time, just after Elaine died and my anger was at it's height. Even I knew that it was turning into an ugly disease and I had to do something about it and I needed to do it as fast as I could before I found myself in real personal trouble.

I had let this mess pull me away from God, occupy mearly every minute of my waking hours and was even keeping me awake at night. I could not rest at all because I was so damned angry and I would tell anybody who would listen about it. I knew when I hung up the phone with her that she would not call me again and I wasn't even upset by that. I guess sub-consciously I knew I was carrying this thing too far and I didn't care. I wanted to make sure she was well aware of my feelings and well aware of how her father would have felt about the entire mess. I didn't even care how she would react to my tyrade, I was just determinded to lay my cards on the table.

True to form for Arlene, I have not heard from her and quite honestly, I think that's the way I have wanted it all along. I honestly tried to guilt her into doing the right thing or even saying the right thing, such as, "I'm sorry I was so greedy," but it didn't happen. The more time that passed that I didn't get this apology that I so desperately wanted, the angrier I got and the angrier I got the more vocal I got. I guess in the end I have only myself to blame for her silence now. However, I am not upset by her silence. As I said, I think I wanted to shut her out of my life but for some reason did not have the guts to just say, "I don't want you in my life any longer, so take your money and go."

Here's the bottom line. Nothing's changed. There's no new information. Nothing will probable EVER change and there will probably never be any new information. As long as Arlene is a part of my life I am going to be hurt, angry and miserable. I don't want to live that way and so the onlt choice I have is to remive her from my live. It's sad to have to do it, but for self preservation, it's just the way things have got to be. Once when Nancy and I were on our way back home from new Orleans we stopped in Hattisberg at Barbara's house and the two of us were talking. She told me that she had told Mark and Arlene that their actions had consequences. I guess this is one of those consequences. Sometimes, in a relationship, too much happens and it's just impossible for a friendship to survive. Sadly, this is one of those cases. The friendship between Arlene and I is a casualty of Bud's death. I can't help but wonder if we had a starong enough friendship in the beginning if this would have happened. Maybe it just wasn't strong enough to survive Bud's death...had it benn anyone elses, we might have made it. I don't know. Am I trying to convince myself that Arlene was a real friend from the very beginning? More than one person has told me that she was never my friend and I guess I could analyze that until hell freezes over and never have the answer...or the one that satisfies me.

How do you mourn the loss of a friendship? Should I write her a letter and do a big goodbye scene or do I just allow it to quietly slip alway? Since Nineteen seventy-something, the two of us had some mighty good times, I have to say. It's been a long long friendship. But then I have also lost others recently. In fact, I have lost more friendships since Bud died than I think I have in my entire life. It's amazing, really, when I think of all the casuality's that came out of his dying. I wonder why he had to take so much with him. Why did I have to lose so much besides just him? Wasn't losing him enough? Didn't I have enough heartache and hell when he died? My God, I nearly lost my sanity along with my home, my car, most of my family...when does it end?!! I have to be honest, I'm beginning to get just a tad pissed off here. And maybe that's another reason why I have been holding on to her friendship so hard. I'm sick and tired of losing, damnit! I know I haven't been completely fair, but that's not the point here. I'm expecting a friggin' friend to stick by me, no matter what! And it pisses me off to the max that it's not happening. OK, so finally, that's the truth here. Am I going to break down and tell her that? There is not a snow balls chance in hell that I will. I have some friggin dignity ya know. And besides, she knows in her heart what the right think to do is, she's a grown damn woman and should not have to be told. I'm sick of her selfishness. She's been selfish all her life, it's time to grow up. I'm not giving in to her like her Mama and Daddy always have. Yes, I'm still pissed off about them giving in and not donating Mary's eyes because she threw a fit. Get a grip, Arlene. Anyway, I have put this whole mess in my Jesus box. Did I tell you that already? And asked Him to not let me take it back. I know He'll keep it this time. When it gets to be too much on my mind, I'll take Cindy's advice and say outloud, if I have too, "CANCEL, CANCEL, CANCEL!" Hey, whatever woks.

And ya'll eep your fingers crossed for me too, please.