Banana Split

This is a Child’s Story from being raised by a split family.

The thought of writing my story came to me abruptly and has coincidently become a challenge getting started. I had the title, idea and obviously the content stored away and ready to use on demand yet to type and get started has been a blockade. I suppose it has to do with the fact I’ve never written down my story just let the thoughts replay as I didn’t want my words to ever be twisted or miscued. It is a side of a story not many people want to ask or talk about unless they are needing advice. A story people assume is unpleasant as the path to a split is 95% uneasy (in most cases) so they can only imagine the kid was “damaged” or “had it rough”. I cannot speak of other cases but I can speak of my own and for that I feel I can make a minor difference helping others out. People may wonder, why tell it? What is the point? We all have a past? I want to tell me story to help kids out and those parents who are having that challenging thought of the kids during this tough period in their lives.

I was very young when my parents made the decision to split which in my opinion probably made the transition a tad easier. When I try to think back to what I can remember, there was never a memory of my parents together. I was too young yet the thought of not having this memory has always stuck with me. Fast forwarding a tad where I can recall thoughts and feelings from my childhood, the fighting would begin. The epic battle of divorced parents. This part was really hard. We have two extremely strong headed parents and also two with bursting hearts of love for their daughters which probably fueled the battles. As the battles went on so did trips to therapists. I never felt like we could ever fully speak as we were always speaking to these open wounds which we in turn ended up being afraid to ever have a voice. We knew our parents meant well and would just always fight for us but the fight for “US” never benefited us. I began silencing myself. It was easier to say nothing and live than cause any waves. When times were calm which were more common we did have the double enjoyment of having TWO rooms… DOUBLE holidays and still two parents that loved us.

In Elementary there were a couple of us who had two sets of parents but majority were from one home. Getting into Jr and High School, it was certainly more rare to be from a split family. All my friends from what I saw, were living this incredible lives with their families in suburbia. I had spouts where I would go through waves of depression as I wanted so badly to have my parents still together in a beautiful family home with our family dog… Neighborhood friends where we all grew up together… This dream consumed me and at the time I always felt so unlucky. I hated I didn’t have this life. Even growing up, my mom’s siblings kids all grew up and most became very close as they were together for all the holidays as well as living in the same quadrant. My sister and I were still on a week to week and holiday to holiday arrangement so in a sad miss, we didn’t have that same time with family. Most our life we had lived in two houses that were always on opposite ends of the city. Always felt like we didn’t belong, oddly enough. Strange to say that as it never should have mattered but as my lonely mind would fester I felt extremely alone. The plus side as I mentioned above is we would have Christmas twice and each parent would try their best to always make us feel special.

What was tough looking back was I was affected very deeply by what I picked up externally. Meaning… I felt my parents pain and heard the anger continuously through my childhood (and adult life) as well as it wasn’t common during my upbringing to know other kids in my same scenario, I always wished for the greener grass. No one talked then about how we are doing or if they had we already had the great wall up.

I never really ever dated. I wanted to ensure 110% I was going to get that life I had always wanted. House, dog, neighborhood, whole works. It was like the universe had to give me that reminder so I can go on and enjoy life. Growing up as I did, I felt like I needed to grow up much faster than I should have. It was like I have always been on fast-forward trying to get through yet I should have enjoyed what I really had. That brings me to meeting my now, husband. I began smelling those roses people talk about and feeling like I could breathe. We eventually bought a house in a beautiful community when I was nearing the end of my pregnancy. Everything was truly becoming real. The life I had always admired was becoming my reality. When I had my son, many emotions, obviously, raced through my body and thoughts about our childhoods and how we would want to raise our son. Many reflections were just becoming reminders to me to enjoy every minute.

The key thing from this journey is there was always love growing up. It may have been rocky at times but I always had two parents who gave all their hearts to us. Most of the time we really had it better than families we saw together. I am not saying one is better as it is each their own situation. But one phrase I hear that really pains me is “we are making it work for the kids…” Absolutely the wrong move. The kid is in a worse situation being raised by parents who don’t belong. They feed off of that plus these parents deserve happiness too. Just because you have a child together doesn’t mean you deserve to suffocate and not live? Do what is best for you which I can say will benefit the child being brought up much happier. If my parents never made the decision and they stayed together, I can bet you all the money in my account, I would not be living this life. As much as I would love to have a memory of my parents happily together, I am SO blessed that made the decision they did. People who are afraid of their kids not making it through, need to realize they will and they will become strong super beings, just always ensure they know how much you love them. Kids are adaptable. We all have some sort of scars from growing up and that is what makes each of us our own.