My pillow and my pylon! (Parental Support in general)

Member Name: idodoyou

Product:	Parental Support in general
Date:	24/09/01 (55 review reads)
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I dunno heh? Parents ……. Who’d have em? Can’t live with em … can’t live without em!! Well, I can. I have to. I can’t afford to move out (still paying off the excesses of a wild and expensive journey into adult hood!! You know, the years you have a credit card, but haven’t really thought about the paying back side of things!!) It’s not too bad actually, I have a great relationship with my parents.

In fact, no I will admit it, I like living with them. I know, I know, I’m 28 and the nest should have been long flown but apart from the money side of things, I think my wings may have been clipped??? I do actually like living with them.

But as with most things in life, and as much as I love them, they are not perfect. Which is surprising really, since I am, and I came from their gene pools?!!? Teehee

Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, the ‘wrinklies’ not being perfect.
Dad is pretty much though, or if he isn’t his faults don’t stand out at present. We have a great relationship. I’m the original Daddies girl. I could, once upon a time, always be found at my father’s heels. In the garage covered in oil and grease. In the garden covered in mud. But where ever he was, I was sure to be close behind. That was when he was around of course. For the first 10 years of my life he was a long distance lorry driver and we were lucky to see him maybe once, twice a week. I used to live for weekends. I used to love the school holidays. 9 times out of ten you’d find me perched up in the passenger side of those big articulated trucks you see on the motorways. Long blonde curls covering a dirty little face, with a grin from ear to ear cos I was with my Dad!

With regards to our relationship, things really haven’t changed. I still love spending time with him. We laugh and joke. And generally put the world to rights, both opinionated and
not afraid to speak our minds. We often have a video out, or have a game of Snooker (I win, he cries and I laugh!! ……. Ok, so it might be the other way round ….. ??? teehee) when mum is out, or working. Or just generally chew the cud with him over a cup of tea and a slice of cake!! Or rather, he’ll have a Jack Daniels and I’ll have an OJ (I haven’t drunk since last September when I lost 3 days of my holiday due to a real stonker of a hangover. Never ever ever again believe me!)

He’s there. And I know that I can rely on him. He lets me do my own thing, he might not agree with it, but after he’s had his say he then stands back and waits until, and if he is needed. We can rely on him. He is the idodoyou family rock. The strength. He’s like a big ole safety net. We know he’s there, and that he will catch us when, and if we fall. He’s a pylon ….. big and strong and carrying the weight of his family upon his back, and it is a weight he carries proudly and with ease.

I’m like him in many ways, and I guess that has helped to strengthen the bond. We are both optimists and fatalists. Punctual and polite. Level headed and down to earth. Apparently I look like him as well, which is, I don’t mind admitting, worrying!! He’s bald and has a nose like David Jason ( a similarity that no one else can see but still I can ………!!) I’ve grown up with his outlook in life. I respect those and the world around me. I’m a strong presence. I take control and won’t let anybody walk over me, or mine. He has helped to make me what I am.

Now, if I got all my good traits from my Dad, my bad ones surely came from my mother.
We are stubborn. We are selfish. And we have tempers, mean ones! We put our mouths into action before our brains are in gear. And usually have to eat our words later. We clash. We are much too alike to
ever be harmonious.

We fight like cat and dog. Sometimes it’s playful, other times it gets quite catty. Neither of us mean what we say usually. But there has been times when it has got nasty, and on one occasion, my father had to separate us.

My mothers’ biggest fault, and some would say that it isn’t a fault at all, is that she is way too over protective. She still likes to run our lives. Oh it’s ok to have our own minds, and our plans for the future, or our little things that we want to do, but if we want to put these plans and stuff into action ……..whooaa!! She’s there. With her looks of disapproval. With her words of doubt. With her questions as to why. And just general condemnation. It’s not nice. There has I have to admit, times when I have changed my plans, or stopped myself from doing something because of my mothers’ disapproval. It was easier to disregard the things I wanted to do for a quieter life. As it turns out, I have never once regretted the things I didn’t do, so maybe she saved me time and energy. We’ll never know.

This summer we had a break through…….. I did something that both of my parents resolutely disapproved of. The atmosphere was not nice. But my father, as always, said his piece and then let me get on with what it was I wanted to do. My mother on the other hand did the total opposite. For days, weeks even we argued over nothing else except this certain thing that I was going to do. It wasn’t right she said. You won’t like it she said. Why are you doing it she said. And even after I had answered her questions, a thousand times over, she didn’t once tell me that she had the faith in me to do the right thing. That she trusted me enough to make the right decision. She said her piece and then expected me to do as I always had before and forgot about it. However, this time I didn’t. I went a
gainst their wishes, I lived my own life (of which I do anyway, it’s just that this time it just went totally against their ideas and principles, and if I’m honest, a little against mine also, but I wanted to do it so ………)

It wasn’t as much fun as I thought it would be. In fact, I really didn’t enjoy it much. To be honest, I questioned why I was doing what I was doing as well. I didn’t know why I was doing it, I just knew that it had to be done. To find out for myself if what my mother had said was true. To find out whether what I thought I had thought was true. To do something on my own.

It wasn’t what I expected at all and what was worse, my mum had been right all along. I didn’t like it. Looking back, it wasn’t right. And to be honest, sitting here typing this, I’m not even sure why I did it.

The thing is, did she know all these things? Or was she just playing her ‘pillow’ card? (over protective ….smother ….pillow)
Does she try and stop my sister and I from doing these things because she knows how we will react? Know that we won’t like it, whatever it maybe? Thinks that we may get hurt? Just generally protecting us from the outside world?
Or is it simply because SHE doesn’t want to do all these things that youngsters (and yes, I still think of myself as a youngster ~ well, if I don’t know other bugger will!!) invariably want to try, to experiment with, she thinks that WE shouldn’t be doing it to??

Is she just being a mother? Do all mothers play a ‘pillow’ card when they think that the kids (however old) are branching away from them?

We don’t spend an awful lot of time together. It’s probably better that way because when we do have the odd hour together, we talk and laugh, instead of bitch and bicker. My sister has always been closer to my mum anyway. I
t’s just the way it is. I’m not bitter. I don’t really care to be perfectly honest with you.

Anyway, apart from her over protectiveness she’s has her little quirks, as all parents do, but basically, she too has helped to make me the kind of person that I am.

I like the person I am. Ok, I have my faults, I know what they are, (and I’m half way there to getting rid of them by just knowing what they are, it’s just that I don’t choose to finish the other half off!!)
I haven’t grown into a drug dealer. I haven’t grown up into a murderess. I don’t batter old women, old men or children. I know right from wrong, and I know how to respect life and living things. For that I have only two people to thank.

When I read on here, when I have listened to friends and read things in magazines about some parental relationships I know that I am extremely lucky. Some children would kill (and I don’t mean literally either) for parents such as mine. I know that.

I know that I have my parents’ support, love and trust. My mother might not relay that she trusts me but she certainly lets me know that she loves me. My father does too, but that’s only when I ring him at work and make sure he says it down the phone in front of a workshop full of men!!! teehee!! Oh I must admit, I do have fun at my fathers’ expense. Why only last week did I clip one of those hair extensions onto his head in Tesco’s. He had a David Beckham fringe. I was in stitches, and so were the people walking by!!
I know that if I’m ever in trouble or need somebody to talk to that they are there.
My sister knows that they will always be there (well, when physically possible of course) when she needs them.

We have a family unit based on mutual respect. We laugh most days together. We support each other (most of the time!!)
I only wish that there were mor
e families out there where the children are lucky enough to have parents such as mine, little faults and all!!

I once heard a little saying, and in the case of the idodoyou clan it’s true …………

A family that plays together, stays together…….!!

Now, rate, comment and then if possible, go downstairs, pop into the next room, or get on the phone and tell your mother and father that you love them. That’s what I’m now about to do. Of course, the old guy will think I want money again but still …………. : )

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