Split

I’ve been telling people my parents got divorced when I was 6. I think I was actually 7. …the concept of time wasn’t that big of an issue for me back then, I had other things to worry about all of a sudden like school work and social structures… I already had so much on my plate, it seemed like, and no one was noticing the lack of portion control.

 

I remember the moment my parents told Sister and I the news.

 

Who served who papers apparently is a big thing. I honestly don’t care. My father was willing to stick it out with that crazy person because he valued marriage above all else, including his sanity. But, I can’t honestly imagine them still together, today. My father once joked to me that it was between divorce or “swallowing a shut gun.” I don't know if he thought that sounded clever, but it hurt my soul that he’d have rather take his own life than go to therapy or dip out more graciously. But I'm unsure if that man has ever really unraveled his tangled emotions or simply chose never to feel that hurt again. Maybe we would've been why he stuck around. Unsure. He doesn't call enough. We aren't really friends like my Cousins are with their Parents. 

 

Mom apparently always threatened to serve him papers and then one day, she did. The betrayal my Dad must’ve felt… the pang in his heart. The sheer loss of giving a shit about the person handing him papers… the audacity he must’ve hidden behind. I can’t imagine that type of hurt. And then never forgiving them... You are the only one being poisoned by the vile you hold within....

 

Mom served him papers. He signed it. She signed it. I'm not sure when exactly they told us in relation to actually getting the divorce finalized. I think I was still getting used to being seven years old at the time so I may have told people I was six. Anyway… I had other priorities to worry about.

 ...

At the old Olivette house, in St. Louis, my Mom was sitting at the foot of the dining table. Sister was sitting to Mom’s right, and Dad was sitting across from me, Sister's right.

In my child logic brain, I understood that Mom and Dad were two separate humans, however… in the memory, I get them confused as to where they were sitting. Mom and Dad are interchangeable in the memory.

 

I was sit/standing on my knees, upright on my chair. The tablecloth was vinyl, thick white and banana yellow diagonal stripes spread across the oval table. The floor was a poorly-installed pink laminate tile.

One parent nods to the other and they tell us they’re getting a divorce.

A moment or two goes by and Sister starts crying. I well up with emotion but she is done over, she is sobbing. That reaction shocks me. The parent next to her is consoling her, and I'm not understanding what exactly a divorce is, and why it just elicits such a reaction from Sister… it was my first lesson to recall that you can just SAY words, and make someone cry. Up until that point in time, it had made sense to me that if one falls or gets injured, it's followed by pain and then crying and/or a bandaid. THAT made sense to me. I wasn’t aware that you could just SAY words and elicit the same reaction.

 

She wouldn’t stop crying. I looked to my mother… I don’t want to add to the drama. I don’t want to add to the stress. And so, I don’t cry; I stifled my sobs. I refuse to add to the scene. I can't even begin to explain the reasoning beyond that because I wish I had spilled over, in the moment. I wish I knew what it meant. I wish I had known the major loss and the childhood I could’ve had if I was raised by fucking mature people who were more selfless and more emotionally available. Who had the consideration of explaining the gravity of the situation, without patronizing me. It occurs to me now, that no one knew. That no one knew what was to come. Life wasn't supposed to go this way and no one had a contingency plan in place.

...

The day Mom moved out, I think Dad took us to see The Lion King in theaters. The father dies in the film. Probably not the best movie to have taken your kids to see for that reason, but here we are. lol. 

... 

I wish I had known or had the words to speak up about the emotional abuse and educated enough to speak up for myself. For our own health… me and Sister. Ages 6 and 8. 

 

I wish I was cared for the way I needed to be. That they could’ve explained what it meant. That I was the only kid in my grade, let alone my school, who was experiencing this “divorce”…. I wish I had known someone else who was struggling with the same issues. I had already felt like an outcast because of my speech, behavior, and grades. And now this.

 

I wish I had known or had been able to advocate for myself… we went two weeks, two weeks. Meaning, every two weeks, my sister and I would exchange households. That’s right. Since I was six, every 14 days, for about 10 years, I would move. I can't math about it, but I got really good at packing. I am very tired of it. By about fifth grade, we finally had separate wardrobes... so we would have clothes at either place, but exchange being other things like the clothes we wanted or needed to wear. Craft items to work on... Writing. Ya know, important stuff. 

 

Every two weeks, I would move. Mom’s house seemed to be not a lot of rules but a lot of yelling and neglect, but then we’d go out to dinner and see movies a lot after the yelling. It wouldn't been cheaper if she had learned how to apologize to us, instead.

Every Saturday morning at Dad’s, we’d have cartoons in bed, fun breakfast, usually pancakes, and then chores. Take out all the trash. Wash dishes. Clean bathroom. Ya know, housework. I always liked it because it was fun putting everything back where it belonged. Everything had its place and I liked the method in which I cleaned. ….dad was single, but later to find out that he was really sad. On Sundays, at Dad's we would attend church. That's a whole other entry that'll happen later. 

During the two weeks we weren't with him, he’d schedule his business trips at the firm. Mind you, these are the days before emails and zoom/facetimes. He’d sometimes fly to Atlanta just for lunch. …of course, I never really understood Atlanta was a real place. It always sounded like Atlantis…. And there, the lore and this city stuck together in my brain. It became my Narnia.

I remember folding laundry with Dad while watching TNG. He and my Mom fanned the flame within about scifi and fantasy… the wonder about humanity and what it means to treat others a certain way… and why. I think Atlantis was a metaphorical placeholder to speak up about the advancement m

I often wonder what they think those shows were about back then... What it was teaching my young brain of what could be, if humanity got their collective shit together.

…

With Mom, we were always at an apartment. She would say that she basically gave Dad the house; I'm really happy that she gave Dad the house. She wouldn't have been able to keep up with it, and who knows who she'd have let stay there with us... We always had cable at the apartment and there were a lot of unsupervised TV watching… I liked watching TV because it seemed to be one of the more consistent things in my life at the time. I wish I had been a bigger reader. When HP took over the world, it definitely made me a bigger reader… but I'm getting ahead of my own timeline.

…

 

Around mother’s day, at age 9, my Dad got remairred to… let’s call her G. G was fun at first, but she changed our Dad's routines. No more cartoons. No more cuddling him in the morning. We had to take notes on cleaning and we had to tape the steps on the inside of cabinets and do it exactly how it said to do them.

... 

Our mother had decorated the kitchen pink and white with light tan counter tops. The kitchen window overlooked the carport. The opposite was an alcove, where the dining table was… the house was built around the early 1970s, if I had to guess. The wall leading into the kitchen had a white panel bottom, with a chair rail, and then the wallpaper were bold swirls of painted splotches...I think they were abstract flowers. Like if the 1980s cultivated a picturesque, illustrated garden. 

 

When G moved in, she tried taking down the wallpaper and we were really upset. She never asked or said sorry or was apologetic. To her, it was her house now. But it wasn’t. It was OUR house. She just married Dad. We were there first. It was my and Sister's house. 

She didn't know how to talk to us and eventually, we were just wrong all the time. We weren't what we were supposed to be, according to some boring guy she kept reading, who was of course an expert on teenage women. lol how would that make sense? A grown MAN being an expert on teenagers, let alone teenage WOMEN. 

What she ended up putting up on that wall was incredibly ugly. It was like she had taken all of one-year-old Brother's dirty diapers and smeared them on like swirls of stucco. She's a very beige person when it came to decorating anything... interesting and worldly... funky and bohemian.... but still..................... beige. 

…

 

As children, we were taken to a therapist, Marty, who was to assess us about the divorce and how things were doing thus far… Sister really liked her. However, I didn’t connect with her. I recall hating her. I remember her telling me to draw what I felt. I remember drawing me, leaving with my Dad, shooting her in the face with a gun. Lol. Like River shooting The Silence because Rory was scared. I didn’t want to talk. She had told Dad that I would speak about it when I was ready.

I guess I'm ready… only took 30 years.

…

 

Brother was born when I was 10. He was the best gift ever given to me and Sister. However, when he got to be about 4 or 5, I would get accosted whenever I took him to the park down the street from me. See, usually old people, would start shoving money in my face, because they had the audacity to assume that I was a teen mom. And they'd get REALLY mad if I rejected their instant cash donations. It was very annoying and very confusing. 

Brother was and is one of my top most favorite people in this world, even though we don't talk that often; he has his own family now. G would always say stuff like “I would take a bullet for you girls” but I just never believed her. I understood the concept, but I never felt that way towards her. Why would she feel that way towards us but then also yell at us for things that we couldn't immediately change? Lol. I would not take a bullet for her. I'd take a bullet for Brother, no question or hesitation. But G? ….she’s on her own. Lol.

She'd also read my mail before me. Didn't people know that was illegal? G can't open my mail, she's not me! But.... I think she wanted me to get the mail for her, and instead of being patient and instilling the kindness in repetition, she manipulated me and my annoyance at someone reading something before me, that was assigned TO ME.....

 

Dad never really stuck up for us within earshot of us; he never provided us the script or the words for how to defend ourselves. It always felt like her house her rules. And we had to use her name all the time. And we had to acknowledge her the right way all the time. And we had to be thankful to her all the time. And we had to stop saying “my real Mom….” In reference to, get ready, our real Mom. "Biological Mom" sounds like my Mom isn’t in the picture; for example, I am someone's biological mom.... But my Mom was there, in our lives. We came out of her and she cared for us the best way she could at the time. She was also toxic as shit… but “biological Mom” sounds so distant. But G was the distant one; she'd get upset if Dad didn't include her in a photo collage of me, Sister, and Dad. ....you mean, G wasn't invited to all those events? Yes....  What had happened, though was she didn't participate because we WERE HERE FIRST. I don't know why that was ever an issue. We are not TimeLords, G. We were in fact, here in this family, before you. To her, we were just averages in a book. We were not what we were supposed to be acting like! 

G would pent up her grievances with how we were supposed to be acting at our “average age” but never really listened to us as far as what was wrong. I don't know if she ever really loved us the way she loved Brother. I understood why, because we didn’t come out of her. She couldn’t rule our lives or have complete control over what we did or thought. We would be yelled at, at Mom’s and then yelled at by G at Dad's... Dad would cower on the sidelines, being the comfort for us after The Match... makes me wonder what his life was like as a child, with two older sisters.... I wish he would've stuck up for us more in front of G. I wish he had a spine. I wish he had said stuff like "Don't talk to My Girls like that." ....but maybe he never did.

It got worse over the years, the older we got. Brother witnessed a lot of fights between me and Sister and that was probably super unhealthy. Sorry, Broseph.

 

We were really trying to deal with the collapse of our family, ever since we were 6 and 8... There was zero recovery time because we were always MOVING... me and Sister had each other, but we didn't really, especially after I chose Mom's house around age 16. Sister had gone off to college, and I rather enjoyed being the only offspring for Mom for a time. We had an "easier" relationship than her and Sister. We barely fought, but we barely really knew each other. Mom was a big introvert; she had no network of other adults. 

Sister enjoyed college, I guess. She had her own experiences... without me, and that's ok. But I kept in touch as best I could. We would complain about Mom to each other... and she'd tell stories about how she'd be worried about her and her roommates at the time were like... "but YOU'RE the child. She's supposed to worry about YOU." .............it was kinda eye-opening with how others would view their own parents, and what it was SUPPOSED to be like.... like a rude awakening of what Life was supposed to be if we had at least ONE emotionally intelligent parent between THREE. ...... generational trauma within a split family... What fun! /s

I don't know where Sister lost her mind along the way, but I hope she finds it one day. I don't think she's safe, she's in denial that there's even an issue.

I have a pin on my jacket that says "end mental health stigma" and she snears at it ever since... 

She thinks she can just ignore our past pains and continue onward like nothing is wrong. But it's all wrong. We should've had loving parents who treated us with love and respect and dignity. I never had two loving parents at the same time, at least I don't really remember. I wasn't aware I was supposed to hang onto those memories. I wish I could. We never had a stable household, ever. But we were supposed to act like we did... 

And nowadays, they all act like we did... Which isn't true! Dad had the audacity to speak ill of his unruly 7th grade students, having single parent homes being the root of their behavioral issues. Uhm, excuse me. Dad? You made me live in a single parent household. Are you referring to my many difficulties as a student? Bc it sure sounds like you look down your nose at these people... Would you rather them with toxic spouses or dead? ....it still boggles my mind that he forgets his daughters were raised in a single parent household that he had direct contributions towards... Funny. 

Mom told us of all his assets and his finances. The money stayed stagnant as inflation rose with rent and gas and food. Mom did her best... But dad protected his money for his perfect family, G & Brother.

...

It always really bothered me when G would say "family portrait" but it only had Dad, her, and Brother. That she would say "the whole family is here" but that wasn't true... Sister was missing. Her family was separate from Ours. We were not her family. We were her husband's first Mistakes. She never said that to our faces, but it had always felt like that. 

No one was really asking us the right questions. Everyone would ask how are you doing but it never felt like anyone really wanted to know.

G once told us (age 12/13. Coddington Place apartment parking lot) that if Mom just saved up her child-support checks, that she could be better off. I’m not saying the number, but the rising rents back then were hard enough. We always had cable because Mom would flirt with the handyman or the cable man. She would date someone that had the resources to treat us to a dinner out sometimes or a movie. Win the kids over, ya know? Looking back, I'm sure she liked the people she was dating, but I get it now. I'd sacrifice a lot for the well-being of my kids, despite my discomfort, even though that's incredibly harmful for everyone involved. Again, another entry all together. 

G was never a single mother. How tf would she know how to save money with two kids on her own without a stable job? Her lack of compassion towards my mother always rubbed me the wrong way... but, of course, not until I would learn much later, that conservatives HATE single moms. They produce unruly children.... interesting how Dad would say that nonsense to me and then accuse me of being too sensitive. People love to forget trauma instead of working through it.

 ...

Mom became a coder, and a damn fine one at that. She's kinda given up on people as far as an Office goes, but that mentality was far before Quarantine 2020…. There's part of me that wishes she lived down the street now, in Atlanta. But there’s part of me that’s glad she doesn’t …. She was and is problematic. She would confide in us, emotionally, her young daughters. She would seek us for friendship and see us as equals, yelling at us when we didn't do things the way we were supposed to... 

We were children. Parentfication... I GOT BOTH!!! oh joy. /s

Parentification:

Usually an older sibling put in charge of younger ones. I remember going to a babysitting class when I was 10. Have you met a ten year old? Would you entrust a baby with a ten year old? ...the 90s were a wild time.

The other type of parentification is when an adult parent confides in their offspring as an equal peer and partner. I learned emeshment equates to love... 

Home life, no matter which house, had a lot of conditions, instead of unconditional love and guidance on how to survive this world. I was raised with the notion of becoming someone's wife and someone's mom... But I didn't think I'd accomplish other ambitions. Those two roles were expected to be followed. 

...

At Mom's, we would all watch tv together. Television shows like Xfiles and Xena… Buffy and Angel…. We would laugh and cry and discuss what we watched. But she's not someone I turn to for actual advice anymore, nor friendship. Her notions of what makes a good roommate or the power dynamic in relationships, she gives out such outdated advice... but she has yet to live with someone else in the last 2 decades, besides me, (and sister) or been in a relationship...as far as I know, anyway. I wish her the best, but I am not her parent. I never was.

 .

The movies we saw were pretty intense, too. In fifth grade, I remember seeing American Beauty. The concepts in that movie were NOT for 12 year olds… but if Dad said it wasn’t a good idea, guess what Mom said we could do? Yep. Which was the basic reason we would watch South Park. lol. Or listen to Green Day ("She" is my go-to karaoke song). 

...

Right around the free cable, unsupervised tv watching era... I started watching a lot pr0n.... meaning, Real Seggs on HBO, skinamax, late night shows. I didn't really know what I was watching, but gosh was it fascinating! I did like their storylines! I wish I didn't have that running in the background of my brain. I mean, eventually I understood what the acts were and what it meant to share with someone those acts, personally... Intimatly. But it has provided a multitude of fun when it comes to Fanfiction of established franchises, so there's that. To those who took the time to write every plot I inhaled as a child, thanks. It would be incredibly interesting to me if any of the Creators of 90s cable pr0n dribble made a name for themselves elsewhere... lol

… 

G hasn’t maintained or called me in like two years. One of the last conversations I remember having with her was trying to explain Crickets' anger to her. That how he operates is fueled by anger.

One of Crickets' managers once told me off hand, “that man gets upset at the littlest things.” And it’s true. He does. He complains constantly about his plights. He always felt like I’d comment and ask him to not be angry all the time, like I was telling him he couldn’t express it… but what I wanted was for him to self regulate. For awhile, I tried to ask him what were three to five things you’re grateful for. In the beginning, he almost never mentioned me…. Which hurt my feelings. And then he made sure to mention it but added that I should’ve been a given (he always had a hard time making me feel loved, and seen... I think this issue was mutual).

Considering he never let me know otherwise, it was nice to hear him say it aloud… but the last time I tried playing it with him, he threw it back in my face… and I never asked him what he was grateful for again. Obviously it wasn’t important to him to build upon why. I was just wrong. How dare I try to dispel his negativity… I was just trying to help. Finding what I'm grateful everyday changed my attitude toward life and how to process emotions... How to remember the trauma willingly and come to the conclusion that I was a child... It wasn't my fault for all the crazy immature adults. 

 

But he never wanted the same for himself, I guess.

 

…

 

Anyway… I don’t really confide or converse with my parents. I wish we could establish a friendship.... but I'm unsure how. My Dad and G are ultra catholic conservatives who schmooze to stay popular and have dinner parties like nothing’s wrong in the world. Just a couple of old white people living in the mountains.

 

And Mom is anonymously reading and writing comments on X and other places… she thinks she’s doing something… but she's just being an internet troll. You can get really into politics and be a dork about it… but if you don’t participate in the community beyond voting, what’s the point? She doesn’t have a network of friends, but she's also 1000 miles away. I wish we could be friends. I wish I could call on my family members for sanity-support. But I feel like I'm the only one treading these waters, and my legs are getting tired.

 

The downside of cherishing my sanity is that I start to see the cracks and fissures in another’s sense of reality. Am I apart of the dinner party lifestyle? Am I going to succeed in the next part of this thing called life? Am I going to go back to school and find out more stuff about myself? Am I going to make more friends, and get back in contact with older ones? Am I going to learn ASL or write a book? Take a yoga class? Get my massage license back and swing back into that lifestyle? Lord knows this city needs more good bodyworkers. I can't imagine doing what I’m doing (however closer by location, and thus a better commute) will be that sustainable for another year or so. But it's super cool! SUPER niche....

 

... 

What do you do to maintain your sanity? What do you put up with to maintain your child’s sense of reality? Would you be able to split your child’s life in half because you think they need both parents equally? If you were my father or mother back then, would you have agreed on moving us every 14 days, or would you have advocated to take us full time, let the other parent figure their shit out on their own? I know we were loved… but were we fought for? Really fought for, for us... not just what you were supposed to do? Would I have gotten the help I really needed if I had gone to a special school? Would I have been abused and taken advantage of more? I definitely wouldn't be the person I am today... AND THAT is the thought that keeps me content and sane; I wouldn't be the person I am today, writing this, if it wasn't for all the bullshit I just endured. 

 

 

Snow.