MKE Week 6 – I can forgive you

I can forgive you, grandpa Elof, for being lazy and not putting the shield over the transmission from the tractor to the harvester that morning in October 1962. Your pant leg got stuck and seconds later you were crushed to pieces against the ground. My uncle, Lars, only 16 years old then, saw it all. He never healed after having seen that. I was 10 months old. I was in the kitchen at the farm with my mom who was baking rye bread. The accident shattered the family and our village.

I can forgive you. Mamma and Pappa, for taking a week’s vacation not long after the accident. I can forgive you for leaving me in the hands of grandma, depressed and suicidal, and grandpa, who in his confused state as an alcoholic ended up abusing my tiny little body sexually before it was less than a year old.

I can forgive you Pappa for pulling out that knife in the kitchen when I was four. Your eyes, staring like a mad man, the panic. You held up the knife and said you were going to kill Mamma, then me and then yourself. I don’t know what stopped you. I can forgive you for your jealousy and for not being present in my life. I can forgive you for your lies and for playing games behind my mom’s back.

I can forgive you, Mamma, for gaslighting me for 50 plus years. Totally denying that any of that happened. Thank you for finally admitting all of it.

I can forgive you, my stepdad for trying to sexually abuse me. I can forgive you for bullying me, yelling at me and actively trying to sabotage my business and my life. I can forgive you for everything you have done to me.

But, I still have a hard time forgiving you for what you have done to my children and my mother. That still hurts a lot. How you laughed and called my son “Baboon”, when he was little. How you called my daughter “Pig” from when she was little. You thought you were so funny. How you threw us out my mom’s house into a cold outhouse with no heating, no running water, no bathroom. How you bullied us and actively worked against me while I was renovating, putting in wood burning stoves, getting water installed as well as a kitchen and a bathroom. How you have never helped me and my family at all, rather laughed at us for being poor. I was very ill. I had recently gone through a divorce. I had moved from the US back to Sweden after 10 years abroad. I had no friends here. I had to start from scratch with two small children and you bullied all of us.

And then all the times you invited your three daughters to come here to “rest and have vacations”. You spoiled them rotten, but not once have you given anything to my kids for their birthdays.

I have a hard time forgiving you for all the times I had to take care of my mom who cleaned the house, cooked food, made beds for your spoiled daughters, for their boyfriends and friends when they came here to relax, party and take advantage of what my family have created and built for hundreds of years.. All the times they were here and I had to pick my mother up after they left. She was so tired, afraid and crying. How you made her an alcoholic just like you.

I have a hard time forgiving my so called “step sisters” for all the times they have been here and never helped out with all the things that need to get done at the farm. They watched us do our work while enjoying their drinks, getting drunk and playing games until the early morning hours, just because you, my “step dad”, had so much guilt for not being there for them when they were small. How you pretended to be wealthy and rich, while in fact, my mother paid for most of the expenses.

How come you have never paid any rent for living here? How come you have spent most of your time drinking alcohol and spending your time in front of the TV?

My mom has allowed you to take advantage of her and her family to the point where her grandchildren, my children, don’t even want to be here. I understand them. And I have not had the strength yet, to take over our homestead that we have had in our family for 15 generations. I am not about to give up, I never was. I work hard, I build, I manage and I will take our beloved farm and homestead into the future with honor and grace, together with my family and all our friends who love this magnificent place. My ancestor was born here 1490 and I am not about to make him, nor the 14 following generations disappointed.

I have never shared this before and I feel shitty even writing this. I feel like I am going to get judged for these words. Like it is all my fault, yet I know it is nobody’s fault. It all happened and I am here to make it all better. Tears running down my cheeks. I don’t feel I can talk openly about it with my step sisters. I would not want to hear such things about my own dad, even though they most likely know. He deserted them and their mother. They say openly to me that they don’t like me and that they don’t want me around at my own place. It is such a cruel joke on all of us, how they have bought into their father’s stories. They have attacked me. I want them to know what their father has done to my mother and my children. I want them to know who he really is behind that facade of his that they see a couple of times a year when they come here for holidays to enjoy themselves.

Is it right to want them to understand what he has done or should I just let it all go?

I can’t even believe how I managed to create a Cinderella story like this one.

I am rising, every day I get better. I am the Queen in my story.

The Master Key has been handed to me.

I can see that the “guilty” ones are not feeling so great today. Their bodies old and broken.

I feel sorry for them and perhaps, with these words I can let the past go, and forgive it all. My Cinderella story.

I am sorry, Please forgive me. I love you. Thank you.

It is all done. So it is.