What we put up with

This afternoon, I was talking to someone who has a bi-polar relative. She said that she should have seen this most recent manic episode coming because as she looked back, she could see a totally inappropriate reaction to a little thing that seemed to foreshadow a bigger explosion. This person lived with a bi-polar parent, so maybe, like me, she was used to big reactions to little things.
When my father was alive, he was arrested for shooting a pellet gun into the neighbor's house. The neighbors according to him were shooting laser beams at him. The officer who arrested him called me and asked, "Does your father have a history of mental illness?" And although I was in my forties, I was shocked to realize that yes, indeed he did! And that I just realized it then.
We put up with so much stuff from people who are supposed to love us for a variety of reasons. And we realize later that they are crazy and all we had to do maybe once was tell them no.
New goal: no more putting up with stuff!