“Broken home.” 

Sounds fucking awful. Who wants to come from one of those? 

 

Broken.

And that’s how they describe it to us, too. Even though we’re small and delicate. Just kids. They speak to us like what they’re telling us is our business.

Usually, it isn’t.

To bitter parents, they tell you things about their exes because it’s common knowledge. Why? Because they are broken and thus we should be, too. 

 

One of the things they don’t teach you as a kid is that your parents are individual souls. With love to give. With a need to receive that love back. With desires and with imperfections. 

 

One of the things they don’t tell you as parents is that you’re fucking us up.

 

As an adult, I have been through enough breakups to understand that sometimes you love someone…

and then you don’t. 

 

Can’t we just leave it at that? Can’t you keep all the inappropriate facts to yourself until we are old enough to understand?

 

Maybe that isn’t feasible?

 

I also come from what they call a “broken home”. 

Honestly, why the fuck do they call it that? Might as well call it a bitter home because ya moms has no problem telling you all of the ways in which your dad ain’t shit. 

 

I am probably an extreme example of how parents can fuck you up.

 

The best relationship model I have is my grandma and grandpa. They hated each other so much that they each took a different floor in the house they owned instead of getting a divorce.

 

You didn’t get divorced then. 

 

They don’t tell you that parents are just figuring this shit out like the rest of us. Your parents are kids and they just don’t realize how bad they’re fuckin’ us up.

 

If you’re a young boy and your mom tells you your dad is a cheating sack of shit and you hear her telling her friends daddy ain’t shit… all men ain’t shit … you start to think … am I not shit? Also what exactly does that mean ? Am I going to grow up and be a cheater? Am I supposed to? Am I the man of the house now? Do you know how much pressure that is for a kid?! 

… And if you’re a young girl and your mom says daddy is a dirt bag, trust no man… what exactly does that mean for my future relationships?

 

I myself have actually never asked for help in a relationship because I was taught you only have yourself. I’ve never had a joint bank account because I was taught to keep your finances separate, you know: Just in case. 

 

I am definitely, 100% an extreme example of how bad your parents can fuck you up. I also think the worst of everyone. I was taught to.

 

When I was 14 my aunt Maria told me she should have never been with my uncle Henry in the first place. but…

“He made me cum.” She told me with tears in her eyes and an apologetic shrug. To be honest, I had no idea what the fuck she was talking about. Come where? See what I mean about inappropriate explanations?

Why don’t we monitor what we say to young impressionable adults instead? And I’m not saying that everyone is that inappropriate but hello these women were with their husbands when they were 14. They had no idea what my point of reference was.

I had just put down the barbies but I looked like a woman. 

My step monster once told me that if my father ever left her she would fake her own rape with a hairbrush and have him arrested. 

Again, I said extremely inappropriate.

The point is:

Even if the women in my life hadn’t been looking for a confidante in me, the teenager: everyone knows that kids are sponges.

It’s so cute when they repeat the good stuff…

but it means we absorb the bad stuff too.

 

Just something to think about next time you’re arguing with your ex about child support in front of the kids: You’re fuckin’ us up.

 

Try to keep that to a minimum.