There are aspects to my genetic inheritance that I would be glad to pass down to my daughters. A decent set of cheekbones. Perfectly straight teeth. A good sense of physical balance. Leg hair that grows in all different directions making shaving a fun, daily challenge.
But then there’s all the gifts I was given that I wouldn’t wish on anyone. Anxiety that at times can smother rational thought. Depression that can be incapacitating. Absolutely zero fucking sense of direction.
I don’t actually know what parts of my how my brain chemistry malfunctions have to do with childhood damage and what parts have to with ancestral gifting, I just know that the things that are wrong with me, I do not want to be wrong with them. Yet there’s a pretty good chance I don’t get to control that.
I don’t control who might get which instability – which is probably good because when I give them things, I’ve been conditioned to make sure to give them the exact same one so they don’t fight over it . If it were up to me, of course, I would make them have healthy, normal brains and the ability to find their way home from a place they’ve been a hundred times before without using google maps.
So I control what I know I can, in the only way that I can. I give them what I needed to have growing up, but did not. I give them the stability that comes from a loving, supportive family and parents that put their children’s well being as a priority.
The house we live in might change more often than we’d like, but what happens in our home remains the same wherever we are. They know that here they are loved and they are respected no matter how weird they get.
And they do get so, so weird.
I make sure they know they can always talk to me about anything, that I am there for them and that I am on their side, even if they can’t always see that. I try to instill a sense of humor and a love of stories. I try to encourage them to find doorways to their imaginations wherever they can because all of these things will help them later on in life. I hope.
I hope that when they are wading through dark times some of this groundwork I’ve laid down for them will kick in and that they will at least be able to have the base of a stable childhood full of love and weirdness to stand on when life keeps trying to knock them down.
Or at the very least, I hope they’ll have access to all of the decent and affordable mental healthcare they’ll need…
–(draft from 2019)
****
That was crushing to read.
I wrote it about a year and half ago and it’s been sitting in my draft folder waiting for me to come up with a bigger point for it. Unfortunately that point turned out to be something I never anticipated.
When I wrote it, their father was still sleeping under the same roof as us. He was here in the mornings. He was here for the math homework I could never figure out. We had dinner as a family. Family outings were planned around his schedule. We moved birthdays around so he could be here for them and he was here for every Christmas. He was here for bedtimes. He was here for late night sicknesses and nightmares. He was here.
He was here.
He was here.
Now we are still feeling the tearing of his sudden absence. Even when he was working so, so much, we could sense him wrapped around us; a stabilizing force. Our family was whole.
Now there is a hole. It is shaped like a husband. Like a father.
Now for the girls there is twice a week therapy.
Now there are twice a week visits with their new part-time dad.
There are no more coffee scented mornings with Lily making him imaginary breakfasts. No more math with Violet. Birthdays are broken in half. He is not here for bedtimes or late night sicknesses. The nightmares are more sad and more frequent and he isn’t here to hear about them. We eat on trays instead of the table where we had those family dinners and instead of family outings, on his day off he takes them away… and I am left here alone.
I wanted to raise my daughters to be strong. I wanted them to have a strong foundation for when they had to deal with the breaking things in the world. I did not prepare them for the breaking apart of their home. Now I feel like a part-time mother because I am forced to spend so much time trying to navigate my own trauma and grief over what has been done.
I thought he and I had the same values on family, loyalty, and love. I was wrong. And now we all paying for how wrong I was. I wanted to give them better. They deserved so much better than what he did. I deserved better too.
When I break, it’s in pieces I silently rage because now I have to worry about what gifts he has bestowed on them through his selfishness. By abruptly quitting this family and stealing away their trust and safety in him. By making their world darker when it comes to things that used to comfort. By being their disappointment, deep and shaping,
What does damage like this gift to a child?
