I came from a disfunctional, old money family from main line/ Phila. We had help, of course. Didn't everyone ;(
It was like breathing and most people were not up to family standards. My dad seemed to go along with my mom. I think he was a little afraid of her. She had plans for my sister and I.
That included dating and I'm sure, one day marriage to someone she felt worthwhile.
The drinking,bickering and fighting made growing up there challenging .
I'd always loved animals and I'd find them everywhere. Then tend to them and mother them. Even a small snake. I'd thought about becoming a nurse. Didn't bring it up until I was a teen and my mother freaked. Being a nurse was lower than a maid. A maid touched clean dirt. Nurses touched people. Body fluids and were, in her opinion maids for sick people.
My aunt who was my moms younger sister, maybe sanest member of the family, was the one to pay for college and support me emotionally. My mom rarely spoke to me for those years because I betrayed her.
Later I met my husband and he and my dad got on well. My mother only accepted him after hearing he was a Psychiatrist. Because Psychiatrists didn't have to touch or examine people.
Years later when our daughters were in school it was my husband who encouraged me to go back to school to become a midwife.
To this day I wonder how I came out of that family somewhat sane. I suppose it was because not 'everyone' was like my mother.
If not for my aunt, my path may have been much different. I'd like to think that no matter what and no matter how much time it took, one day I would have made my way myself.
But if she had not gotten involved, I would not have graduated the year I did, and would not have been working the night I met my hubby. So she had a hand in much more than my education.
I am honored to know her.
