hey buddie

hey buddie,
When I was a pre-teen I was sexually abused.
As a teen in junior high I was bullied.
I found out at 18 that my Dad had been abused.
My Dad died in a sensational industrial fire when I was 28. Someone went to jail for his death.
I started binge drinking at 14. Didn’t stop for 30 years.
After years of substance abuse, my brother died in his early 50’s from a heart attack.
I was 45 yrs old in 2017 when I had a heart attack. I thought I was dying.
In 2023, at 51, I was diagnosed with throat cancer. I thought I was going to die.
I can’t remember my Dad ever saying I love you. My Mom did, but not until after Dad died
I learned eary in my life that there was 1 person to count on. Me. I didn’t have any backup from adults in my life. No one to help me through. I only had me.
As an adult, it came through mental agression, taking things personally, feeling less than, asking for help meant failure. I asked myself often if I was or why I was such a bad person. I wanted to do things that made me feel good like smoke, drink, sex. As hindsight has proven, none led to good things.
I try not to blame my parents. It was a hard time for them. They had me late in life and neither had a ton of support from their parents as kids. Dad was abused and Mom was one of the oldest of 18. She started being a Mom to her siblings before she turned 10.
But, I wonder sometimes what it would have been like as a kid, and then as an adult, if I had parents that knew how to support me? Who would I be? I suspect life would have turned out quite diffently. But I can’t dwell on that. The past can’t be changed.
I’m a different person today. Thats thanks to so many people that care and a lot of reslience.
My other coping mechanism was to be as busy as humanly possible. Grow the career. Work harder than anyone else to prove myself. Coach hockey. Be on the board. Stack as much as I could on top of childhood memories. Bury them deep.
Until one day when I was biking during cancer treatment and the memory of the sexual abuse came back to me. It answered some of the questions on why I was who I was. But those were surface questions. It took seeing a therapist in summer 2024 to help me understand the deeper impact my childhood had on me as an adult.
Turns out I wasn’t a bad person. I was a good person that was handed a shit deck and did what I needed to survive. It might not have been pretty but it got me through.
My personal journey since the cancer diagnosis has been crazy. There was a time when I had the impression the cancer was a death sentence within 5 years. Not a fun time for myself or my family.
Self care has become super important.. Including cutting people out of my life that brought a negative energy, a negative spirit. People that tend to bring me down vs lift me up. A hard thing to do. It can be only.
I wish I could spend the rest of my days helping people. I mean as a full-time job. But, life is not free. One day I will. One day life will make that dream come true. I know my story has changed people’s lives. Perhaps even saved some. And that feels so good it makes me cry sometimes. I wanna happy cry more. It fills the bucket. It feels good.