1981

I was eight when I asked, “Why doesn’t grandma love me?”

I was told, “She doesn’t love anyone, just herself.”

At eight years old it made sense. I didn’t cry about it. I just knew that she couldn’t love me and I was fine with that.

Grandma didn’t love my father either. When my father was small… around six or seven… he was stung by a box jelly fish. My grandmother did not rush to his side to help him but told him how stupid he was and that his brother bet get some lemons to help with the sting. He also told me that one evening he refused to eat his dinner. Grandma made him sit at the table until he ate it. Around four in the morning she grew fed up and “made him” eat. He choked and coughed up what he had eaten. She “made him” eat that too. He didn’t love her either.

Grandma didn’t love my step mother. I remember her sitting in her rocking chair telling my step mother how her cooking, cleaning, wife and mothering skills were terrible. My step mother didn’t love her either.

Grandma didn’t love my grandpa. When my grandmother and grandfather were living in England my grandfather was struck by a car. He received severe trauma to his head which resulted in him having a partial lobotomy. His family said it was a blessing so that he could blissfully deal with my grandmother’s abuse and not know what was happening. My grandmother and grandfather were both in the British Army and my grandmother was a nurse. So after the accident she took care of him. My father is pretty sure that my grandmother euthanized my grandfather when she was tired of taking care of him.

This bear is the bear my grandfather made for me during his rehabilitation from his lobotomy. This is the bear I was given, with love, from the man whom I was named after. This is the bear from my grandfather and NOT from my grandmother, because she didn’t love anyone.