by Cindy (Pennsylvania)
I was born in 1967. My parents were on the cutting edge of society then. My mother had become a career woman in 1961, when my brother was an infant.
There were no daycares, only grandmas. Even after I was born, my mother wanted little to do with marriage and family. My father didn’t seem to
mind much until his career took him to another state and my mother never adjusted. She returned home and they separated. I was 3. After a short
period, I suffered an illness and my father returned home. They remained amicable for my sake. But by the time I was 6, they barely spoke. Each
had their own life and their own indiscretions. By the time I was 9, my parents were divorced. I was the only kid in class with divorced parents.
I was very sad and very confused. They kept a lot of secrets from me, hoping, I think, to make it easier for me to adjust.
Initially the custody situation involved my brother living with my father full time and me with my mother. Our family was split right in two pieces.
But after a series of my mother’s instability, my mother agreed to give me to my father. Along with that, my mother also agreed in the divorce
settlement to sell a large amount of family property for some jewelry. It was an inheritance from her father, but she sold it to my father thinking
that my brother and I would still benefit. How ever wrong she was.
My father immediately remarried after the required 6 months. His new wife had come from an abusive relationship and also had a disabled child. I grew
to love my step-sister, and honestly I am grateful for that experience. It gave me a tenderness for children with special needs that I still carry
today. After my step-sister’s death, my father and step-mother had a daughter together. I was 13. My world changed after that. Naturally, my father
needed to focus on his new family. I can’t fault him for that, after all he had a wife and child. Only my step-mother never sustained a meaningful
relationship with me. After my father’s death, we spoke only a few times. I tried to rekindle our relationship about 10 years ago, but she had
a new husband and new “children” and “grandchildren.” Ultimately, neither I nor my own children meant very much and it died before it started.
After being abandoned by my mother, I spent my youth basically without a mother. I had no contact with her from age 11 until I was 21. I knew nothing
about her, other than rumors or messages from her sister. I was left without a mother and with a huge void.
Basically, I grew up in a home where I was not really a part of a family and ripped apart from the family I had been given. In high school I told people
I was adopted rather than explain that my parents were divorced. I did the best I could, but made no real connections with family or friends. I
was angry all the time and felt cheated. My parents had moved on with their lives and my brother and I had to do the best we could.
My brother and I are statistics. We graduated highschool, but couldn’t make it through college. Drugs and alcohol got the best of us. He spent a few
years in prison. We have a grown half-sister who my brother is interested in and with whom I try desperately to have a relationship. It isn’t easy,
but we try.
Today, my father is gone. I am left to take care of an aging, disabled mother who abandoned me and about whom I care nothing. For 10 years, I have
been caring for her. That’s longer than she cared for me.
The pain and anger still lie under the surface. I often wonder how different my life would have been if my parents had toughed it out and stayed together.
My mother’s property that was left to her by her father was left to my step-mother in my father’s will. She shares it with her new husband. My
brother and I hardly speak. I can’t even look at my mother with love and admiration.
Luckily, this is not a fate I wanted to pass on to my own children. Even though we have had some rough times, my husband and I have been married 22
years. We have 7 children who have both their mother and father together at home.
If I could tell people who are thinking of divorcing anything, I would say please, for your children, work it out. Whatever problems you have, you
can solve them. Really, you can! Put your children first. When you got married, you committed to raising a family together. So do it!
Trust me, the parents might be able to put the life with their spouse behind them, but the children suffer forever, even after the parents are long
gone.
