I put the FUN in Dysfunctional

I was chatting to an elderly lady last week. She is a lady who is well travelled, well spoken, well put together and spiritual. I like to have conversations whereby I learn something and when I come away from it I don't feel like I wasted thirty minutes of my life. So putting my time to good use, this lady and I started to talk about families and how almost all families may feel like they are totally normal, but instead each and everyone of us has some sort of dysfunction (word?) with thanks to our family.

My grandmother passed away two weeks ago. She was not well. She had been suffering for a while, but as my cousin - who was closer to her than I was, told me - they all knew this was her last leg. My gran was a radio presenter on VOK back in them days. When I got into radio it wasn't because she inspired me to, I did it without knowing she had been on radio, I found out much later in my life, but I suppose media runs in the blood.
Anyway, she was never close to my mum - mum doesn't hide that from anyone. Mum was brought up by her aunt after she walked away from her mum at age 11. When we learnt that granny was unwell, my brother and I told her to visit, but mum being mum said she didn't want to be a hypocrite. They hadn't spoken for 50 odd years, why now?

As you know, I lost dad when I was young. He has a huge family. Here's the deal - dad was married twice. His first wife had three kids and then he met mum, fell in love, married her (that is a story for another blog) and had three more kids. Initially all was hunky dory, but people went their own ways and the inevitable happened - we grew up. When I look at my brother or my husband and see their respective families and wonder how I would treat them should either of them (God forbid) suddenly pass. I would continue to treat them as family, why should things change just because someone is no more?
We may have been very young when dad died, but it didn't make us blind nor did it make us oblivious to the fact that our mother was alone and made to feel that way by a lot of people.

It is very important to treat kids with so much love and respect. I look at Ariyana today and want to do the best I can for her as a parent. Even if it means putting my ego aside and allow her to know her family - she has a HUGE one! The thing is children are not stupid. What we do as adults, what we say, how we behave - all of these things have an impact on a child's life. You may be an aunt, a distant cousin, a father - how you treat the children around you is key to moulding them.
People may think that it is upbringing, that it is solely on the parents to give the child a rounded and healthy childhood. Agreed, it is for the most part. But I can tell you of experiences and memories where someone said something to me and there and then, in those ten seconds thanks to someone else's issues I became slightly dysfunctional.

I would have loved to have grown up with all my cousins and older relatives, grandmothers and grandfathers, alas this was not meant to be. I was chosen to walk down a different path. So what if I am slightly dysfunctional - at least I admit it, I am not in denial! I have to say - the love I received from my mother and my brothers and the few years my father was with me compensated for all the S*** we had to put up with! Dysfunctional? Whatever! I am all for not playing victim - take a situation and turn it around..forget dysfunctional, how about Ms.FUN Galore.