Did any of you grow up in a toxic or unstable home as a kid? How did you actually deal with it, or move past it?
Looking back, home wasn’t calm growing up. Constant fighting between my parents, things a kid shouldn’t really be exposed to. I don’t even fully know whose fault it is, honestly, and part of me hesitates to blame either of them completely, because I’ve also watched both of them work hard for me despite everything falling apart between them. That contradiction is confusing on its own, seeing people cause you pain and also genuinely try for you at the same time. I’ve started noticing it in myself now, more impatience than I think I should have, reacting harder to small things than the situation probably calls for. It’s like some of that environment got wired into me without me even realizing it until recently.
I’m not asking for sympathy, I’m asking because I know I’m not the only one who’s grown up like this, and I’d genuinely like to know how people actually worked through it, not just survived it, but actually became calmer, steadier versions of themselves afterward.
A few things I’m curious about:
Did you notice the effects on yourself right away, or did it take years to even recognize the pattern?
Was there a specific turning point, therapy, a relationship, distance from the situation, or was it more gradual than that?
Does it ever fully go away, or does it just become something you manage better over time?
Genuinely trying to understand this instead of just carrying it forward without realizing it. Appreciate any real experiences you’re willing to share.
[[[[Sometimes I catch myself wondering what it would’ve actually felt like to grow up in a genuinely happy, peaceful family. Hard to even imagine it sometimes, since it’s not something I ever really got to experience firsthand._]]]]
Oh yep. Big time. I was raised in a very Catholic household in a quite conservative community. Religion aside, I think my parents were overall pretty good, despite being quite strict, other than their insistence on having surveillance over all Internet access at all times. Knowing your parents are constantly watching fucks with your head.
But what I’m still working through in therapy are all the myriad lessons I internalized through my conservative religious upbringing. There wasn’t any one particular thing, but that was 100% not the right environment for a trans girl who didn’t know it yet to grow up in. I barely knew trans people existed until I went to college, and I was pretty homophobic in high school. It wasn’t until I was out of grad school, living and working in another state, that I had the distance to finally do the self-reflection and therapy work to realize that I’m trans and pan and accept that about myself.
I had a moment after my egg cracked of “oh no, I’m the kind of person everyone I grew up around hates”. Jury is still out on how my family will react when I come out to them. I haven’t said anything because I’m afraid of how they’ll respond, given that I’m the only one who is no longer Catholic.
Anyway, I could ramble on. Short answer: yeah, my upbringing fucked me up real good, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be done working through it.