No motivation

I almost did not write today. I am tired.

I am visiting home for the holidays and resting but I have returned to the stress of my 4 generation household. With my son and I home there is 4 generations: He, I, my mother and her mother. For the first 4 years of my sons life and my first 4 years as a parent I endured this situation. I know that in America we are pushed toward independence and individualism and other cultures are more collectivist and village-esque. All of these people, while they do help immensely drive me insane.

My grandmother is in a wheel chair and does not leave the house. She is cared for by my mother. Our downstairs bathroom has had a huge potty chair with hand rails on it since my son was born. Potty training him with this was interesting and now he's learned to do a sort of gymnastics move when using the bathroom. He grasps the handle bars on each side and hoists himself in the air, balancing his weight on his arms and aiming at the same time. He's quite strong really.

My grandmother has lost control of so much in her life. She still has her sanity. My mother's sanity, as her caregiver, is questionable. I think with my crisis pregnancy my mother lost a lot. I think she lost optimism, idealism and a little happiness. Things changed forever with this event. She no longer was raising the family from her mind. I am not sure what my mothers dreams were and are. We don't communicate very well. I do think that she wanted the idealistic American family. I think this might have been one of her dreams, to raise a good, accomplished family. I think I shattered this dream and perhaps a PhD is redemption.