In my therapy session today I feel I have stumbled upon something interesting: I was describing my dreams, the back pain, which happened yesterday morning from exercising with my daughter, my annoyance with y parents making me run with my brother as if I had to be responsible for his health, because they don’t want to be responsible anymore. And without asking I am being forced to act as if I was his parent, without choosing it and when I mentioned they’re doing this they get defensive. I am exhausted enough from being responsible for my own children(which was my choice) and from feeling responsible for my father(which, again, was not my choice, similarly to the situation with my brother)<\/p>\n
So I am feeling so totally and absolutely overwhelmed with responsibility it makes me really unhappy as a mother, it paralyses me as an artist, it is making me think I will never be able to work because I can’t not take care of my children. I feel like everything that will happen with them in their lives is my responsibility. If things go wrong, I am to be blamed for it.<\/p>\n
I am drowning in the sea of responsibility. I am crushed under a mountain of responsibility. I am paralysed with responsibility. I need to get out of this. My therapist said she couldn’t believe and was mesmerised how I didn’t just run away and leave my family because the weight of reponsibility makes it so unpleasant to be a mother, so unbearable.<\/p>\n
But the story is: my mother got divorced and chose my stepfather so I got stuck with my father and his feelings, which he was unable not to burden me with. My mother had my brother and post natal depression so I got stuck feeling mentally responsible for my brother, feeling like his mother. My children now need me but I feel like I need to give them more than it is physically possible.<\/p>\n
Letter to my brother 11.07.2004, when he was 7 and I was 22 years old:<\/p>\n
Kochany braciszku,<\/strong><\/p>\n Chcia\u0142abym napisa\u0107 do Ciebie list, kt\u00f3ry mo\u017ce kiedy\u015b przeczytasz, jak b\u0119dziesz w moim wieku \u2014 mo\u017ce m\u0142odszy, nie wiem. Mam 22 lata i jestem Twoj\u0105 siostr\u0105. To znaczy, bardzo chcia\u0142abym ni\u0105 by\u0107, ale prawda jest taka, \u017ce nigdy nie ma mnie przy Tobie, bo mieszkam w innym kraju i przyje\u017cd\u017cam do Ciebie tylko na wakacje i na Gwiazdk\u0119.<\/strong><\/p>\n Smutno mi, bo mam u siebie w pokoju mn\u00f3stwo Twoich zdj\u0119\u0107 i cz\u0119sto my\u015bl\u0119 o Tobie, ale tak naprawd\u0119 niewiele wiem o tym, jaki jeste\u015b, co lubisz robi\u0107 na co dzie\u0144, czego nie lubisz.<\/strong><\/p>\n A najbardziej chcia\u0142abym wiedzie\u0107, czy mi kiedy\u015b wybaczysz, \u017ce wyjecha\u0142am do innego kraju, a nie zosta\u0142am w Polsce przy Tobie. Mam nadziej\u0119, \u017ce kiedy\u015b uda nam si\u0119 sp\u0119dzi\u0107 wi\u0119cej czasu razem i lepiej si\u0119 pozna\u0107.<\/strong><\/p>\n Zawsze marzy\u0142am o tym, \u017ceby mie\u0107 brata i nareszcie go mam. Antolku, bardzo Ci\u0119 kocham i chcia\u0142abym tylko, \u017ceby\u015b o mnie nie zapomnia\u0142 \u2014 \u017ce zawsze b\u0119dziesz dla mnie najukocha\u0144szym braciszkiem i zawsze b\u0119d\u0119 Ci pomaga\u0142a, kiedy b\u0119dziesz mnie potrzebowa\u0142.<\/strong><\/p>\n Kocham Ci\u0119,<\/strong> My dear little brother,<\/p>\n I would like to write you a letter that maybe you will read someday when you are my age \u2014 or maybe younger, I don\u2019t know. I am 22 years old and I am your sister. Or rather, I really wish I could be, but the truth is that I\u2019m never there with you, because I live in another country and I only visit you during holidays and at Christmas.<\/p>\n It makes me sad, because I have many photos of you in my room and I often think about you, but in reality I don\u2019t know much about what you are like, what you enjoy doing every day, or what you don\u2019t like.<\/p>\n Most of all, I wish I knew whether you will ever forgive me for moving to another country instead of staying in Poland with you. I hope that one day we will be able to spend more time together and get to know each other better.<\/p>\n I have always dreamed of having a brother, and now I finally do. Antolek, I love you very much and I only wish that you won\u2019t forget about me \u2014 that you will always be my dearest little brother, and that I will always help you whenever you need me.<\/p>\n I love you, In my therapy session today I feel I have stumbled upon something interesting: I was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[845,143,33,238,132,93,295,146,94],"tags":[88,249,503,103,148,86,144,893,327,77,52,514,100,11,67,821,266,336,894,74],"class_list":["post-3463","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-autoetnography","category-caring","category-experiences","category-family","category-motherhood","category-psychology","category-reflections","category-relationships","category-therapy","tag-abandonment","tag-artist-mother","tag-care","tag-caring","tag-daughter","tag-depression","tag-emotional","tag-family-issues","tag-feelings","tag-grandmother","tag-mental-health","tag-mother-mental-health","tag-motherhood","tag-mothers","tag-overwhelmed","tag-post-natal-depression","tag-pressure","tag-responsibility","tag-weight-of-responsibility","tag-worry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olgaszynkarczuk.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3463","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olgaszynkarczuk.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olgaszynkarczuk.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olgaszynkarczuk.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olgaszynkarczuk.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3463"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/olgaszynkarczuk.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3463\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3466,"href":"https:\/\/olgaszynkarczuk.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3463\/revisions\/3466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olgaszynkarczuk.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3463"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olgaszynkarczuk.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3463"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olgaszynkarczuk.com\/pl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3463"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Twoja siostra Ola<\/strong><\/p>\n
Your sister,
Ola<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"