Life Transitions | And Family Dynamics

Journalled on Wednesday, 19th of July 2023: Flamengo, Rio de Janeiro: 23 degrees, overcast and rainy.

It is the middle of the week again, and everything is going smoothly; I am exercising and working.

Yasmin is doing well at school and is on holiday until the 1^st of August. Nalva is off from work until the following Monday because she worked one week straight in São Paulo.

What has surprised me so much about my temporary living arrangement with Nalva, my ex-wife, is how well it is going. We have small arguments now and again, but nothing too much. The truth is, it is the opposite of how we all lived together before, as a couple.

Even so, I am having some problems with Yasmin. She is trying to face me head-on, but I am not accepting it.

My issue is that I feel that Yasmin is a little lazy and spoiled; it is almost impossible for her to help at home with the housework voluntarily; she never offers; she pretends to be blind to whatever is around her. I try to relate to her as I was at her age in England in the past.

I always remember being regularly active, constantly doing things and going out. I usually hung out with older friends, which meant I attended lots of parties and events. However, life at home was always a living hell with my mother.

As my father had already gone, my mother assumed the role of being both mother and father. She was very harsh with us both, especially me; she especially liked to hit us in the face when punishing us.

I noticed that until she had hit us in the face at least a few times, the punishment was not yet complete, and she would not be satisfied until it was properly done.

Our childhood, in some ways, was so complicated. My brother had had a nervous breakdown due to such a difficult separation and divorce between our parents, and because of that, our mother tried to protect him more.

However, as he was highly hyperactive as a child, he could not stop; he was always a hundred miles an hour all the time; if there had been any confusion either at school or where we lived, he would have been in the middle of it, if not ten times out of ten, at least nine.

Because of my brother’s issues, I now realise that my mother would take out her anger, frustration, and ignorance on me more than on my brother. I am not trying to play the victim; it’s how things were at the time. Even my brother acknowledges this to this day. Ironically, my brother and mother have not spoken to each other properly for over twenty years.

My brother married Debbie and has two children, Charlotte and Luke, who are about the same age as Jessica and Yasmin.

I have lived out of England and on the other side of the world in Brazil for more than three decades, and who was more mistreated by our mother than my brother was I, who has always had time and patience for her.

While I had the school for more than two decades in Copacabana, I would call her every week to see if everything was ok. When there was a problem or confusion, and there were various, I would go back to England to sort them out.

Returning to Yasmin, I sometimes feel I may be too hard on her, but as Nalva is always trying to please her, perhaps for financial reasons, and Yasmin and even Nalva have said that Yasmin can talk more with me than with her mother, it is a balance. However, I have noticed, and Yasmin has also confirmed, that she does not like all of us being together very much.

I think it is a little strange that she does not want her parents together; maybe she likes to play one against the other.

Or perhaps she is a teenager, confused for other reasons, or simply has a dark side. All I know is that I love her and want the best for her, but I also know that life is difficult, so she will need to be more prepared for the harsh reality awaiting her.

Going back to the living arrangement, I know that it is temporary and just another phase in my life. It is good and convenient for the short future before going to England. However, in this situation, it is not easy to build a relationship or get laid, but I know this is the price I have to pay. Everything in life has a price, both good and bad.

I worked, and we had lunch.

In bed by 10 p.m.