Generational Trauma

The Post is usually behind a paywall for me but @backhand, I agree with the premise 100%. It's also slowly (too slowly) being acknowledged for its significance, on a societal rather than familial scale, in the history of racial injustice and inequity.

Whether societal or familial, the specter of generational trauma is heartbreaking.
 
My father never said much about his childhood, and even less about his father who died before I was born, but I got a clue when a cousin, much older than me, told me about her experience as a child at the hands of our grandfather. I've no doubt that he affected my life quite profoundly as well, albeit in a very much less direct way. The sins of the fathers...
 
This is very prevalent in my family and life as well! And I believe it is what led to diagnoses of depression, anxiety, and OCD by my pediatrician when I was a child - all of which were swept under the rug because it was easier for my parents to believe that it was just me being hormonal and not at all related to other things that required change and acknowledgement. I was never told about those diagnoses until I was rediagnosed at Mayo Clinic in my late 20s and my mom said, "We already knew all that." You did?!

I'm grateful to be an adult and in a position where I understand this today and can work on it. Generational trauma is no joke, but we can work on new, meaningful paths for ourselves.
 
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