Dear Life,
I am the youngest of five kids, whose parents have been married 50 years. ’50 years’, people exclaim…and say what a wonderful blessing and example of love. Well, sort of.
My dad started beating up my mom before they were even married, in the mid 60’s. That lasted about until the mid 80’s, when my brother died in an accident. My mom was finally saying she was going to leave my dad, right before my brother died. My dad had been unfaithful (another secret I didn’t know until my twenties, and at that, I learned from a sibling – it was, and never has been talked about). When my brother died, things changed for a while. No more alcohol (both parents are alcoholics), and my dad went to therapy for his abusive behavior towards my mom. The physical violence stopped, but the emotional abuse continues to this day. They control each other and are so co-dependent that they don’t like anyone else. No one. Continue Reading…