Move on, put the past behind you, or at least try!

Many of the friends I am close to seemed to be involved in family disputes lately. Sure, we are all just human, and humans often make mistakes, we fail and sometimes even the most stable relationships can be destroyed. It would be good to avoid such an outcome though.

Sometimes we just can’t. I have been guilty of saying something when I should have kept quiet, of assuming something about a person and being wrong; some things can’t be taken back and we just have to move on and live life as best we can. I hope now, at this late stage of my life, I have learned to proceed with caution should I be in the same position in the future. I try to ‘button it!’.

The saddest thing is when children in their 30s or 40s decide that all their life problems are the fault of their parents. A marriage breaks up. Unhappiness as a result of body shape. A lack of confidence. I’ve seen parents — especially if the relationships have been up and down — blamed endlessly for such things. Yet if you look around there are examples of successful lives even after the most tumultuous childhood. A friend of ours, for example, was abandoned and brought up in an orphanage in Victoria. He was then ‘dumped’ in our small town at 15 with no real connections and expected to make a life for himself. He worked hard and prospered, found a soul mate, and had 10 children. He is now 80 and living a full life in his retirement.

So many war time babies had a tough life, yet they were the generation that built what we have now. They did not go about blaming others for their misfortune. They worked as builders, chefs, in industry; they took whatever the country offered. Many made good lives, bought houses, and brought up families. I do not, however, overlook those who have been badly abused, the scars relating to real abuse do destroy, and for them forgiveness is not always easy. There are always exceptions. Evil does exist.

I have often said to my children, “Okay, I made mistakes and you have survived pretty well in spite of them!” In my opinion, parents usually do the best they can. The times we live through dictate what happens. The way parenting was in the ’50s and ’60s and how it is now is a vastly different.

There are still children who were deprived of a good childhood, without a sound role model they lack the tools to cope, never having a good example to guide them. Parenting styles have changed, and they will go on changing, with each generation sure they have it right and the others have it wrong. The style I used could be considered more like ‘tough’ love — bed times were only negotiable at weekends or on holiday; we expected reasonable manners; we ate together; there was no talking back allowed and it never happened, although there might have been some muttering and slammed doors, of course! I don’t mean we were always strict and harsh, a lot of laughs accompanied the lifestyle and we could always talk things through. Our grown up family came on holiday with us willingly when they were teenagers and that doesn’t happen in a miserable family.

I love my family, I loved those I have lost too, I hope we can always negotiate the hurdles when they appear. Life is never a smooth path, and there are still some parts I have to accept I can’t change. I will go on trying though. Life pulls us in directions we don’t choose to go, yet through it all there is a bond, there are invisible strings, and we are still connected. I hope with our children and grandchildren it will always be so.

What have you had to put behind you? How would you rate your family relationships?

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