From the bottom to the top

Something you didn't know about me. Or maybe you did. I think I have discussed this before.

I dropped out of high school. It was just a couple of months before graduation, but it's not like I would have graduated if I had kept going to school. I didn't have enough units because I had ditched so much.

I hated school. Or maybe I didn't. I certainly proved to love school later in life because I went to the local community college when I was 26. It took me about 12 years, but after 1.5 years of community college, I went to UCI and obtained a B.A., then enrolled in a paralegal program for a year and a half, and then went to law school for 5 years and obtained my J.D. and then, of course, passed the bar exam.

There was so much going on in my life when I was in high school that I think I was distracted. And having ADHD, it's no wonder that my personal circumstances prevented me from doing well in school. No wonder I ditched.

Both of my parents were abusive. My dad was a major pedophile. He managed to die without ever having been in jail. Back then, the measure taken by law enforcement was to make the child molester move. We moved several times as a result of my father's actions, but it wasn't until later in life that I learned that we moved several times because of my dad.

My dad molested not only his daughters, but friends of his daughters. It became hugely embarrassing, as years went by and high school memories receded, that friends of mine or of my sisters would inevitably confess to one of us that they had been molested by my dad. These days, my dad would have been charged with something and would have had to register as a sex offender.

My mother was physically abusive. She would lay in bed all day in her dark room with her T.V. on, eating (she weighed over 300 pounds most of the time). She would throw things at us from her bed. I remember going into her room once to answer her questions about something she had found out about me and I had to walk over to her bed so that she could hit me.

She was a nurse who worked the graveyard shift, and it never failed that she would get out of bed at about 10 p.m. and start screaming through out the house about any mess she found, as she started getting ready for work. I especially remember her screaming about her missing hairbrush. It would seem to me, in hindsight, that she should have bought more hairbrushes. Holy shit, she had 5 daughters. Of course her hairbrush was missing!

I have forgiven both of them, although I didn't have a relationship with my dad for quite a few years before his death. My mom is still alive. I have come to terms with my mom, but it's not an easy relationship for me.

I don't know how my kids grew up to be so well-adjusted. I didn't start out very well, and I was pretty messed up until I finally got counseling from the time I was 26-years old until I was 32-years old.

Considering that my life was pretty messed up while I was a kid, I am really proud of myself that I got counseling. I'm glad I didn't cause my kids to be too messed up. I can see, in small ways, how I messed them up, but for the most part, they came out good in spite of myself.

I became an attorney! My kids are doing great! How is this possible?!?

It was the counseling, of course. I wish I could remember the names of all the counselors that I saw over that 6-year period. I remember the name of the last one, but I think that each of them helped me in their way to overcome my emotional problems.

Each of my kids has been through something, as a result of my problems, that has specifically affected them. If they each come to me and asked, "What?", I would tell them honestly. I had a part in how each of them was affected because of how I was affected. I'm not going to post it here at this point, and probably won't unless I get their permission since several of them post here, too.

For Teeter and OCD, it was a direct result of me "pre-counseling" that messed them up, and yet they turned out great. For Fairy Boy, the results of my messed up childhood came later, and were an indirect result. Same for the Student and Aspie Boy.

Okay, I'm done for now. I might post more about this later. I can already imagine OCD shrieking, "You posted WHAT???"