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I wrote yesterday after I got a text from E and before I actually had to talk to him, and my head was pretty full of worst case scenarios. Today I'm reminded of what I find myself constantly telling my mother: it's not that bad, and there are little signs of progress, they just come very slowly.
I also thought a bit about how quickly 'normal' sibling irritation clouds my judgement; that is, besides the fact that my brother is socially inept and tiring to be around, I've still got some buried frustration from being a kid who was told she HAD to play with him, even though he's five years younger and frequently just ruined it, as far as kid-me was concerned. I've still got the "Oh, god, he's EMBARRASSING me" thing, too, and one way or another, I need to get over it.
That one's really hard.
Like E says, your family always knows how to push your buttons because they installed them.
There's another level of frustration that makes me snap easily, and that's even less fair to my brother: the frustration that says "Damn it, you're so close, why can't you just be normal?" He can't be normal. He could learn to interact with the world in a more normal way, but he has to learn it in a way that isn't 'normal.'
Before he went away to school last year I actually made some progress with that, helping him learn some concrete cues for social situations in which there were snacks offered. He tended to crouch over the group offerings like a vulture and stuff his face, and mom finally had enough and said she wasn't inviting him anywhere, and he showed up, again, on my doorstep in tears. I think that was the first morning I really realized he honestly, truly didn't think he was doing it. He didn't grok it at all. So I gave him a set of really concrete guidelines. "If there's a plate of something, take one portion you can hold in your hand, like a cracker with cheese, and go back and lean against the wall to eat it. Don't take another portion until someone else takes something."
He got it. I don't know if he ever applied it, but it made sense, in a "I can do this!" kind of way.
That was me at my best with him, and it doesn't come out very often. I don't usually think about it that way, and I need to start.
(BTW, I know I haven't given examples of my own bad behavior, but trust me on this -- he brings out my absolute worst. I don't do anything comparable online. I have a very hard time making time for him (unless he shows up on my doorstep sobbing, in which emergencies I've always made time for him) or giving him any benefit of the doubt.)
Part of this resolve is a bit pessimistic -- if it comes to him knocking on my door looking for a place to live and I have to say no, I'll feel better if I've actually tried to help, and it's not just the latest dismissal in a whole bunch of dismissive, irritated encounters.
As I tell him over, and over, and over, whenever he gets upset (which is frequent): You can only change you.
It's still not easy to change yourself. He's still going to hit all my immediate-annoyance buttons. But I did just text him about coming over and doing a little work with me this weekend, and asked if he was okay after yesterday, which may be the first time I've initiated communication in the last year. (Granted, it's hard to be the one that initiates communication, because he calls SO DAMN MUCH that I get irritated just seeing his name on my phone, and then has nothing to say. Again: buttons that are easily pushed). It was a perfectly okay text-convo -- easier medium for patience than the phone. I'm getting into together time by choice, which makes it easier to handle.
I'm not good at this.
But.
Trying.
I also thought a bit about how quickly 'normal' sibling irritation clouds my judgement; that is, besides the fact that my brother is socially inept and tiring to be around, I've still got some buried frustration from being a kid who was told she HAD to play with him, even though he's five years younger and frequently just ruined it, as far as kid-me was concerned. I've still got the "Oh, god, he's EMBARRASSING me" thing, too, and one way or another, I need to get over it.
That one's really hard.
Like E says, your family always knows how to push your buttons because they installed them.
There's another level of frustration that makes me snap easily, and that's even less fair to my brother: the frustration that says "Damn it, you're so close, why can't you just be normal?" He can't be normal. He could learn to interact with the world in a more normal way, but he has to learn it in a way that isn't 'normal.'
Before he went away to school last year I actually made some progress with that, helping him learn some concrete cues for social situations in which there were snacks offered. He tended to crouch over the group offerings like a vulture and stuff his face, and mom finally had enough and said she wasn't inviting him anywhere, and he showed up, again, on my doorstep in tears. I think that was the first morning I really realized he honestly, truly didn't think he was doing it. He didn't grok it at all. So I gave him a set of really concrete guidelines. "If there's a plate of something, take one portion you can hold in your hand, like a cracker with cheese, and go back and lean against the wall to eat it. Don't take another portion until someone else takes something."
He got it. I don't know if he ever applied it, but it made sense, in a "I can do this!" kind of way.
That was me at my best with him, and it doesn't come out very often. I don't usually think about it that way, and I need to start.
(BTW, I know I haven't given examples of my own bad behavior, but trust me on this -- he brings out my absolute worst. I don't do anything comparable online. I have a very hard time making time for him (unless he shows up on my doorstep sobbing, in which emergencies I've always made time for him) or giving him any benefit of the doubt.)
Part of this resolve is a bit pessimistic -- if it comes to him knocking on my door looking for a place to live and I have to say no, I'll feel better if I've actually tried to help, and it's not just the latest dismissal in a whole bunch of dismissive, irritated encounters.
As I tell him over, and over, and over, whenever he gets upset (which is frequent): You can only change you.
It's still not easy to change yourself. He's still going to hit all my immediate-annoyance buttons. But I did just text him about coming over and doing a little work with me this weekend, and asked if he was okay after yesterday, which may be the first time I've initiated communication in the last year. (Granted, it's hard to be the one that initiates communication, because he calls SO DAMN MUCH that I get irritated just seeing his name on my phone, and then has nothing to say. Again: buttons that are easily pushed). It was a perfectly okay text-convo -- easier medium for patience than the phone. I'm getting into together time by choice, which makes it easier to handle.
I'm not good at this.
But.
Trying.
