speak russian

I’m not ashamed to talk about it and it usually helps me to do so. My mother was 100% Russian and when I was 12 she committed suicide. I was so angry and hurt that I basically went through all the things I could change (maybe not physically) that reminded me of her and I changed them. I changed my religion, I stopped celebrating certain things that were part of the Russian culture (food, dancing, music etc.) and above all I stopped speaking Russian. I absolutely refused to do it. My grandparents and I would have conversations that consisted of them speaking to me in Russian and me answering back in English. I held my anger in for a long time until I met my husband and learned that I wasn’t the only one who lost a parent to suicide. Since then I have been gradually starting to let go of my anger and have started to incorporate some of the things I use to do into my daily life again. After all she was still my mum, and yes what she did was selfish, but I have to learn to forgive sometime and I can’t spend the rest of my life being angry. I’m lucky I have a husband who speaks Russian as well. He can help me brush up on mine. Ah he’s my life saver :-)