Had to watcher her go last night. Blanche 2010-2026
How do you get through the first day?
The first week?
The first month?
It hurts so much. It physically hurts.
Had to watch her go last night. Deep immense grief. I know you guys understand. I just needed to talk about it somewhere. She was the best girl 💔 my heart physically hurts. For those with experience, what was the first week like? The first month? Today is just the first day and it feels like it will be impossible to overcome and return to life/work everything else we have to do in this world.
I got into Seger about a year ago and have been hyperfixated on his music ever since. I love everything about it. I was looking at Seger merch on Etsy and cracked up at this lol
https://www.etsy.com/listing/4555500742/michigan-sunset-shirt-bob-seger-comfort
I live in MI and we're about to have a bunch of senate elections in August. We have Nikki Stevens and Abdul Al Seyed for the two major Dem candidates. I was in a pretty "blue" area of town riding my bike and I saw a sign for Nikki and recalled reading earlier that morning that Nikki takes AIPAC money while Abdul doesn't and then just kinda loosly was thinking about the greater narrative lately about Isreal being exposed for a lot of stuff on the world stage. How it's pretty obvious now that even 9/11 was an inside job to create conditions for the USA to go to war with the middle east on behalf of them. So literally the same time I'm thinking it's obvious who did 9/11 I look up and read "World Trade Press" which is a business I happened to ride past at that very moment and was like wtf 😂😂😂
Edit to add initial context - the p3do is not Trump.
I needed to ask this in a sub with people with religious backgrounds who would understand this and the crazy that goes along with it, because I feel like people who have never interacted with people like this wouldn't get it.
​
I love my spouse more than life itself and we've been together almost 20 years at this point. We got married very young because we both come from insanely religious backgrounds. We met within this religion, were married into it, and have both found our way out.
​
My spouse's family is still pretty religious. Not as strict as before, but still very American Christian. One of the big things about our former strict religion is that there were a LOT of male predators. When I was in high school there were at least 10 girls and boys who were preyed on by teachers or church staff. My graduating class was only 12, which gives you context as to how bad this problem was. I narrowly escaped being a victim myself but seeing it happen all around me definitely took its toll. So I'm extremely sensitive when it comes to religious people either supporting pedos knowingly and willingly or doing it through less direct ways (not calling it out, pretending like it's not going on, excusing it in their own family, etc)
​
So my spouse has an aunt that deleted me off FB for calling out her pastor for covering up abuse. This aunt was actually a victim in some way by her mom's husband (wasn't her bio father) but he did something bad enough to go to prison for hurting a child. Not sure if it was my spouse's aunt or another kid, but either way, he went to prison and was a certified pedo. I know at the very \\\\\\\*least\\\\\\\* he spied on her while she was changing.
​
This happened in like the 80s or 90s. Fast forward to 2019 when spouse's aunt deleted me off FB. Around this time, my spouse's grandma (which is my spouse's aunt's mom) somehow reconnects with her ex husband the pedo. She's old at this point and has been single for decades. Naturally the family wants nothing to do with it. Nobody wants him around, everyone is pretty disgusted.
​
Grandma doesn't care. She doesn't want to be alone anymore. She tries to bring pedo to church but it's a small town and nobody wants him. My spouses younger siblings aren't allowed to go to grandma's while he's there. At this time, my younger siblings were about 10 years old. My parents attended the same church as my spouse's grandma and she starts getting pretty aggressive asking repeatedly if my parents will allow my siblings to come to her house after church. They didn't think much of it, just that maybe she was lonely.
​
This is when pedo steps in. Grandma brings the pedo TO MY PARENT'S HOUSE to ask and literally straight up beg my mom to let my siblings go there. They live a couple towns away so they had to drive pretty far to do this. My mom tells me about this (I had no idea this was going on) and I'm instantly pissed. I told my parents to NEVER let my siblings go there and told them he's a pedo. They ended up leaving the church. Now, for me, this is enough on its own to be mad enough and justified enough to distance myself from my spouse's grandma. But what happened after that made it so much worse...
​
So after this I basically don't have a relationship with spouse's grandma anymore. I say hi when I see her but that's about it. The pedo dies of COVID and the problem resolves itself for everybody else. Nobody really knows I'm harboring this because I'm a people pleaser and don't want to create problems, which I'm working on. Well, she's getting old and can't climb stairs anymore. We all have to go to her house for Christmas and Thanksgiving. I walk in for Thanksgiving and there's literally a shrine to the pedo in her living room. Big pic of him that says "MY BELOVED"....
​
I'm instantly sick to my stomach wondering why the fuck we're just going along with this...
​
Nobody says anything. They're uncomfortable too but nobody does anything. I don't feel like it's my place. I actually really thought after the first holiday somebody would tell her we're not doing this. I come back at Christmas, still there. I was absolutely shocked but still, didn't feel like it was my place. My spouse felt the same way like he was really expecting his parents to make sure it was taken down.
​
Next Thanksgiving rolls around, I was absolutely positive it would be gone. It was there. By the time Christmas comes I was basically running on fumes like I was so detached to the entire thing because it was like I was almost in denial that I had to actually accept they were really just gonna keep doing this. That Christmas really broke me when it was still up. I love my spouse and although it hasn't always been easy with his family I do love them and want things to be good for my spouse. It was absolutely the last straw for any of that. I was done. My spouse who had been expecting it to be taken down told them we're not coming to anything there anymore and in fact, we're not going to her house ever again no matter if it's taken down or not.
​
I pulled away pretty bad after that and it was taken as if I was just being a distant bitch but nobody really knew that was the reason because I didn't feel like I should have to explain that. I didn't create this whole thing, I'm just reacting to it. Then, all this shit comes out about Trump being a pedo and TPUSA Erika Kirk basically affiliated in many different ways with pedos and my spouse's family are Trump but especially TPUSA supporters. It was like truly, truly a breaking point for me feeling like I can NEVER escape having Christians around me supporting pedos but then acting like they're not just because they don't \\\\\\\*feel\\\\\\\* like they are.
​
I feel like I'm going crazy as if I'm the villain or I'm overreacting or I'm removing myself from their family unit over "politics" (which is what I know they'll try to spin it as so they can cope). I made a post on Instagram that made it pretty clear how I felt about continuing to keep the peace with Christians who directly or indirectly support pedos. I don't think it was taken well but I do not care. I have barely seen or talked to anyone in his family since February and we've been doing separate family holidays like my spouse goes to theirs and I go to mine. I also stopped responding in their fam group chat.
​
I just feel like they're gonna gang up on me one day and I'm gonna be the one they blame for all this but am I crazy!? Would you sit around the shrine to the pedo at Christmas and just accept that is the way things are, especially after the pedo targeted my young siblings WITH HELP from the grandma!? Am I overreacting about the TPUSA stuff? I'm just super sensitive to it and I need to feel safe in this world too... I just don't think people who actually cared about me could treat me like I'm the one with the issue just so they don't have to take accountability. At least acknowledge that this happened within their family and it was NOT OK.
​
Its taken up so much brain space for me and I've only ever talked about it with my spouse but I would assume other ppl would also be upset. If I'm the one who's wrong I want to know because I never want to be a person who can't take accountability, criticism, or learn and grow from experiences. I want to be logical and discerning. I want to be a person who's true to myself and creates safe conditions for myself even if it's hard. If I'm wrong I can absolutely accept that. But this whole thing has just been like one big sick joke.