30 Days of Blogging: Day Three

Day three: Describe your relationship with your parents.

First of all I consider myself to have four parents. My Mom and Dad got separated just before my 7th birthday. My Dad married my stepmom, Karen, when I was 8. My Mom married my stepdad, JD, when I was 10.

I'll start with my mom. I just love that woman. I've always looked up to her and am so privileged to have such a wonderful role model. I wrote quite a bit about her recently and from that post, you could probably detect my love and devotion to her. We have a lot of history together (my whole history, technically) and she's proven time and again that I can count on her and that she loves me. We have a great relationship. I call her when I'm down. I call her when I'm happy. I can always count on her to help me see things from a different perspective and to look on the bright side. I owe a lot to her.

JD or as I like to call him JDad. Oh, that man. How I love him to pieces and how he exasperates me to no end. He and I are so much alike - we're fun-loving, silly, compassionate; yet so different - he has ADHD and has a hard time focusing, I tend to spend a lot of my time focused and get easily irritated when he can't. He loves to tease (me, specifically) and I have a hard time accepting teasing, even when it's good-natured and loving. One thing about that man - he is loyal to the core. He stands up for me, he fights for me, he loves me. And I am so thankful he is in my life. He's more generous to me than he needs to be. He's thoughtful, kind and caring. He's been a fantastic dad for the last 20+ years.

My Dad. I love my dad. He means so much to me. We, too, have a lot of similarities, yet lots of differences. Dad is outgoing, talkative, smart and focused. He just doesn't always understand relationships. I think he struggles to connect, and through difficult circumstances in our past, I've put up a wall to guard myself from connecting. It's not something I want, but it's there, nonetheless. I'm working on bringing that wall down and allowing more room for him. I do love him and I would never give up on our relationship.

Karen. Karen has been in my life for more than 25 years - she's been a big influence. I didn't live with my dad and Karen growing up, so it was harder for me to see her as a mother figure. She had never been a mother herself, so our relationship wasn't much like a parent/child as much as an adult/child relationship. I don't really know how to explain that better - maybe like when you go over to your friend's house and she has kids so you chat with the kid, maybe participate in an activity together, but the child knows you're not responsible for them so you just kind of hang out together. Maybe kind of like a babysitter? I don't really know. Anyway, I love Karen very much and have learned a lot in my relationship with her.  

I count myself very blessed to have the parents I have.