J
jazzbaby1
Guest
How do you do this? Please keep in mind that I’m still in RCIA so I don’t know much about it but I’m feeling led to at least investigate it and to also work out some remaining angst.
My biological parents are both dead, as are both sets of my grandparents. My paternal grandparents raised me, but they didn’t charitably take me in, they took me from my dad and step-mother with a threat that if dad didn’t straighten up they’d take their other kids, too. They totally controlled my relationship with my dad, step-mother and siblings until I was old enough to move in with my dad (and then my grandmother tried to act as gatekeeper at dad’s funeral a few moths later, dictating to me when or even if I was going to be allowed to view his body) and ran him down every opportunity they had. My grandmother, especially, was very competitive with other women and she despised my step-mother and my mother before her. I forgave my step-mother for an incident that happened in my childhood and GM overheard me and ranted about how I could forgive SM but not her (I’d forgiven her many things, but never wanted to open the discussion because I was fearful of how I would be blamed for ruining her life). Toward the end of her life she even competed with me in many ways for the attention of my husband, including putting my engagement ring on her finger and commenting that it fit her better and cutting into our first dance at our wedding reception.
I know that these are hurts that I need to forgive and get over, but some questions for me remain. My paternal grandparents raised me, but shouldn’t have and were wrong to have taken me (a few months later they tried to get my older brother, too) and used me as a bludgeon against my dad (he got to see me when he jumped through their hoops). Do they get the same kind of honor that my biological parents would, or do I honor them more because they raised me regardless of how or why? This is not something I want to fulfill the minimum requirement on; I truly want to please God. And was my rant in my second paragraph dishonoring to them, even though it’s true and an account of what happened to me?
Thanks in advance.
My biological parents are both dead, as are both sets of my grandparents. My paternal grandparents raised me, but they didn’t charitably take me in, they took me from my dad and step-mother with a threat that if dad didn’t straighten up they’d take their other kids, too. They totally controlled my relationship with my dad, step-mother and siblings until I was old enough to move in with my dad (and then my grandmother tried to act as gatekeeper at dad’s funeral a few moths later, dictating to me when or even if I was going to be allowed to view his body) and ran him down every opportunity they had. My grandmother, especially, was very competitive with other women and she despised my step-mother and my mother before her. I forgave my step-mother for an incident that happened in my childhood and GM overheard me and ranted about how I could forgive SM but not her (I’d forgiven her many things, but never wanted to open the discussion because I was fearful of how I would be blamed for ruining her life). Toward the end of her life she even competed with me in many ways for the attention of my husband, including putting my engagement ring on her finger and commenting that it fit her better and cutting into our first dance at our wedding reception.
I know that these are hurts that I need to forgive and get over, but some questions for me remain. My paternal grandparents raised me, but shouldn’t have and were wrong to have taken me (a few months later they tried to get my older brother, too) and used me as a bludgeon against my dad (he got to see me when he jumped through their hoops). Do they get the same kind of honor that my biological parents would, or do I honor them more because they raised me regardless of how or why? This is not something I want to fulfill the minimum requirement on; I truly want to please God. And was my rant in my second paragraph dishonoring to them, even though it’s true and an account of what happened to me?
Thanks in advance.