I just watched a YouTube video of Jimmy Carr being asked by a single mom for advice on how to raise her 5-year-old son to become a Good Man. It got me thinking about my upbringing and my mom and dad and the dysfunctional history of their relationship and how it shaped me as a father later in life. Their dynamics were the kind of stuff of ‘us against the world.’ I truly believed they loved each other. But their respective upbringings were less than optimal, hence their struggles with managing life as adults and raising a number of children was, to say the least, difficult.
Dad struggled with maintaining employment, mom struggled with keeping the family safe, fed and happy. We were mostly happy because of the endless love she showed us. Dad was a good father besides not truly providing financially. They separated many years later. This is not the story of the why and how that happened. This is more about how I never really hated my father for his leaving. I believe much of that is due to mom never said a bad word about him. When asked, she always said, ‘you will understand more when you’re older.’
There were those talks later in life. Some were tearful and difficult, but she would not say a bad word about him ever. It just didn’t work out. It wasn’t until I became and adult and began experiencing similar issues in my life that I began to question my history and the patterns I caried with me into adulthood. It too a few decades to finally understand the dynamics and the truths of everything. I had a Satori moment when I realized that I had always thought of them as just mom and dad. But they weren’t just.
When I learned to put my mind into them as people outside of the parental roles I began to see the depths of their sorrows and their losses. I saw the tragedy of the effects from generational trauma and how that carries in its ignorance and secrecy through generations of families. But the greatest thing I realized that any anger I harbored about my childhood, those overlapping stories beyond what has been said so far, I found that my anger was really sorrow that hurt so terribly I turned it to anger in an effort to separate the pain from myself.
Sorrow, deep and enduring sorrow often turns to anger and hatred as an attempt to protect oneself from the pain of the truth of life. It is born of ignorance and endured with stories told by people that still hurt and still hide from their pain. The truth is, a whole life can only be lived with love and understanding in one’s heart. Going back to that YouTube video, I have found that all it takes to raise a positive and emotionally healthy child to adulthood is one person in their life that loves them and shows them how to love no matter what.
The Journey of a thousand miles 