This was the first time I had been pulled into one of my oldest brother's tirades against my parents. Unbeknownst to me at the time, my own mother had blamed me for her mistake. She was attacked in the same email that was sent to myself, my mom and my dad and played the shocked card. My father who has quite a temper himself, blew it off calling my brother an a**hole.
Instead of begging or blaming anyone I wrote him back a nasty response to his email. That afternoon I received a hurtful response and I decided that I was done with him and his family. I was confused and had enough emotions going on that he had no idea about anyways. Sadly, my parents fed me their thoughts on the situation which didn't make it any better. My dad, who I am more like emotionally, continued to tell me that I should not apologize before my brother did.
Months passed by and my parents had made amends with my brother but I held my ground. I was not going to give in to such behavior without an apology from him first. To make my heart ache more, I was expecting my second child and was not able to share the joy with my brother and his family. I was too proud to let him get away with treating me so badly even to share my good news with them even of it hurt me.
My baby shower passed without having my sister in law and niece attend because I was not ready to speak to them. Little E was born and I finally broke down and called my brother. He knew that my son had been born but I wanted to share my joy with his family personally. I knew that I had not made a mistake to cause his anger but I was going to forgive him anyways. Family is very important to me and I was willing to take the first step to bring ours back together.
Forgiving him for the venomous words he said that day was one of the best things I did.
This post was written for the Red Dress Club Tuesday prompt. This week's prompt is about forgiveness. Forgiving others, forgiving yourself. Write about a time of forgiveness.
