Letter to my parents

Letter to my parents
Hauser

Hauser

Registrant
Preface: I'm only posting this to ask you guys if I'm being too harsh to them ok? Ok here it is.

Q % A % Clarifications

In 1978, I think that Mom had just left, why I dont know. Its my understanding that she wasnt happy anymore. That summer I was on my own as far as defending myself from a potential perpetrator.

You guys let me, knowingly or not, hang out with a man that was in his late 20s, he was a friend of Ricks that he met over the cb radio. Mom, if you were around maybe this wouldnt have happened. You might have asked Alan, where are you off to? Oh, Im going over to a friend of Ricks, hes all grown up and hes really cool. Perhaps you mother instincts could have compelled you to reply to that hypothetical conversation by saying No, I dont think so, not unless Rick or I or your Dad go with you? Jesus Christ, Dad was willing to pay all the bills and all you had to do was be a Mom. How fucking hard could that have been?

You guys never told me what to do if someone started touching me. You guys never asked me What if questions. Questions like What if your babysitter asked you to take a bath with him/her? etc. This shit is taught in kindergarten now, I would like to know why you so easily overlooked this, since youre both bright and college educated people. Not only did you not have these talks with me, you didnt have them with Luke either apparently, because I decided to disclose to him because I didnt know who to talk to or how you guys would react. You didnt even tell me what to do if something like this did, in fact, happen! So I told Luke and Dave Brown, when I was 9 and Luke was 11, and they made fun of me!!!!! Not only that, Rick didnt know how to handle it either, I know that because Luke wasnt done making fun of me one day, and set up Rick to listen in on a conversation that Luke started with me. Luke jokingly started asking me for details of what he was doing to me sometimes and Rick overheard me say Luke, you know I dont like talking about this. Rick knew what was going on but he didnt know what to do either, so he did nothing! He didnt know because you didnt fucking tell him what to do either if sexual abuse of one of us ever occurred. You didnt tell any of us did you?

Mom stopped making dinner at the table, obviously, after she left. If dinner at the usual time was still going on that summer, you might have seen a change in me right away. Instead, I was trapped in embarrassment and silence while we ate frozen TV dinners on our own time. Obviously, starting at the age of 12, problems started to arise later, due to things that I care not to mention right now, but all of this could have been prevented, all of it. Problems that I couldnt talk about with Dad, because to do so would have forced me to bring up the painful past, manifested themselves in the most terrible ways you could possibly imagine, its so bad that I cant even fucking talk about it still. I was trapped!!!!

If you guys wouldve given me the tools and knowledge to defend myself, red flags would have gone up IMMEDIATELY when he was probing me to see if I would object or say no etc. When he noticed that I had NO defenses, he moved in for the kill! He wasnt my only abuser either, if you want names Ill give them to you. Having been victimized once made it easy for me to be perped by someone else.

Mom I want to know why you left, I want to know why it was so damned important for you to leave. Do you happen to know the percentage of SA victims that live in broken homes? Guess what? Its very high.

My current status:

Im discouraged and disgusted with EVERYTHING! I have to open up old emotional wounds now in order to START to heal. I was gonna check out a karate class but now I just dont feel like seeing anybody. Its hard for me to even attempt to improve myself. Everything has led to failure so far. I have no faith in anything I try now. Im now geographically isolated away from a community college, not that I think that I could attend and finish a single college course anyway. My mind is polluted with the worst thoughts about people and the world. I told Dad earlier that Im trying to be optimistic about the future but I dont see any reason to.

The only reason I have to feel good about myself lately is that someone in my online support group said that I was one of 2 people that kept him from killing himself. Great. Maybe if he becomes a future President then this will all have been worth it.
 
yup I got it now hauser. Sounds like you do have to get this off your chest. You're right it's tough, This is a good rough draft though. I hope you recieve the love your folks have for you! D.
 
Hauser,

That's a powerful letter and I hope you get the reaction and response that you need. Either way, we are here for you bro.

You said something that I want to comment on briefly:

Its hard for me to even attempt to improve myself. Everything has led to failure so far. I have no faith in anything I try now.
Click to expand...
Hauser, all these self-images are so typical of survivors, especially when they are just starting to face things. For so long we are silent and we don't even admit the way we feel about ourselves. When we commit to recovery, wham, there it is all in our face.

I would like to urge you to consider how much of this boils down to feelings you have been carrying around since childhood. They are YOUR feelings, so don't reject them; learn to face them and treat them as flagging areas you need to work on. But don't accept them as reality. Don't let them make you think you are a hopeless case and doomed to failure no matter what you do. That just isn't true, and in time you will see that.

Stick with us, and we will all discover this together.

Much love,
Larry
 
Wow, what a "rough row to hoe."
I hope the response(s) help with the healing that, even if you can't see it clearly, has obviously begun.
Hauser, you're getting stronger and more self aware every day and you'll come out of all this eventually with plenty of reason to be proud and secure.
Until then, "keep coming back" to these boards and all your brothers here who wish you well.
Love, etc.,
 
Well then, hopefully they're strong enough to say sorry and hug you. I hope they are. I seem to have to candy coat everything with my mom or she'll get all hurt and defensive. She still is more aware of the pain that my molestation caused HER, than me. That's just where she's at though. Remember to breath Al. Love Dan
 
breathe
 
Hauser,
I just read your letter over and over.......for someone who feels so lost, you sound very unlost...and totally in touch with what is going on with yourself....you are so brave, you inspire me....i have lived as an afraid person for as long as i can remember....for so many years in therapy i have learned how to hobble my way through life so far.....but...still so fucked up and afraid.....i don't think i will ever have the fortitude you have shown with this letter to your parents......thank you for being you....and here...love....Steve
 
I thought I might share the replies from my parents, the first from my Dad, the 2ond from my Mom, ok here goes:

Alan, you are correct in what you said, that we didn't give you the information you needed to defend yourself. Was it deliberate? No.. Neglectful? Yes. Could we have done better.. Yes. Should we have asked where you were going and who you were with? Of course, and I really thought I mostly knew. Now it proves, I had no idea.

As I learned about homosexuality from a friend after some older man approached him, I have known about the problem since I was about 12. It was a knowledge that didn't come from a parent, and frankly, it never occurred to me that you wouldn't come to me or your mother if someone tried anything that made you uncomfortable, that distressed you as I told my mother when I was approached at about 13.

When you were growing up in the 70's and 80's, sexual abuse wasn't very public, and in the public media was virtually restricted to girls. There wasn't a general awareness of how common SA was and how frequently it involved boys. We weren't bombarded with warnings about protecting our children from SA. Is that an excuse? Probably.
Your mother did what she could. She wasn't well equipped to mother, and I wasn't well equipped to father, but we really didn't know that at the time we married. It later came to be "survival time".. dig in and do what we can. As for your mother leaving, she did that in order to survive as her life at home was simply too difficult and painful. I didn't understand then, what was needed to support her in emotional terms and so failed to help her with the difficulties she faced, but I came to see that I'd failed her.

All of us have to play the hand we are dealt by life, as best we can. No one grows up without scars though usually not so severe as yours. You can blame us for your past experiences. There's nothing we can do to change that past. It unfortunately falls to you to pick up the pieces and go on. You have many strengths and will prevail. Your importance in keeping a person from suicide is a beginning in your understanding your importance.

Your mother and I will always love you and wish the best for you.

Love, Dad

And from my Mom here:

Alan

Sounds like you're going through hellish present and reliving a hellish past. I'm truly sorry that I wasn't there for you, probably wasn't very there for you even when I was, in fact, there.

I am at a loss to explain my behaviors and shortcomings as a mother and as a housewife. It isn't enought to say that I was ill-suited for either. Plenty of women are equally unsuited, and yet perform acceptably as wife and mother. Immature is the closest I can come to an explanation at this moment. Some parts of me just never grew up and became functioning adult. Alcohol came to play a part as well, but more obviously in my years after the divorce. I can tell you more about the breakup of our marriage if you want to hear it sometime.

Your abuse experiences have come to me out of the blue. I never considered such as an explanation of your troubled behaviors and emotional distance as a pre-adolescent. I had heard of instances of children being molested, but had no idea that it was so "everywhere."

And you are right, I never told you what to do "if." I don't recall that I ever even considered discussing inappropriate touching with you kids, any of you. It seemed like something that happens to other people, not in our familly, not in our neighborhood. I did think about talking to you about sex, but never could get past the embarrassment barrier on that one either. I think today's parents are more straightforward (and knowledgeable) about sexual development and child exploitation.

There were some incidents in my family when I was a child, that I didn't hear about until very recently, and a relatively minor incident that happened to me as a child that I never told about. My observation is that "don't tell anyone" is a common gut reaction. I think a lot of us have these "guilty secrets" and carry them around for years or a lifetime.

I love you, Alan, and I hope that our relationship can survive this turmoil. But more than that, I hope you come out the other side OK.

Mom
 
Indeed, "Wow".
Hauser, how do their responses differ from what you might have been expecting from them?
To me both of your parents seem surprisingly calm and open about their own shortcomings and their willingness to admit responsibility.
How helpful will this be for YOU now? --- and later?
Love, etc.,
 
Hauser,

I have been putting off responding to this post for a few days now. I want you to know that I admire you, I think you are a brave guy, and most of all, I am sorry for your abuse.

All that to play Devil's advocate. I know that you read your parent's responses, but I hope you REALLY read them. I'm not sure if you have children of your own, but I raised two sons. Hauser, children come without an owner's manual, unless you count Dr. Spock. You do the best you can. I can tell you, it's a day to day process. You have all these plans to be the best for your children, but things come up during the day. You still try to do the best you can, because you love them.

Many times, as was the case with me, a parent, or both parents, are dealing with unresolved issues of their own. Mine was of course sexual abuse. My wife didn't even know this about me until our kids were teens. Who knows what issues my wife had? While it is easy to say that spouses and parents should communicate better, that is not always the reality.

Your Mom leaving may have been the best thing for you. You may have been worse if she had stayed and you saw constant friction within the home, along with your abuse. My brother and I have talked before about our childhood. We actually know that we would have been better off if our parents had divorced! We went to bed each night listening to yelling and crying and accusations flying at each other. Our household was full of tension. We were expected to act as if nothing was wrong, so we became good actors and learned to hide things from others, including feelings and things like abuse.

I would never tell my parents about my abuse, because I knew instead of helping me, they would accuse each other of allowing it to happen. Like you, I get resentful that I couldn't tell them about my abuse, but I do not blame them for my abuse. I only blame my perps for my abuse. They sexually abused me, not my parents. I can spend the rest of my life saying "What if my parents had been this, or What if they had done that", but the cruel reality is that I would most likely have been abused anyway. My perps were clever at manipulating me.

I also have to say, like your Dad told you, SA was unheard of in the 70s and 80s, and when it was, it was always regarding females. Talking about male sexual abuse was taboo, and as a result no one did talk about it, to anyone, their children included.

Hauser know that I am not making excuses for your parents, any more than I am making excuses for mine. I'm just saying that life throws wrenches in the cogs of each of us. Each of our parents, individually, and as a couple, have issues. All they can do is what they think is best for their families, but ultimately, what is best for themselves.

I can tell from reading their letters to you, Hauser, that both of them love you. Both are sorry that you were abused, and both seem willing to help you now that they know. I hope you will allow them to do that for you. You deserve it, buddy.

Please know that I am in no way trying to minimize your abuse, and issues with your parents. I'm just trying to get you to see things from a different perspective. God knows my wife and I made mistakes in raising our sons, but we did the best we could with what we had each day.

Take care, Hauser. Stay safe.
 
I agree our parents too were victims of their circumstances but could never work it out for themselves or get empowered by it so that they had no energy to invest in us.

Even today, most parents become parents without any planning or preparation, the result it is all a stop gap arrangement and just about keeping things together under control.

My father used fear and power to control, and most often he stayed away from us or was too involved with his life to bother about us, except when I was unwell. I used to love the days when I was unwell. I became such an attention seeking kid; I would do anything to stick out!

Today I am still busy repairing the damage done, by visiting parenting sites and finding way I can still parent myself better. Like my parents forgot an essential ingredient of parenting -respect and since they didnt loved themselves they probably couldnt love me, for what I was.

Like my parents never thought that I was of any consequence and so I concluded the same, and that is the hardest thing to get over, but then now I know that I no longer need to believe that lie. I am important for myself, and I have to make that my reality.

It is ironical that there is no qualification test reequired no job interview for the most important and toughest job on the planet- parenting. To bring a new human life on to this world is such a big honour and responsibility.

Parenting is about reverence for life that you are bringing in. That is why I believe empowered parents make empowered children and make the job of growing up all the more easy.

Treating myself with the love and respect is my best chance of recovery.

www.childrenlights.org
;)
 
Hauser:

Wow. What an amazing set of responses. When I was in chat the other night with Dan_in_ne2 and FLRich, we were kicking around the idea of what to say to parents, and how -- a discussion that was a direct result of this thread. I made a couple comments that your letter could well start communication where there needed to be communication, but where there had been a void instead. Looks like that happened -- in spades. Your parents have both made very honest, caring responses to your letter. I am so proud of you for taking this step. I salute you, man. You are the bravest of the brave, in a lot of ways.

Who knows, I might even take the initiative and let my Mom & Dad know sooner than I thought I could. You've been that inspirational.

{{{Hauser!!!}}}

John
 
Thank you John and Steve and everyone else, I'm glad you found a good thing in this as far as being able to maybe do it yourself.

I said what had to be said, I didn't care what they where gonna say.
 
Wow, this whole thread has been so healing. It's just amazing that for years we believed that noone could ever understand, but we all are experiencing the same stuff. I'm so glad for you Al, and am really praying that their love for you sinks deep, and helps to disolve those lies that have held you captive for so long. Dan
 
Hauser,

I think you got some excellent responses from your parents. They have taken responsibility for their failings and it seems to me that they genuinely regret them. Most importantly, they both seem to be reaching out to you.

One valid point they do make is that when you were growing up there was no professional or public awareness of the sexual abuse of boys. Your father sounds like a good man, and his reaction to your disclosure reminds me of what my Dad said when I disclosed to him last November: "How did he get past me?"

The answer is in part that abusers were phantoms in those days. We were told to watch out for strangers trying to lure us into cars, but most abuse is committed by people whom the victim knows. This simply wasn't on the radar yet.

I hope this exchange helps you in your healing and serves as a first step towards better relations with your parents.

Much love,
Larry
 
Hauser,

You've gotten a good response from your parents. I'm glad that you've been able to disclose and be honest with your emotions towards your parents. I too was/am angry with my parents. I hope that expressing your anger with them is/will be healing as it was for me. And yes, back in the day there wasn't much information or discussion about child abusers and how to protect your child(i.e. talk with them). Remember that your parents are what's been called secondary victims. This may be hard to understand, but the abusers hurt their son.

You deserve more ... keep fighting for it.

Courage-Wisdom-Spirituality
 
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