Dealing With Anxiety and Staying Strong

Childhood Trauma

I've never had the perfect family. I'm not even sure what the definition of a perfect family is. I'm not even sure what true happiness in a family is supposed to look like. I only know what normal is in my family, and I can say that my family is not 'normal'.

My mom and dad met in high school. They were high school sweethearts. My mom had me at the age of nineteen, and I remember my Mawmaw telling me how in the beginning we stayed at her house until my mom got her own place. Two years later my mom had my sister, and years later she had my brother.

Growing up wasn't always fun in my household. I actually thought my childhood was 'normal', but it wasn't. I say 'normal' because it's what I thought was normal, but later on in life I learned that what I've been through in my life isn't 'normal'. You'll read more about that later, promise!

My parents had a bad habit of going out a lot. By going out I mean meeting their friends and going to drink the night away. I remember my aunt babysitting me and my sister, and we always begged her to let us stay up until midnight (which she allowed).

I remember my parents always fighting. I vaguely remember what they would always fight about since I was so little. I do remember them constantly yelling at one another and sometimes I would get involved. I never understood why they always acted the way they did. At nine or ten years old how could I understand? I remember my mom took me to my dads work one day, and she locked the car doors after she was done talking to my dad. I remember seeing my dad come to the passenger side window where I was seated. He was angry, but not angry at me. He started yelling, "Ness unlock the doors. Come on Ness, unlock the doors now." And then I would hear my mom yelling in my other ear saying, "Do not unlock the doors. Do you hear me? If you unlock these doors you will be punished."

Now what was nine year old me supposed to do? I just sat there, and I cried.

That wasn't the first incident I was involved in. I was involved in plenty more. To me, I thought this was normal. I thought that the way my parents acted towards each other was normal. I thought that parents were supposed to yell at one another constantly. I thought that throwing things when you get mad was normal. I even thought that going out and getting drunk almost every night was okay. Little did I know that none of this is normal.

I became traumatized as a little girl. I started to become more to myself. I became very quiet. I didn't speak to anyone including my family. I stayed in my room and played with my toys as a kid. I put up this wall and started to pay attention of everything that happened around me.

As I became more to myself, my parents fighting would escalate every single day. My sister and I would just sit there and listen, and I started to become nervous. At just the age of ten I started to become very nervous about every little thing and about the people around me. I became scared of everyone. I thought everyone was the same. I became afraid to live. I felt trapped at home. There were days when I was happy, but then something would happen, and I became sad. I felt alone, and no one knew. I wasn't even sure why I started to become afraid as a kid. Now, I know, and I have people to blame, but I can't be mad at them. Can I?