Showing results for "George" in Dysfunctional Families

My mother was bipolar, mentally ill, a sociopath that not only got pregnant by my 15-year-old father but went on to abuse me in every way imaginable. This is my story. People have a hard time believing that women, especially mothers who are supposed to protect their children, can be molesters and pedophiles, but my mother was one. I am not only telling my story for my own recovery, exposing the sins of the mothers in our family, but to help others to see that if this happened to them, they are not alone, and they can recover and have healthy, reasonably happy lives.

Family is difficult because family - every family - is an echo of the gospel. Family can be the source of some of the most transcendent human joy, and family can leave us crumpled up on the side of the road. Family can make us who we are, and family can break our hearts. Why would this social arrangement have that much power, for good or for ill, over us?

The stories in Paul Alan Ruben's Terms of Engagement explore father and son as intimate enemies, each yearning to be understood, acknowledged, and validated by the other. Raw and gripping as delivered by a cast of incredible narrators, these nine stories take place in collision territory - where father and son engage in trying to repair their alienation.

Growing up as a Martin would be impossible for this generation of youths who believe that the highest score wins the love of the parents these days. When you raise your children on chips and pizza, you'd get a boot in your ass by my father, the patriarch and cornerstone of my family, who would just sneer a, "What you looking at boy? You better learn how to cook a decent meal, or I'll teach your ass how after I retrieve my size 12's out of your hind parts, you dig?"