Mommy Issues

sex, lies, and infidelities

As this finds its audience, my intention is to validate the feelings and experiences of others who resonate with what I share here. I harbor no resentment and see no purpose in holding grudges. That’s not me. Truth telling—my truth—that’s my thing.

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I am the only child of a teenage mother who lost her mother when she was only six and was abandoned by her father before she turned seven. She wasn’t alone because she has an older sister, but she would never really feel parented. By the age of nine or ten, I started to see how this limited her ability to parent me. There were times I’d get sassy or roll my eyes at a chore request, and she’d say things like, “If I had had a mother, I would never act this way,” which I knew even then made no sense in reality.

This year, just after the first birthday of mine she has ever ignored, my mother told me to consider myself an orphan, and I started to understand more about why she was never able to love me the way that I love my children. Her unresolved childhood trauma had evolved into narcissism. I also understand that whatever ick is spewed outward is also exponentially absorbed inward. I imagine it as feeding a parasite within. It’s heartbreaking, and I continue to pray for change for her.

But I’m moving forward with my growth and development, while nurturing the authentic relationships in my life—with my grown kids, my partner, and our collective chosen family.

You’re on your own kid/You always have been. —Taylor Swift

I’ve known about “the cheating ways” of my dad and stepdad via my mother for a long time, but this year showed me the significant part infidelity played in shaping my early life experiences, or rather how my mother’s choices around infidelity shaped my early life and the relationships I would have with my two daddies.

Daddy #1

Potentially doomed by statistics from the get-go, my teenage parents remained married for about two and a half years. It was infidelity that finally did them in. I was told about his missteps—two in total—one heterosexual, one homosexual. It was the latter that sent her packing his shit and filing for divorce. I think she probably handled his little side piece from class well enough, mostly because I’m almost certain she found a way to get hers in return.

But walking in on, bearing firsthand witness to, the unholy act of boy-on-boy intimacy…in 1973?!? No way in hell their union was coming back from that shame-filled scene; she’d be certain of that. My dad’s inability to grow up quickly enough to be a parent is undeniable, and he would continue to fuck things up by falling asleep on the babysitting job and leaving a sheet of tab acid within my toddler reach. He was a mess because his childhood home had been a mess (thanks to a shit ton of narcissism), and I find his story even more heartbreaking than my mom’s when it gets down to it.

So Daddy #1 had failed the parenting mission no one had asked for and was deemed unfit by the mother of his child. Soon, his daughter will move out of state, and he’ll tell himself how much better off she is to have this other man, who will surely make a better father than he ever could. His fear was he’d be just like his father—a critical asshole. In time, he will make the belief that he shall not be a father a part of his physical being by having a vasectomy performed. He would not accidentally father another child if he wasn’t even raising this one.

Anyway, at some point, I was to understand and accept that my biological family failed because my father couldn’t be faithful to my mother. She never said he broke her heart or anything like that. But Daddy #2 sure did.

Daddy #2

My mom technically already knew Daddy #2 as a classmate of her sister’s. Talk about convenient, right? She wasn’t going to have to go it alone for long. I know from him that not only was she just gorgeous with that long, dark, ironed hair and perfectly tanned skin, had an adorable little place, a cute car, and of course, a precious three-year-old with wild curly locks and a penchant for dancing to a groovy beat. We couldn’t lose.

How it all started: First, she pushed him to take us along as he completed his military musical training on the other coast. Being an intensive training situation, the participants were encouraged to set up alone for the six-month program, leaving family members to join them later. No way was she having that because it was Operation Instafamily time. Next thing you know, they’re married, and I’m baptized as his daughter. Add in a new kitty cat, and boom—one happy little family. Except it wasn’t. She was the first cheater there, but she would never admit it. When you know, you know, and he knew.

Life continued on base in Texas, as I started school, took ballet lessons at the YMCA, and joined Brownies. Daddy did military stuff during the day and played drums at clubs at night. I suspect my mom’s cocktail waitress job may have originated from her desire to keep a wifely eye on him. You know what they say about it taking one to know one? Who knows, but apparently, she had her share of dalliances, too.

How it all ended: Daddy #2 was playing, and he met himself a “black haired beauty with big, dark eyes,” and they started working on their night moves, so to speak. (Thank you, Bob Seger) Yep, cheater—infidel—adulterer. And he wasn’t a teenage father, and he should have known better. Okay, whatever. He was still in his 20s, had been rushed and pushed into the role of husband and father (of not his kid). I loved him. He loved me. He was a warm, loving father, who made me laugh and made me feel safe. But he made my mom feel yet again abandoned and unlovable when he left her for another woman.

He and his brown-eyed girl were together for more than thirty years until he lost her to breast cancer. They were great friends and partners and loving, supportive parents to their one daughter. My mother would only refer to the new woman as a whore and to Daddy #2 as the selfish asshole who broke her heart. It really does say a lot more about her than them.

We would end up back in California without him, and ultimately, I would lose him completely from 1979 until 2022. It was the greatest heartbreak of my childhood, and it has been the most healing reunion of my adulthood.

May you find peace or purpose in reading what I’ve shared. Please comment below to share your thoughts on the writing itself or what resonates with you. Namaste. 🙏