Simon and I couldn't be more different. When we met, I was 38, he was 54, and his unabashed zest for life broke through my complicated caution. I knew I was in love when, after a lazy summer evening together, I lay on the stone beside a Trafalgar Square fountain and felt joy seep through my skin. I moved in with him, his rural 15th-century cottage becoming our home, workplace (me in medicine, he in shipping), and where I discovered previously unknown contentment.
She also doesn't understand why, as a woman in my 40s, I like certain things that she considers childish, like animated films. However, when I think about her childhood, I realize that she probably still has unhealed trauma that was never dealt with. She was born in France, just two months before the Nazis marched in, and spent the first five years of her life in wartime and economic struggles.
For most of my life, I have carried an invisible companion: a harsh inner voice that sounds like mine and tells me, over and over, that I am not enough. It's so oppressive that people close to me have often said they'd never met anyone so hard on themselves. Over decades of listening to that voice, I let it convince me that no achievement was ever sufficient.
My parents took me to see it in the theatre, under the impression that it would be appropriate for a seven-year-old. Princess Mombi's macabre wardrobe of disembodied heads; the psychopathic laughter of the wheelers, with all four limbs ending in squeaky wheels; Nicol Williamson's sinister, vicious Nome King all are permanent fixtures in my unconscious hall of famous terrors. And Fairuza Balk's Dorothy is eerie to match, a perfect uncanny heroine for a truly twisted children's film.
Somewhere in the process of parenting, you begin to see your younger self in your child-and you are forced to face the parts of yourself you have either buried or never fully understood. I started noticing this mirror effect when my daughter became a teenager. Suddenly, her behavior-makeup, boyfriend, confidence -was triggering emotions I did not expect.
There are all kinds of things we could murmur to our brains to soothe the fear of being judged. You could point out that almost nobody is looking at you; mostly people are too wrapped up in themselves. You could point out that you already know you're competent from how you rise to occasions at work; there probably isn't much to mock about you. You can pat and soothe your brain with evidence that the thing it's afraid of is very, very unlikely.
I guess we probably all do, right? Especially at this stage in my life - a grown-ass woman with a tween and a teen who have the drama thing on lock in our house - I try to be pretty proactive about protecting my peace. And yet, somehow, chaos seems to find me. Or could it be that I'm subconsciously seeking it out?
The play, onstage at Southeast Portland's 21ten Theatre, takes place in the orchard of Lissie and Roger's childhood home in rural Oregon, which they fled as teens 25 years before. Returning for their father's funeral, Lissie (Paulina Jaeger-Rosete) is visited by Billy (Michael Heidingsfelder), someone she briefly knew in high school. When Billy offers to buy the property, memories of her painful childhood come back to her.
Marriage is beautiful, but parenting is one of its greatest assignments. Unfortunately, many adults today are damaged not by demons or destiny, but by the parenting style they were exposed to. As a marriage counselor, I've seen husbands and wives still bleeding from childhood, raising their own kids with inherited pain.Dear parents, parenting is a ministry. We must be careful not to produce well-fed children with empty souls. Below are 10 parenting styles that may look normal today, yet they produce broken adults tomorrow.
Living in a village near Mosul was full of happiness until the Islamic State invaded. I witnessed the murder of my father and cousin at nine years old.
On his seventh album, Brian Christinzio confronts childhood abuse with a mix of visceral soundscapes and poignant storytelling, offering an innovative rock opera experience.
As a former gymnast, my life has been greatly affected by injuries from childhood sports, leading to surgeries and teaching my kids to listen to their bodies.
Eighty-five years ago, 1940, a boy prayed for his parents' safety during bombings, highlighting the long-lasting impact of wartime experiences on his adulthood.