2009-2010 holds the crown as the most self destructive chapter of my life. The amount of failures I accomplished that year was legendary. Adultery (her), Failed marriage. Failed business. My first Harley was repo’d, my SUV was repo’d. The cherry on top was the super rare 1 owner, 5 speed, all original, low mileage 1989 Fox body Mustang GT convertible with every piece of documentation since time of purchase (to include the canceled check the owner paid with) I had to sell for a stupid low amount of money.
But before I carve that charred section of my heart out and set it out for judgment, allow me to share some of my history and how my personal values and beliefs were formed. Remember, just because I’m mental, it doesn’t make me an expert in the field of mental health. These are my personal opinions based on my own life and the commonalities I’ve found with people I have grown close to over the years.
When I was 7, my parents split for good. Based on what transpired over the next 10 years, my choice to refrain from parenthood would be permanently etched into my soul.
From a young age, I had no desire to raise children of my own. The habits and mannerisms I developed and witnessed in adults around me was not the kind of knowledge I wanted to pass along to my offspring.
I never got to see my father. And for various reasons, I do not remember my mother being home that often either. I was mostly raised by my grandmother.
Between my father breaking his promises to come and get me on the weekends and my mother saying she would be back to pick me up after work or a date and rarely returning the same night, I developed a severe abandonment issue along with a low sense of self worth. I mean, why else would neither parent want me?
Every time my mother dropped me at mamaw’s house, I’d run back to the door only to watch her walk away without ever looking back. Each time I gave chase, my mamaw would say those all-to-familiar words to me. “Go play baby, you know she’s not coming back tonight.” I refused to believe her for so long… but eventually, I accepted that when mom left me, I would see her when I saw her.
My fear of abandonment made itself known when I made a spectacle on my first day of kindergarten. I wrapped myself around my mother’s leg and cried my eyes out begging her not to leave me there. Not another place to be dropped off and forgotten about.
Of course I didn’t understand what was happening. What 6-7 year old would? Had someone explained things to me when I was somewhat older, maybe things would’ve been different… maybe…
Between the abandonment and an unstable living environment (we moved like gypsies), I was neither socialized with kids my age outside of school, nor able to stay in one place long enough to develop long term friends, at least until I was several years older. Even then, I was not allowed to have friends come to my house and spend the night.
Attention? Affection? Quality time? Those were in short supply. I learned to associate gifts with love, not hugs and kisses. It didn’t make sense at the time, but that’s how I was programmed from a young age. We didn’t do family time. Didn’t play board games. I think maybe one or two family vacations I can remember, but even then it was the same version of us, just at the beach.
Materialistically, I rarely wanted for anything, even with my mother telling me we never had money. GI Joe? Had’em. He-Man? Had’em. M.A.S.K.? Had those also. For Christmas one year I actually received 2 bicycles. One for home. One for mamaw’s house.
What drove home the whole “gifts = love” was the fact I was the first born son and first born grandson. I bathed exclusively in the receiving gifts spotlight for 7 years. Then my younger brother was born… And what little physical attention I received was given to him instead. My self worth evaporated. My mamaw’s hugs and my mother’s kisses were shifted to my brother.
My younger brother was the center of attention. I hated him for it. I didn’t want to. He was my brother. I was supposed to look out for him. But I struggled a great deal. He took virtually all of the only thing I wanted from my family – physical acknowledgement that I existed.
Then it got worse. My mother’s siblings began having kids. Next thing I knew, I had cousins. This meant I slid even further down the totem pole. Neither my brother nor I knew what to do with those emotions – at least in a healthy manner. Protecting him never dawned on me. I didn’t even know what that looked like, aside from now allowing what happened to me to happen to him.
By the time I reached adulthood, my relationship model was crafted with the following guidelines.
- Love was expressed with gifts over physical affection.
- Any verbal altercations between adults meant the relationship was over.
- Always be prepared to move.
- Sex was sex. It wasn’t about love, but I wasn’t sure what it was about.
- Family, loyalty, honesty, and communication were all things that didn’t seem to be that important unless they were needed.
I became selfish, introverted, socially awkward, and developed a sense of hyper-sexuality at a very early age. What do I mean by hyper-sexual? I experienced oral sex and intimate kissing before I was 10 years old. Between 9 and 14, I was continually approached by someone I saw regularly to perform weird intimate acts (clothes on). Before reaching puberty, I was taught how to masturbate by someone who had no business teaching it to me. At either 14 or 15, I had sex for the first time. Between 16 and 17, I had what could be considered my own personal concubine whom I orchestrated my first three-way and my first gangbang with.
I believe neither a child nor adolescent truly understand the concept of right and wrong. There’s just curiosities, learning curves, and various forms of trauma. You come away with a life lesson or you come away with emotional baggage. We believe we can trust people our parents trust… until we cannot.
The further I descended into survival mode, the more skewed my views of everything became. I was selfish and self-centered. I learned to lie like a professional (future stories will demonstrate this), I learned how to manipulate people and craft words in order to get what I wanted. I was on my way to becoming a narcissist. If you know anything about NPD, you know it’s such a uniquely twisted disorder, it’s almost impossible to correct.
I never plotted dark or evil shit. I never set out to hurt or use people. I wasn’t about taking advantage of others or placing them at risk in order to get what I wanted. It wasn’t like that. I wasn’t an evil person, but I wasn’t someone with a functional moral compass. I chased shiny things with an intensity that most people found overwhelming to resist… Until it was too late for them. When the shine wore off, I moved on to the next shiny thing. Most of the time, they never saw it coming. I carried this trait until my mid 20’s.
Off The Rails 