This piece is very personal and took me a lot of courage to post, I hope you'll read to the end and try to understand.

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Grandma,
I will proceed to become extremely,
brutally honest with you.

I hate you.
There is no simpler way to say it!
I despise you,
I don’t like you,
I “strongly dislike” you.

I hate how you try to do things
your own way
in our house.

I hate how you think you have
the right
to do whatever you want
when you are simply a guest.

Yes, that’s right
you were living alone,
an early alzheimer’s patient,
in a tiny, boring apartment in the middle of
somewhere,

believing you could take care of yourself
by yourself
while knowing deep inside, past your annoyingly
defiant personality,
that you needed help.

I love that all of my other aunts
rejected you,
rejected the idea of taking you in,
rejected the idea of having
anything to do with you
because you treated them like literal
trash.

And at the same time,
I hate that my father was obliged to take care of you
just because he was the youngest…
and the only one left.

You are lucky your son and my
mother,
who you treated so badly
had enough heart to let you live
in our family’s safe warmth.

I hate how when I’m studying
downstairs,
you come up behind me with your quiet,
shuffling, socked feet
and breathe in my ear.

And keep breathing in my ear until I turn around
shocked to see you.
Honestly, grandma,
you’d have fifteen black eyes by now
if you weren’t
a grandma.

You seem so rude and disrespectful
when you hang your hand washed,
lacey underwear in the yard
and walk around the house
more than half naked
without having taken a shower in a solid, four months!

I hate when I sleep on the
couch,
and am sleeping soundly…
until you sneak out of your room
at three AM, and see me.

You grab a nearby blanket and throw it
over me,
and when I wake up and try to shove it off,
you come closer with a determined face
and stubbornly paste it on my angry,
writhing body.

Like a fisherman catching a slow,
frustrated whale.

I wish you would stop trying to care
for us,
when in reality,
it is us who are caring for you.

I don’t get why you feel obliged
to cook and clean
when you were the one who used to force my mom
to cook and clean.

You never even cooked
and cleaned properly for your own
three sons anyway.

I hate how all of my friends say
‘You’re overreacting!”
and when they meet you, they tell me
that you’re nothing but an old,
kind grandma.

And I suppose you are,
in your pitiful, helpless state
in which you are indebted to your own
family.

But the thing my friends don’t know
is that there’s more
to the relationship you completely and
utterly soured between you and my mother.

Grandma,
I can never forgive you
for how you tried to give my brother away.

Oh yes, we’re getting to the good part now.
You tried to give my older brother
to my aunt because she was struggling
to give birth to sons.

I hate you!
I hate you!
I hate you!

My father was a college student
and married my mother before he graduated.
So they lived in your house.

I hate how you forced my pregnant mother
to do physical labor
in your own house.

I hate how you shouted at her
to cook and clean your filthy living space,
vigorously, while you sat
watching TV.

Everyday, a little bottle of milk would be sent
to your doorstep.
But no, this milk was not
for the tired, very pregnant, cinderella
who actually very much needed it,
but for you.

How could you?
I don’t want to hear bullcrap
about how society made you do it,
but I have to accept that it did.

The silent rules that influence us,
the little
mistakes that are so easy to make,
the customs, the traditions,
they are all so hard
to break.

But it is always the most amazing people
that break them.
And somehow it makes me disappointed
that you were never able to.

Ever since you moved in, my mother
got headaches more often
and is constantly on edge.

I’m sorry for exposing my family,
but my sister, mother, all of my aunts,
and I especially,
don’t have any time to even try
to ‘love’ you.

The very thought of it is revolting,
the very idea
of forgiving you
stirs a furious, burning anger
in my heart.

My words cannot fulfill the absolute
monotony
of the fact that I hate you.

This hate is killing me
and I, for some reason,
find satisfaction in it.

No, grandma,
the love you see between me
and my family is most definitely
not for you.

Don’t even think about laughing again
when my sister and I laugh
just because you’re trying to fit in.
You don’t even understand English,
so we know.
Surprised?
You even laugh when we laugh
about you.
That’s proof enough, no?

You can step off the stage,
get out of the light,
cower in the dark hole
of your loneliness and self
pity,
but I will not feel anything more
than a disgusted relief.

You are not worth
my sympathy.
I am just a child, but I know very well
what I like.

And that most certainly
will never
be you.

But of course, we have to learn to forgive
and like my sister said,
everyone is a complete,
complex human being.

You have to learn how to adapt
to our rules.
And we must learn to
forget about our grudges
and offended personal space.

You will receive little love
and little gratitude for your existence,
but hopefully, you understand
that even though we will never care much
about you,
we at least try to accept that you are here,
and human.

-Signed, not your ‘granddaughter’,
or any of that bullshit, but signed
“A stranger” that knows
a little too much about you.