Hey All!
Paige
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What struck me is this: you broke the chain of abuse and in breaking the chain your life was forever changed.
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Thanks for this, Paige and for the kind words. Sometimes I wrestle with this legacy of mine. I ask myself if the homelessness and the street would've come my way even if I'd been from a perfect environment. It's so hard to say, you know? Because anybody can fall in with the "wrong crowd". But the flipside is that maybe it wouldn't all have happened and then I would'nt have been such a mess that I ended up having to choose to relinquish to start with. And then I go to the "then this wouldn't happened but then that wouldn't have happened" crapolio.
Sigh....the chicken, the egg and the barn they're sitting in. LOL!
The chains that bind us........
I can picture your dad out there on the streets here; such mean streets. But he clearly came out of that with so much compassion. Your story of him reminded me of an answer to an op-ed piece on child abuse that I read once where this guy was saying that when victims of abuse are labeled as "future abusers" it only victimizes us again. So true.
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He was afraid to go so far as to spank us because he was afraid he’d turn into a monster. He was afraid to the day he died that he would transform into something ugly. My heart shattered when he told me.
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And mine aches for him as well. Fear of becoming the very thing we hate most. Abuse; it really does chain us to it. Even....even if we refuse to give in to the legacy of hate and violence behind it, it still dictates the choices we will make. That's a frightening power.
Aspenhall
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As an adult, I have taken my sister from the neglect (phys abuse stopped after I left) and emotional abuse.
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I tried it you know. I remember being 12 or 13 and getting up in my stepdad's face and telling him that if he didn't change his ways, I'd call Social Services. I'll leave the rest unsaid....too hard to speak of.
I am glad that your sister has you!
On the obituary, Wow!! ((( Aspenhall ))) It must've been a cathartic moment to write such a thing.
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I've had one aunt cry and beg me for forgiveness and says she still lives in fear of judgement day when God will ask what she did to help us.
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Do your aunts ever speak of theirs or your mother's past? I am wondering if there is information back in there somewhere that can answer some of your questions. I have done a small bit of research into nutso dad (biodad). Also, the infuratingly pea-sized amount of info that I have been able to pry from my mom like an alternator from a V-8 stuck in a 4-banger has lent me some clues. But it did help explain the long, cold stare and even cooler pathos.
Paige talks about her dad and his fear of being like his own father. You know what frightens me? If nutso dad's pathology is an inherited trait, could I be just like him? Ruthless? Indifferent? Coldly violent and calculating?
Sigh....what if I am and I just don't know it.
I'll stop now cuz I'm crying.
Kathy Thanks for the prayers. Lord knows I need 'em!
Love you guys.
You got me where you want me
I ain't nothing but your fool
You treated me mean oh you treated me cruel
Chain, chain, chain, chain of fools .
One of these mornings the chain is gonna break
But up until then, yeah, I'm gonna take all I can take
Chain, chain, chain, chain, chain, chain
Chain, chain, chain, chain of fools
Aretha Franklin