She May Have Had Borderline Personality Disorder (On Letting Go)

My grandmother was a very negative woman. She held in so much anger and resentment, that I am certain it was a food that sustained her for much of her life. A perpetually unhappy woman, she carried woes that dated over fifty years, constructing and reliving ancient scenarios in order to justify and propagate her discord.

Being the only grandparent that lived long enough for me to know, it took me a while to realize that of all her grandchildren my brother and I bore the brunt of her malice. We may have been children, her grandchildren, but we were also the grandchildren of her most hated enemies.

I was oblivious to much of my family's history growing up, and thus did not understand why she treated me the way she did. Upon learning the tale, a lengthy and varied tale of deceit, dishonor, blame, black magic, cuckolding and more, I began to understand the depth of her hatred.

What amazed me though, was how she allowed this hatred to cross three generations, how this grown woman could inflict so much emotional trauma upon her young grandchildren.

The second to last time I saw my grandmother, I was in her neighborhood making purchases prior to my return trip to Armenia and stopped by to say goodbye. As soon as I crossed the threshold she told me she had something important to tell me.

"Your grandmother was a whore," she said, "and your grandfather was her pimp. Their house was a whorehouse, selling to anyone who would come by."

My mother's parents had been dead fifty years, and still she could not let go, choosing instead to shriek at me that I needed to know the truth.

For the first time in my life I yelled back at her. My anger boiled over. Enough was enough. I told her that she should be ashamed, that even if her allegations were true, how dare she tell me, how could she. They were my grandparents, alive only through the stories of others, why would she want me to hate them?

I left her there as I walked away, fighting the urge to return and rage.

There is a truth obscured by memory and time about what took place in the city of Beirut so many years ago regarding the relationship between my grandparents, but it is irrelevant, providing nothing in the way of a better life, no grounds for happiness, nor aid in putting the issue to rest.

What I have learned instead, the only real gift my grandmother gave me, is that hate chars the soul. And through her I was able to see what that looks like first hand.

There is an art to letting go that I have learned over time. I practice it constantly for fear of falling victim to the alternative; that continued suffering that eventually brings us low with our own heavy hands, leading to a life alone and abhorred.