Last year, Odalys talked to us about her Cuban grandmother’s toxic behavior and how familismo made it hard for her parents to address it. Today, she reflects on how their difficult relationship shaped her and how opening up about it on our podcast helped her begin to process it all.
If you loved this episode, listen to Odalys's (aka Ody) original episode, When Familism Hurts.
We’d love to hear your stories of triumph and frustration so send us a detailed voice memo to virginia@lwcstudios.com. You might be on a future episode! Let’s connect on Twitter and Instagram at @TalkToMamiPapi and email us at hello@talktomamipapi.com. And follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and anywhere you listen to your favorite podcasts.
Juleyka Lantigua:
Hi, everybody. For our final episode of 2021, we're wrapping up our OG check-in series. It's been so cool to catch up with so many OGs, and hearing them reflect on their experiences from this past year. Today, I'm checking in with OG Odalys. Odalys's episode aired on November 2nd 2020. Here's a clip.
Clip: Everyone in the house had issues with my grandma. Every time I talked to my mom about my grandmother's behavior and the arguments that we would get into, she would just try to pacify the situation. She just encouraged me to respect my elders. And I feel like a lot of that came from Marianismo. The idea that you have to sacrifice for family. Especially when the arguments were extremely out of hand, my dad would have a stern talk with her, and voices would be raised and she would end up going into her room and slamming the door, almost like a child. It was like their roles were reversed.
Lantigua: In her original episode, Odalys talked about how toxic one of her grandmothers was to her and her brother when they were growing up. She told us she was just beginning to process the emotional abuse she had endured. So for OG check-in, I wanted to hear how the journey had been going for her so far. Let's get into it.
Odalys: Hi, I'm Odalys. My pronouns are she/her. I originally came on the show to talk about a toxic family member, my grandmother.
Lantigua: What has happened since we spoke?
Odalys: The last time we spoke, she was pretty ill. She was in the hospital. She got released, and then soon after she had to go back to the hospital and she actually passed in November of 2020.
Lantigua: I'm so sorry. I have a note here from our producer that, coincidentally, she passed away the same day that your original episode aired.
Odalys: Yeah, it's true. It was, in a way, healing because doing the podcast episode really brought up a lot of feelings and thoughts that I had never really taken the time to process. So when it came out, I was able to kind of listen back to it and sort of be reminded of all the mixed feelings I had about my relationship with her. It was stuff that was there and it was dormant and I didn't realize how much of an impact it was having on my current relationships. So, yeah, definitely talking about it and putting it out there, it really... Just recapping everything really helped kind of set the tone for the healing that I've been doing ever since she passed.
Lantigua: What has that healing looked like? What have you done differently? What have you started to put in place to help you heal?
Odalys: Since those feelings bubbled up, I needed someone to help me process. So I went into therapy. She was the last relative that I still have ties with, that is a blood relative, or was a blood relative of my father's. He passed back in 2011. So it was something that I knew I needed.
Lantigua: So did you feel, as you were starting to process her death and also her impact on you after the episode, did you feel conflicted? Did you feel guilty? I'm really interested because some people might have experienced that as a relief, some people might have experienced it as feeling guilty because they spoke about this person in such an open way. Where was your head at when this all happened?
Odalys: At first, I really did feel what you said. I felt elated. Just, oh, this weight. She's resting, I'm resting. We have time away from each other now where I can heal. And then, of course, it's a whole mixed bag of feelings, right? Because there were moments where she did try to connect with me, not in the ways that I wanted to, or that I... We spoke very different love languages. So we were kind of like ships passing in the night in a way, trying to connect, but not knowing how. And I started looking at her past and kind of saying, okay, well, she did the best she could with the childhood that she was given, the parents that she was given.
Odalys: When she was living, it was just hard to see past all the negative things that were there between us. The history was too fresh, the wound was way too fresh. So after she passed, I was able to look at more the positive aspects that I took from my relationship with her and the positive moments that we had together, which honestly weren't that many.
Lantigua: Would you say that you have forgiven her?
Odalys: I don't know. I still feel like that's a journey I'm on right now, because I'm still dealing with all the repercussions of the damage she's done to me. So it's not just me, but my family and my brother, we were all so affected. We're still, my brother and I, are still kind of, "Can you believe she did all that to us and we made it?" It's kind of like survivors, this pride of surviving our childhood with someone so toxic. And I don't know that I've forgiven her yet. I can say I am closer to it than I was when we first spoke.
Lantigua: So it's something you would like to have happen at some point?
Odalys: I mean, I feel like anyone holding on to resentments or anything like that, it does weigh on you. And I have to say that it does still weigh on me. The weight is lighter and I do hope to one day just be free of it. One of the things that I haven't tried yet in the healing process that my therapist recommended was to go to ACOA meetings, Adult Children of Alcoholics and Dysfunctional Families.
Lantigua: Oh, wow.
Odalys: At first, I was my parents didn't abuse substances, my grandmother didn't, I don't understand. And she's, no it's also for dysfunctional families. They help you to break down the dynamics that didn't work for you in your childhood and help you create new dynamics. So that's something that's on my, I guess, to do, my list of-
Lantigua: "To explore."
Odalys: Exactly.
Lantigua: So what have you learned about yourself in this process?
Odalys: I never realized how my relationship with my grandmother and my father's relationship with his mom, who's my grandmother, I never realized how their dynamics and my relationship with my grandmother actually affected my current relationships. In my work with my therapist, she actually highlighted something that I didn't even see. It was that I'm creating a lot of friendships now, and even in my relationship with my husband, I'm learning to relate in a more healthy, open fashion to the people around me. And that's kind of like me healing my old relationships.
Lantigua: So my last question is, on the show, we hear from experts, this term familismo, the notion that Latinos put family first and above everything else, that there are pressures and expectations and modes of behavior that everybody tries to adhere to. And definitely, having a toxic matriarch is par for the course in familismo, and it has generational impact, the way that you and your brother have felt it. Have you thought about what the trajectory might be for your extended family now that she's completely out of the picture?
Odalys: It's a very valid question and something that I've been processing myself. How is, I guess, her legacy, what she's kind of left behind, how is that going to affect the family dynamics going forward in my own family? I got to say it's really difficult because I've had to break a lot of bad habits, a lot of toxic dynamics that were going on in my family. It's going to take a lot of work. It's a lot of work. I have a daughter, so I'm trying to encourage her to be kind and be happy for others when they succeed, and communicate openly and honestly, and all things that I didn't have in my family growing up, right? We couldn't communicate openly because we would risk explosions, emotional outbursts, or just fights that would escalate to yelling and all that stuff. And my husband is on the same page. We take the time to, in terms of healing those relationships with the females in my life, and kind of passing that on to my daughter. It doesn't have to be catty, and jealousy, and toxicity. We're encouraging her to be open and just speak out if she's feeling a certain way and also relate to others in just kind, positive ways.
Lantigua: That's really fantastic. I'm so proud of you for doing all this work. This is not easy stuff to do.
Odalys: No, it's been tough.
Lantigua: I'm so thankful that you came back to the show. I really appreciate it.
Odalys: Thank you, Juleyka. Thanks for taking the time.
Lantigua: Odalys's original episode is called When Familism Hurts, and you can find it in our feed and on our website. We've also linked to it in the episode notes. Thank you so much for listening and for sharing us. On behalf of the entire How to Talk to Mamí and Papí team, we wish you the happiest, healthiest, love filled new year of all. How to Talk to [Mamí & Papi] About Anything is an original production of LWC Studios. Virginia Lora is the show's producer. Kojin Tashiro is our mixer. Manuela Bedoya is our social media editor. I'm the creator, Juleyka Lantigua. On Twitter and Instagram, we're @talktomamipapi. Please follow us and rate us on Apple Podcast, Amazon Music, Pandora, Spotify, anywhere you listen to your favorite podcast. Bye everybody. Same place next week and next year.
CITATION:
Lantigua, Juleyka, host. “OG Check-in: She's Working to Forgive an Abusive Grandmother”
How to Talk to [Mamí & Papí] About Anything,
LWC Studios., December 27, 2021. TalkToMamiPapi.com.