I completely understand there are thousands of stories of children all over the world that haven’t had a healthy childhood and mine in comparison isn’t anywhere near the worst. I can only relate to my own personal journey and my own memories.

I suppose in a healthy and normal childhood we grow up thinking that our parents were too strict or didn’t let us have all the things we wanted. For myself, I grew up in the 70’s with a what seemed as a “normal” family. During my early childhood years, what I remember were good memories at grandparents, with aunts, uncles, cousins and family around the holidays. But, most all of that disappeared before the age of 8 and then my parents separated by age 11.

By the age of 9 my parents were fighting constantly. At the time, it seemed like every day when my Dad came home from work, my mom was just always pissed off at him. Yelling at him, he would get mad, they would fight and he would leave again. Eventually, he wasn’t coming home and when he did it was for a couple of days and then he was gone again.

I didn’t realize that he was going to the bars after work every day, drinking too much, meeting other women and running around on my mom. While she was working and trying to keep two kids going to school and a house together.

Eventually what was bad went to worse, they separated then a horrible custody battle began between the them for custody of us. I am not sure I understand why my dad was fighting for custody other than to hurt my mom, avoid child support payments or pride. It was most likely all three of those reasons.

Once the custody battle was over and my mom received full custody, it was just an angry time for me. During those years, nobody got divorced and it certainly wasn’t discussed outside of the home. I didn’t understand what was happening but all I knew was every time my Dad showed up, my Mom yelled and ran him off.

By age 12, I was angry at her, missed him and didn’t understand anything that was going on. My Mom and I were arguing all the time, we were both angry and hurt. So when you take in account that neither one of us knew how to manage our emotions, it wasn’t a happy home for anyone. I am not sure I remember the breaking point for her, but my memories of it all are vague at best.

All I do know is that before I even realized what was happening, my mom had packed up my clothes and sent me to live with my Dad. He was in an efficiency apartment in a bad part of Dallas, with a young girlfriend that just wanted to be my best friend.

My Mom and brother moved in with my grandparents so my Mom could work, get back on her feet financially and rebuild her life, I guess. She eventually moved out and my brother stayed with my grandparents.

In my opinion, this period of time are the examples of how my parents stopped being parents. It’s certainly not the worst part of my childhood, but it’s when my parents decided they had a choice on when to be a parent.

My Dad stopped being a husband and father when he decided the bar was more important than his family. In fact, his alcoholism impacted our lives for several years after their divorce.

My Mom stopped being a mother when my dad hurt her so badly that she seemingly decided she couldn’t cope. Or that’s what I think happened, I honestly never had a conversation with my Mom to ask. As we know, my perception was my reality.

What I do know is that we all have to live with our decisions and they both had to live with theirs. I am not sure that either one of them fully understand how these early decisions shaped the rest of our childhood or the rest of lives for that matter.

As a result of these challenges, I pray everyday that I became a better Mom because of this journey.

~Many Blessings