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Growing up, I had dreams of becoming everything from a rock star to a professional skater. I drifted for a time after getting out of high school and decided that I wanted to go to college. I would be the only person in my family to go and still am.
I also made a promise to myself that I would never be the man that my father was …. an abusive alcoholic. I lied about my age to get my first job. Growing up in Texas, you can work at 14, thanks to the oil industry where at least one parent is gone on the Gulf’s oil rigs. I was 13. I worked for an elderly Jewish couple that owned a cheese steak sandwich franchise. They loved me. I called every day and asked to work.
A neighbor, who had his driver’s license early on, would drive me to the local mall where I would make cheesesteaks to order. All through high school, I would continue to work at that same mall, eventually making it to my dream job; the record store. This made me the coolest guy in school.
But what I didn’t know what I was doing was escaping my life at home. I didn’t want to be there because I never knew which dad would come home. It could be the somewhat happy dad who would have a couple of beers and then go to bed. It could be the drunk, pissed-off dad who would come home, raise hell about something and then the slapping would start on my mom or me or both.
After I would get off of work at night, I’d get home after 9:30 p.m. or so. Most of the time he would be passed out on the couch or in bed and my mom would be picking up the pieces of his temper tantrum of the evening. One incident stands out when I was younger.
My father came home and was angry about two things; 1) Dinner was cold and 2) the Christmas tree was fake. He proceeded to tear up the tree, stomp on the presents and kick the whole thing out of the back door. It was Christmas Eve and I was in the eighth grade.
My mother started heating up dinner for him to appease him and he came up behind her and slapped her across the back of the head. She grabbed a skillet that was on the oven top, spun and caught him in the head with it. He dropped like a stone. My mother calmly said, “Go to your room.”
I remember crying myself to sleep that night, promising myself that I would never be that man. I would never be that sort of father to my kids. I woke up the next morning to the tree set back up and presents back under the tree. My mother had worked all night to once again, clean up his mess.
My parents woke up eventually after I was playing with the presents that were left unwrapped. My father’s face was slightly swollen and we all acted like nothing had happened for a few days and eventually it receded to just another incident in a long line of incidents from his issues and alcoholism.
As I grew older, got married and my twins were born, I was still convinced I wasn’t that man. I made my way through college somehow and my first wife (who had also been my high school sweetheart) and I divorced. Why? I cheated on her. I wasn’t happy. Our ambitions had changed while I was in college. I wanted more out of life. I met someone one night while out with college friends.
She made a comment that caused me to immediately fall in love with her. We went out for a while and I told her about my marriage and kids. She asked me to make a decision. I did. I love my kids with all my heart, but I just wasn’t in love with my wife any further. I felt like we were friends more than anything.
I moved in with the person that would become my second wife and second divorce. We were in love and after the honeymoon was over, so to speak, my troubles started to rear their ugly head. I took everything for granted. My temper would explode at the simplest things. I couldn’t keep a job for longer than a year or less sometimes. I ran up extraordinary debt. We had a son that would be exposed to our fights.
My second wife had enough. She also grew up with an alcoholic parent. She saw the behavior that is destructive and she sure as hell didn’t want it in someone who was supposed to be her partner. We divorced and I started therapy. I was on a good path and was living a few hours away, coming back to spend time with the kids. She asked me to get back together. We did.
Moving back in, I started the same destructive behavior. She recommended that I go back to therapy. I ignored it and continued on. I kept telling myself, I’m not that person. I’m not my father. This went on for almost 12 years or so …. and like before she had had enough. She threw me out of the house. I immediately went back to therapy.
I’m living with a friend of a friend. I’m working on myself. I discovered that I am an Adult Child of an Alcoholic (ACA). We come with our set of troubles. During one of my sessions, my therapist asked me if during my life, I’ve been putting up a façade. I’ve been working on the person that I thought I was and not actually working on my true self, the ACA. It struck me how true that was. That I’ve been wearing this mask all along and I’m working on the wrong person.
This journey is new to me. It’s hard to accept that I have been living a lie to not only myself, but to my family. That it has cost me my job. That it has my true self. It hurts. But I have accepted it and as the promise I made to myself years ago, not to be my father. I have moved that promise from the mask that I used to wear to my true self.
I still love my ex. I’m in love with her. She’s still just as beautiful as the day I first saw her. We’re cordial with each other and I miss her. I miss my kids. I miss hearing their laughter and them telling me about their days. I’m attending ACA meetings that are like AA meetings. Full of people just like me. People who have lied to themselves and to loved ones.
Am I the man I hoped to be? No. Harsh reality. But I’m still on the right side of the dirt and I’m working on me. This journey has just begun, but it’s full of sunshine and puppy dogs. I’ve hit rock bottom. But I’m on the way up, one day at a time, one step at a time.
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Photo: Getty Images