“You blamed it all on your kids. We were young. We were innocent.”
— Leader of the Landslide (The Lumineers)
A furious man raised me. For the first half of my life, I learned that anger is the best way to show your frustration. Fast forward to more than a decade later, I am in the process of unlearning everything.
My father was — how do I put it nicely — not the kindest man figure. He was angry all the time. And right now, I could not even remember the days when he was not angry. Most of my memories with him revolved around him yelling at my brother and me for our most minor mistakes.
He never got physical, though. Not that it justified his past actions.
Every day during my childhood, my mind and body were in constant ‘alert mode’. My therapist told me that is why I now suffer from anxiety attacks occasionally. The default setting of my body is to be alert to everything, even when it is something that I do not need to worry about.
You might ask, “Why?”
The answer is simple.
At that time, I spent most of my time wondering whether my father would come home from work with his problems. If he did, it meant that the chance of us — his children — being targeted by his anger was high. So, for as long as I can remember, I thought it was normal for fathers to completely lash out their anger toward their children, especially when they misbehave.
My brother got it worse, even though he rarely misbehaved.
I did not understand why. I had never found the answer.
He never got into trouble at school. He was smart. And yet, there were so many occasions in which I had to witness him being yelled at for completely nonsense reasons. Sometimes, he would even get angry when we asked for things. The worst part was how he would call us names with his whole chest. I could not even bear to write it down here.
I do not want to get into details either.
All I could remember was the terrible feeling of watching your sibling go through that, and yes, of course, it was even worse when you were the one being screamed at. It was bleak. After the screaming sessions, nobody comforted us. No one came to tell us it was okay.
We buried those feelings deep inside. Hidden beneath all the other cruel memories.
Everyone knew. But nobody stopped him.
There were even times when he got mad at the children in front of the family. They said nothing. I wish someone did.
The trauma has stayed with me until now. I have not lived with him for more than a decade, but the trauma never left. And yes, he is no longer the same furious man he was before. He changed when he found out he had heart problems. But that did not re-write history.
Every time I see a man being angry, I get anxious and paranoid.
A day ago, I was in a meeting with one of my bosses, who is the same age as my father. He suddenly got upset at something that was not my fault. He began to express his frustration. Albeit not explicitly being angry like my father used to, looking at that caused my heart to race, my legs turning jelly, and my vision going blurry.
At that moment, it clicked with me.
I might have escaped the angry man, but the angry man will always stay.
He is there, lurking in the corner.
And he is there inside me.
