The BS Files #11
Healing
I’ve written about the trauma that I carry from my childhood; however, I am not blind to the trauma that my children carry and have had to heal from.
A comment that I receive frequently is “You are such an amazing parent”. People have that perception because I am very close to my adult children. I may not have abused them mentally or physically, but I still fell short in many ways.
My oldest son recently mentioned that he remembers me forgetting him at school when he was around 7 years old. He was laughing about it, but it made me feel horrible. I don’t remember it, but I was also barely hanging on back then with 3 children. If he was around 7 that would mean I had a baby and a newborn. My youngest are 15 months apart. That is no excuse if I was running late or whatever the issue was. I apologized so sincerely. That is his memory. I know he has many more, it is just the one he mentioned recently.
My daughter has a few things. She was my very sensitive child. I could look at her like she was in trouble, and she’d start crying hysterically. She was the best kid. The worst problem I had with her was not cleaning her room, but let me tell you, she was disgusting. I just kept her door closed.
One weekend, I told her to clean her room. I said, “You have until the end of the weekend.” Sunday rolled around and of course; it still wasn’t done. I said, “You have until 6:00 to get it done.” Well then, 6pm rolled around and she was napping. I went in her room and lost my fucking mind. I dragged everything off her dresser and nightstand all into the middle of the floor and made a huge pile. I mean EVERYTHING, like slang it all with my arm. I think even her lamps. I said, “Now you have more to fucking clean.” I was screaming like a lunatic. That is a core memory of hers that she laughs about now, but I am ashamed.
My youngest son had a friend over and let me tell you, I did not care for this kid. I know that sounds awful because he was a kid; however, if you have kids, you couldn’t convince me that you loved all of their friends. I’d call bullshit. Well, my son walks out of his room, and I noticed a black “cross” probably ½ inch long and ½ and inch wide. He was probably 14. I say cross lightly because it looked like an X. He said ol’ Billy Bob (made up name for friend) had done a tattoo with a needle and ink pen.
This mother, who is covered in tattoos, lost her fucking mind. My baby boy’s skin was tarnished by an idiot wanting to doodle. I shit you not, I think I yelled and lectured for 12 hours straight. I went to Walmart and bought things to try to get it off, nothing worked. We were all up until 4 am. I just couldn’t let it go. The unsanitary part, the ugliness of a homemade tattoo, just all of it. I regret it so much. It was so minor.
My sons also said that they could have brought home a dead body and I would probably have been more chill about it than how I feared them getting someone pregnant. That stems from me getting pregnant at 15. I talked incessantly about condoms and birth control and being careful. I should have maybe chilled on that topic too.
I also damaged them by jumping from relationship to relationship. They will say it didn’t because I was always a constant and always put them first and showed them love but I know it did. I have many things I regret.
We all cause some type of trauma. It could be not showing affection, not giving undivided attention, irritability, never being present or more severe things like mental or physical abuse. What’s important is that we acknowledge our wrongdoings and let them know that their feelings are valid.
Even as my kids are adults, I still fuck up, but they know they can talk to me about it and I will apologize and try to do better. They know that I will do everything in my power to be a part of their lives.
Whereas, my mother, when I tried to talk to her about something pretty serious, said “OMG, you’ve done stuff too.” She dismisses everything by saying “Nobody is perfect” which makes me feel like she has zero remorse. That makes it really hard to forgive.
I think our children can learn from and forgive just about anything, if we acknowledge our wrongs, show respect for their feelings, and try to do better. We cannot change the past, but we can damn sure make a better present and future.
Talk to your kids. Allow them to tell you what hurt them. We can all heal together. By doing so, they will be better humans and better parents. Parenting is hard but so is being a kid.
Xoxo,
B