Jailhouse blues

So my dad’s in jail, minimum security, nothing too serious.  The bigger problem is that for most of his life, my dad has stayed roughly at the maturity level of a 20 year old, letting his mother and sisters take care of the majority of his responsibilities, financial and otherwise.

When I was younger, I would come to visit my dad, but I mostly stayed with my aunts and cousins, seeing my dad for an hour here and there.  I was 25 before spending a night in the same house as my dad.  Almost 5 years ago, he had an accident, and was in the hospital for 6 weeks, and that was when our real relationship started.  We are now at a point where we accept each other as is, no judgement. 

So now here we are, he’s in jail, my aunts are in charge of his money, and they are deciding how much and when he gets any.  Needless to say, he is frustrated, and since I am the only one who goes to visit him, I am stuck between them.  My aunts complaining about how he keeps calling them for money, his money, but they don’t like how he is spending it, so they refuse.  I see them, they complain about him and how he lives his life, but they continue to enable him.  I see him, he complains about them and how they judge him and won’t help (read enable) him enough, but he is the one who keeps putting them in charge of anything.

It’s gotten to the point that I don’t even want to visit them while he is still in jail, simply because I am sick of everyone complaining but not doing anything to change the situation, and that is something I have zero patience for. 

Shit happens, life isn’t fair, and there is nothing to be gained to wallow in self pity or complaining.  I’m not saying I never complain, we all do, but I don’t just sit around waiting for things to change, I take action.  The action I take doesn’t always work, but I keep trying things until I find something that does.  As long as someone is trying to make a situation better, I am there and will do everything to help, but when people just keep going around and around in the same cycle, and the only thing they do is complain, I just get frustrated.

This has been a very emotionally two months, and there is still a whole other one left.