He married my mom after the war – and I came along less than 9 months later. He couldn’t stand to hear me cry and shoveled abuse upon my mom until I was 4 months old…then he started in on me too. When I cried I got hit, spanked, and yelled at until finally, he would leave. By the time I was one, I could spell my name and count 10 pennies; because if I didn’t get it right, I’d get slapped. He was determined to make me “tough” – and “smart” – “even if it kills him”. The first thoughts I can recall from my childhood was that I wanted to die. Infractions or weakness were beaten out me then until I was 12, but I’d learned at 9 they were shorter if I didn’t cry, so I stopped. My mom left him when I was 12 too, however the consequences didn’t leave, they were a part of me.

I was 18 the first time I attempted suicide, and attempted many more times in the next 13 years, until I quit drinking myself and started to make amends. I had become him. In therapy, I learned that I acted out the survivor’s suicidal rage he had manifest as violence directed outward in his denial, yet he finally attained the unconscious, denied goal of self destruction when his liver stopped working. He never allowed himself to know his demons.

I still struggle with depression at 55, and relationships are a challenge for me as I sometimes slip back into my old mindset when I’m under stress. I’m convinced I developed fibromyalgia from a lifetime of muscle tension that attacked the nerves in my myofacia, and I am further disabled from losing my right arm in my last attempt in 2004.

I’m encouraged to have found this website, and see an organized effort to help all of the wounded souls cut by wars and social misunderstanding of the consequences. Perhaps humanity will finally decide the cost of war is too great to bear any longer, and those of us with the unseen disease will stop passing on the sins of our fathers.

My trauma was that my mother was arrested while we were shopping; we were taken to a police station where I was taken from her; and I never saw her again. She was an alcoholic, and no doubt I witnessed many terrible altercations between her and my father before he moved out a few months before she was arrested. He never explained to me what happened to her, refused to even speak her name. Grief was banned from my home, and with that emotion, went all the others. But we were “strong,” we “kept the flag flying.” The one time he spoke of my mother was to tell me she had been “weak.”

Somehow I managed to look fine, to convince myself I came out of those years unscathed. I did well academically, and that became my anchor. Terror that I would lose my father created within me an amazing ability to suppress my pain. Until I went to law school- again, to please my father- and nightmares began, fear opened up like a bottomless pit. I became afraid to leave home and sought refuge in a relationship where I was more a a child than an equal partner.

I once went to my father’s medical office to beg him to tell me what had happened to my mother. He said maybe someday he would be able to, but he died before that someday arrived. The day he died my terror opened up, and though I managed to keep skirting around its edge, the effort was sucking me dry. And even therapy and antidepressants did not manage to break through my depression.

Then I found the photographs and learned my father had been among the liberators of a Nazi death camp, that after treating its survivors for two weeks, he had suffered a mental breakdown. I spent three years finding and speaking with other WWII vets who witnessed the camps. They ALL still are suffering from the trauma. The pieces of my family’s mystery began to fall into place. Now I knew what my father had not been able to face and what the cost was of his terror. His terror became mine, though I could not see, hear, smell or taste it. I had absorbed it into my blood and soul.

My heart has opened to my long denied grief, but the healing is slow and long. And I worry what I have transmitted to my children in the years before I became aware of what I was carrying. But we talk now, we speak our truths. I hope I have and continue to provide them the tools for creating health.

I pray my father’s soul came to know peace. I grieve that I never knew him when his soul was whole.

Just a thought.

From what I can gather my parents were rarely separated during the war , except of course during his basic training experience at Ft. Polk, which he referred to politely as the armpit of the world. They were subsequently stationed at Ft. Bliss in El Paso. My mother boarded the train back to Ga. when she was 6 months pregnant with me, as they did not consider  the medical care at the base adequate.

My father never “went overseas”, as deployment was referred to then. He fell down a flight of stairs on base, which resulted in a ruptured lumbar disc that plagued him for the rest of his life. . My mother and I returned to El Paso and remained there with my father until the end of the war. My father’s younger brother, who had been stationed in Seattle with his wife, drove down to Texas and all 5 of us came back to Georgia.

The only stories I ever heard were the funny things, the close relationships formed, and a sense of adventure. There was never any mention of any anxiety around living in a country  impacted by war. My parents came home, bought a house, my father entered professional life and everything was just fine.

One of my uncles was a Seabee and served in the Pacific, but I have no idea if his experiences resulted in the alcoholism that  framed the life of my cousins. I was 16 when he died, and it was only then that I learned he was alcoholic. A family secret. I would like to explore this with my cousin, but…a difficult conversation, to say the least. Silence.

Another uncle was a Navy pilot during WWII, and a younger one a pilot in Korea during that “conflict”. I remember how the family worried about him while he was there, and my sense as a young child about how horrible war is. I am not sure what the effects of war were on these two uncles.

I am just now beginning to look into family history through the lens of the influences of war. I know that there was an ancestor who fought in the Reveloutionary War, others who fought in the War Between the States. Details are sparse, just factual. I have no idea who these people were or how their lives have influenced mine.

This is a beginning exploration, just an inquiry. I hope to engage other members of the family in this inquiry so that we can enrich our lives with deeper understanding of those who came before us.

Please join Veterans Heart Georgia, and others everywhere in telling your stories of growing up in a family during a war or in a family in which a member was a war veteran. Narrative, or story-telling, is age-old and has been known to provide and nurture healing down through the ages.

We are inviting people over age 18* to use this blog to write and share–perhaps for the first time ever– the stories of the effects of war in their families. We see this process as opening awareness and overcoming isolation, and giving voice to long-held silence. Our intention is that this sort of exploration will lead to understanding, reconciliation, forgiveness and healing, even though in many cases the original pain occurred generations ago.

Family can include parents, children, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. You may even remember the collective experiences of close friends and members of your community. Veterans, you are encouraged to write about your experiences within your family of origin, the family you left to join the military, and the family you came home to.

The experience of war and the effects of war encompass not only those who served in combat, but being anywhere with the military during wartime, or being excluded from serving. The experience of war includes civilians living in countries where war is fought, as well as civilians waiting for service members to return from war. The experience of war is about goodbyes, homecomings, loss and grief, terror and horror, and continues after the war has ended as well.

We expect that you will respond to the postings of others with respect and kindness. At times you may notice the impulse to give advice or try to help, or “fix” something for other bloggers. Try not to act on this–we are simply Speaking (writing) and Listening Deeply to each others experience.

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I didn’t understand why we weren’t with my dad. I missed him. I was maybe 7 when he came home. He had a new wife. It wasn’t long and I had a half brother. I remember spending some time with my dad. He taught me to ride a skateboard, took me fishing, and took me for rides in some really fast cars. He got me into Cub Scouts and was my Scout Master. I saw the monster now and again, but was glad to have my hero again.

He was divorced again when I was 9. I remember being really sad the day he moved to Florida, I didn’t want him to move. My grandparents took my sister and I down to him, and we would spend weeks with him. By the time I was a teenager, I’d spend the whole summer with him. I remember one time he showed me some pictures when he was in Vietnam. I enjoyed seeing all his buddies, then his mood changed and he seemed sad, and quickly he put away all his pictures. Never again did he share his memories.

I went into the Navy just after high school; my dad said he’d shoot me if I joined anything else. His dad served on the USS Waters during WWII, and never shared his stories. I was the oldest son and grandson. I wanted to make them proud. My dad was a Seabee, I wanted so bad to be one, but the timing wasn’t right. Not until 7 years later, when I was finally a Seabee. I remember the day my dad gave me the duffel bag he had in Vietnam, it has a Seabee painted on it. He didn’t say he was proud of me, but I knew he was.

In 1997 I left active duty. My wife was pregnant with our first child, and I didn’t want my family to experience long deployments. I was raised by a single parent, and didn’t want my kids to have to experience that, even if it was 7 months at a time. The Naval reserve recruiter was giving me the run around, for like 3 months, so I joined the Georgia Army National Guard.

It wasn’t until I returned home, in May of 2004 from a year in Iraq, did I see why my dad was a monster. I had one growing in me too. I struggled with rage and depression for almost 7 months. I had become distant from my wife and family. The day that I snapped, and saw the pain I was causing my family, I realized I was becoming my dad, and knew that I needed help. The next day I was at the VA, trying to get help. Those were some dark days. I didn’t like how the VA was treating me, so I quit. I tried a couple of sessions with another counselor, but didn’t like what he had to say. I tried to just stuff it and keep this monster from coming out. I tried convincing myself that I was okay. I was faking big time. I didn’t work. I was watching the Bob Woodruff special, when they showed an IED exploding a Humvee. I completely freaked out, was crying, fast breathing and heart rate, and was shaking so bad. The next day I called another counselor. After a couple of months with her, she gave me a flyer of a study the Emory University was doing.  I was in the first MBSR study,  and this completely changed me.

My dad has had to deal with his monster. The VA has classified him as 100% disabled. I think my dealing PTSD, has been a bridge and helped my relationship with my dad.