Mom and Dad

I guess the logical place to start would be my parents. I mean, in a lot of ways, they really got the ball rolling on so much of my personality. I need to say upfront, with absolutely no equivocation, I hold no ill will or even blame on my parents. Yes, in many ways they set the stage for what happened to me growing up at home and at school. Still, I love and cherish them both dearly for the people they are today, and I try to focus now on the good qualities they instilled in me.

I say this because my parents were essentially kids raising kids. My sister was born the day before my dad turned 20; my mother was 19. I came along 3 years later. I will be honest here; I didn’t model my parenting off how I was parented. Much of that was due to my education in childhood development and psychology.

Aside from their young age, another obstacle of my childhood was the time period I grew up in and the religion I was raised in — Catholicism. The 70’s is not really known for tolerance and acceptance of people who were different. Plus, we didn’t understand or accept what we know now about mental health, anxiety and depression. We doubled down on this by attending Catholic schools where again, free thinking and being different were not greatly encouraged traits. “My way or the highway” describes my mother to a “T”. I remember one time getting a lecture on how I could eat without drinking first in the morning. I remember thinking, even at that young age, “who cares what I do first?”

One thing though, my mother was loyal, so long as what you were doing was on her “accepted” list (i.e. sports). Anything with music or the arts was a “hell no” and the one time my sister managed to get ballet lessons, there was nothing but complaint for every drop-off, pick-up, even the recital. Yet, she didn’t miss a game we played in. She even went to almost all the softball games where I was only the team manager. I didn’t even play, but she was there!

My dad worked a lot. He is your typical accountant — everything has a place and everything in its place (mostly). I didn’t get that gene which certainly led to blow-ups over my room. I did get his pack rat gene! He directed his temper mostly toward other adults though — my mother and others. He would go weeks and a few times even months without speaking to my mother. He didn’t speak to one of his younger brothers for most of my life — in fact, he shocked me when he had me invite him to my first wedding.

I did get a taste of this myself as a teenager. Granted, there was at least one time when I clearly remember I was at fault and once my mom explained the full history and context causing his anger, I apologized (something I don’t recall him having ever done), but I still got the silent treatment. He didn’t speak to me at my high school graduation. I don’t remember why, just that mom had to fight just to get him to take a picture with me. I did take this behavior on during my early adulthood. If you wronged me, or even worse wronged a loved one, you were done. We’ve both mellowed with age, but I do still hold his lesson of cutting someone out that isn’t a positive force in my life.

My mother was — is — a yeller and an arguer which doesn’t mix well with an introverted, severely, anxious child. I think this was a large influence on the peaceful, “quiet” home my kids grew up in. I was always nervous around my dad. He was a perfectionist, and I knew I could never please him. In the end I tried to stay out of the way.

Through all of this, I also suffered through my sister’s abuse. I will talk about her later, but the end result was a lonely childhood. Then you throw into a pot a lonely, isolated, introverted, severely anxious child with a manipulative, narcissistic psychopath with only one target — you come out with a kid ripe for some really bad things.

Now all of that sounded very harsh. I don’t like writing or even thinking about those times. So much so, that I had to tell my husband early on that he was making me re-live childhood traumas because he would sound so much like my dad used to when I was younger.

That said, I try to focus on the good things my parents gave and did for me. For instance, I could always count on my mother to be at every volleyball game — even the boring ones and man did I have some boring ones! She also taught me the importance of family, although in fairness, both of my parents hold family at high regard. The difference I have is I don’t believe family ends with blood and I don’t believe blood entitles you to a place in my family.

I learned loyalty from my dad. Loyalty to family, friends, company and country. The most prized quality I received from my dad is my humor. Growing up there was very little he wouldn’t joke about or tease about. He even feigned passing out in the car after a surgery on the way home scaring my mother to death while she was driving. He looked up with a big grin, “fooled ya.”

As I said, I hold nothing that has happened to me — even at my sister’s hands against them. They did the best they knew how at the time. Both wanted nothing but happiness for me; they were hampered by age and by the times. Mental health — depression and anxiety — were barely whispered back in the 70s. Even now, over the last decade, it’s been a struggle to help them understand that my anxiety and my daughter’s anxiety are not choices, but how our brains work.

In the end, I hope both of my parents look at me and are proud of who I am and what I’ve done so far in my life. I, for one, am grateful to have them both in my life still, even though they still can try my patience. I’ve had friends who have lost parents early in life. My mother is 17 years older than my grandmother’s age when she died. In so many ways, I know it’s borrowed time.

I can only come up with maybe a couple of things they could have done differently, but even then, I doubt it would have changed anything in my childhood or teenage years. I needed to start with talking about them first so when I find the strength to share about my sister and the damage she had wrought or my issues at school, you’ll know I hold accountable the person(s) responsible for hurting me. It is neither of my parents.