Nowhere to Hide Separation was never the problem; the problem was the yelling, the tussle, the loud mornings and sad nights, my father’s alcohol and his disease. Alcoholism drew my childhood in an odd shape, intoxicating my father and thus my life as well. When the exposure to a hostile environment comes about, you first tend to hide and seek shelter. However, once you can no longer hide, fear strikes. It strikes so deep and sometimes for too long, thus you let go and make such fear your own. I embraced that fear and helped it vanish, mixing with the oxygen in the air I breathed. It intoxicated every aspect of my life, and I became used to it, for a while. Next to my mother and my two siblings, we capsule away this intoxication, unchaining …show more content…
It introduced freshness, a sense of peace and it brought hope. Their separation was never the problem; the damage done was the problem. After years of experiencing the harsh reality of my family’s decay, my heart harden and I fell out of place. Childhood was now merely a word. My father had left the house and moved in with my grandparents, yet, his taunting presence was still there, inside me. I found myself unintentionally yelling at my siblings and discarding them as unimportant, a reflection of my father’s attitude. I realized that my father’s negativity had not left, for I was carrying on the results of a life spent on irresponsibility and battled with the trauma left due to years of domestic …show more content…
I spent my afternoons eagerly waiting for her to come home from work, because I knew that she cared for me more than anyone did. Her actions filled with integrity, her work ethic, and the way she carried herself in front of my siblings and me depicted an admirable image. As if untouched by the aftermath of many years, my mother planned the future with optimism. Her essence deliberately patronized the subconscious attitude that I carried, closely resembling my father’s. My siblings were also mantled by my mother’s calm perception that everything was fine. They displayed an oddly alien understanding towards her views, thus treated me with much patience. In the same manner, my rugged mind realized how unnecessary it was for me to carry on the burden of my father’s mistakes. Suddenly I found myself interacting with my siblings in the dignifying and affectionate form they respectively deserved. I rectified my character and pledged to never fall prey to fear, for my mother and siblings stood next to me preserving the serenity we
Some show love through words by saying the words “I love you” or saying how much they care about you like my parents or through actions The things your parents did, I will admit, made me confused. In the first couple of chapters I could not understand how your parents could treat you and your siblings the way they did, but as I continued to read I realized the motive. My parents have never done anything close to what your parents did. On the other hand, the more I thought about it, the more sense it made behind your parents reasoning. I don’t know much about the life of your parents outside this memoir and I do not know the details of their life growing up. However, I know enough to infer that they had hard ones especially when you revealed your dad’s life. Your parent’s intentions behind almost everything they did were good although the may have not been executed in a good way. They believed that they were teaching you a life lesson by preparing
The author clearly shows how his childhood effected his adulthood, making in a living example of what he is writing about allowing the audience to more easily trust what he is writing about. Instead of using factually evidence from other dysfunctional family incidences, the author decides to make it more personal, by using his own life and comparing family ideas of the past to the present.
There is a special bond between parents and children, but there is always uncertainty, whether it’s with the parents having to let go or the children, now adults, reminiscing on the times they had with their parents. The poem “To a Daughter Leaving Home” by Linda Pastan is a very emotional poem about what you can assume: a daughter leaving home. Then the poem “Alzheimer 's" by Kelly Cherry is about the poet’s father, a former professional musician who develops the disease. These are only two examples that show the ambivalence between the parents and the children.
As a child, I spent a lot of time with my parents – especially my mother. While I was in elementary school she chose to dedicate an hour of her night to help me with my homework if I needed the assistance. There were plenty of times when I chose to spend time with her simply because I enjoyed he...
...pport that they require. These events force us to encounter a leap of maturity, in order for us to finally realize our mothers’ need for love. By experiencing these crises, we can see our parents not as helpful objects, but rather as human beings like ourselves.
Soon thereafter my parents split up and I could feel their discord; like vibrations of hate upon snapping wires. They seemed to become somehow physically incapable of co-habiting the same spaces. It was as if something physiological that was once inside them was taken from them. Stolen was that strange organ that makes people feel the sincere need to be near someone else. As I grew older I began to observe my mother and her bizarre behaviors. Her anxious isolations and her pill bottle like a Xanax Barbie stuck to her hand. She was always so far away from me. I would sit and wonder where she would go; off to some corner of her mind where up was down and all the wrong in life was right. She was safe behind a closed door; in silence and stillness. I was always alone; and always lonely, with my mother in the next room. She may as well have been a million miles away from me. The older I got the colder the hugs became; it was like she was tired of faking it.
And while the details of the arguments that caused these altercations are lost to me now, all I can remember is the distrust and rejection that ravished my identity the moment their bodies made physical contact with mine. Living a life that was constructed by them and for them, I was utterly lost when the feelings of trust and acceptance died. I had committed myself to taking part in extracurricular clubs that stepped up my involvement and got me closer to getting ahead, and I had achieved a status that was somewhat unmatchable for others in regard to my popularity because of my success, but all of this seemed pointless because of the confusion that my parents
It only takes a moment to change the way you think, the way you feel and the way you act. During my period of infancy and preschool I was spoiled, as one could be coming from low middle class family in Brazil. I was loved, cared for and wished for nothing. However my father’s family thought, that since I had so much love from my mum’s family, that they would introduce me to the hatred and pain that the world could offer. I don’t remember a moment, which my father’s family showed any positive feeling towards me or my mum’s family. They thought of us as trash even though they weren’t better than us and I thought that the only good person that came out of my father’s family was himself. That is till I was five years old, and I watched from the shadow as my father kicked my mother, till she was no longer screaming or crying for him to stop. That is the most vivid memory I have as a child. I remember looking at my mother with blood on her arms, and wondering why she never took her arms away from her face, to try to protect the rest of her bod...
My mother was a complex, multi-faceted person. Many of you here today knew my mother personally, and many of you knew my mother indirectly through one of her family members. You may have known her as a coworker, a friend, or a support person. Of course, all of my mother’s family here today each knew a part of her, a “facet” of her--as a mother, a sister, an aunt, a grandmother, a cousin.
Looking back at my past, I recall my mother and father’s relationship as if it were yesterday. I am only four years old, small and curious; I tended to walk around my home aimlessly. I would climb book shelves like a mountain explorer venturing through the Himalayans, draw on walls to open windows to my own imagination, or run laps around the living room rug because to me I was an Olympic track star competing for her gold medal; however my parents did not enjoy my rambunctious imagination. My parents never punished me for it but would blame each other for horrible parenting skills; at the time I did not understand their fights, but instead was curious about why they would fight.
Stimulated by Anastasia’s story, I learned that it was all right if my family wasn’t necessarily a family. My mother left me and my father when I was not even one-year-old. She left him an epistle explaining to him that she was leaving him and did not even come to the divorce to claim me. My aunt would bellow obscene profanities at me every day for doing something slightly off the beam and my grandfather told me I would by no means be his favorite or anything remotely close. Feeling superfluous, I knew I had to proceed with my own life. Anastasia was going to be the woman who taught me unerringly what I needed to know to make this more than just an aspiration. Anastasia had no family but she still seemed happy. What was the key to her happiness? She accepted that she and her past were not the same thing. She moved on with her life regardless of anything that co...
The afternoon was slowly fading into the evening and I had gone the whole day without the figure of my aspiration, my father. I impatiently paced the floor in front of the door like a stalking cat waiting to pounce on its prey. The thoughts of wrestling my father and hear those words of affirmation, “You got me! Mercy! I give up!” filled my head. My father was obviously faking it but there was something about his words that have such power over a young boys life. Mothers are sources of comfort and safety for a young boy but it is the father that defines the identity of a young boy, the father bestows manhood on the boy.
It was a traumatic and unexpected loss that shook my family. The loss of my husband stopped me in my tracks, and it felt like I was from another planet learning to survive in an entirely new world. Of course I am still affected and triggered by my grief, but the journey has been bittersweet and transformational, to say the least. However, the time of transition I am basing this paper on is how my new relationship has affected my family and the ways in which we are making the transition from loss to renewal and what they once viewed and knew me as, to the person I am today. To understand the impact of the loss one would have to know that my late husband and I had known one another since sixth grade, married out of high school and for ten years prior to his death. We “grew up together” for some of our relationship and he became part of our family of origin, as did his nuclear family. Our relationship and his families with ours changed my family’s identity, as we joined the characteristics of two different families (Bennet, Wolin & McAvity, 1988). My late husband’s death disrupted the continuity of our family identity, and roles shifted to maintain a balance in the period of
At the young age of ten, I was faced with a situation that has had one of the largest influences in who I am today. My parents’ divorce has and still currently plays a role in my life that has affected my drive for motivation bringing diverse perspectives. At such a young age, I was filled with such remorse, discouragement, and fear. My educational abilities were collapsing, along with some of my common social activities. I was absent-minded due to my adolescent understanding and confusion of the situation. I became emotionally depleted coming eye to eye with what I was promised would never happen. My personal connections with my family gradually became diminished, from what I kept so valuable. I was placed in a situation that tore apart my contentment, arrogance, and self motivation. It wasn’t until years later, I took my position as a chance to transform my bleakness into a strong desire for greatness.
... a smile came across his face, a smile that for three weeks, I thought I was never going to see again. Unfortunately, his struggle with alcohol was just beginning. To this day he attends AA meetings and is doing great. The days of speed boating have continued, but there is no more beer drinking. For his grandkids, not much has really changed, except Grandpa’s health has improved. He has more energy and a better outlook on life. I think the experience helped him realize that his motto “Quality over Quantity” is not concrete and that there needs to be a balance between the two. We cannot get by on just the pleasures in life because it isn’t fair to our loved ones we have to compromise and make sacrifices in order to keep our health.