On Fanmail, Fathers, and Fears
Pausing your regular newsletter
“Abuse is its own kind of reincarnation, isn’t it? We become the ones who made us.”
—Mary: An Awakening of Terror
I recently finished reading When the Wolf Comes Home. It’s a lovely little horror novel about being all-powerful and completely powerless at the same time.
At the end of the book, the author invites his readers to reflect upon their experiences with and as fathers, and share these with him.
This began as a letter…
Hello Nat Cassidy,
I’m not a fanmail person. I finished Mary just before When the Wolf Comes Home (out of order, I know), and I was still processing the quote from Mary: “Abuse is its own kind of reincarnation, isn’t it? We become the ones who made us.” Your invitation at the end of Wolf was too raw for me to ignore.
My father was, is, an angry, abusive man. Not the abusive that would warrant a 90’s TV special (“Did you hear about what goes on in Dave’s house?”), but enough to warrant me questioning what “normal” homelife meant. When you find yourself at 20, squaring off with your old man just begging inside that he would make the first, wrong move so the 10-year-old deep inside you can Bonus Action Rage and settle deeply buried scores, you might not have a healthy relationship with anger.
Fast forward another decade, and I was on the cusp of fatherhood. My wife was convinced that our first child was going to be a girl. I claimed ambivalence about gender, but truthfully, I was relieved. A father-to-be can’t say these things out loud: I was scared shitless of raising a boy. I was so afraid that any son I had would be the same, angry wreck that I was raised to be.
Fortunately, the universe has a sense of humor and granted me with not one, but two amazing sons. Wonderful, smart, sweet, boys who were also challenging as f**k some (often?) times. I loved them so deeply, and yet so deeply scared by them. What business did I have raising other human beings when I was still such a work in progress?
Becoming a father unlocked one insight about my father: at the end of the day, he was doing the best he could. That he was a product of his own upbringing and what he learned about being a father. That he was also scared most of the time, and anger is an easy mask for fear.
I am a far from perfect parent, but I have made conscious and intentional choices about the man I am to my sons. I faced a decision early on, where I saw the depths of my fear and the impacts of my rage, and decided that I would rather try to be the parent I wanted to be, than the parent I was taught to be. Or rather, be the parent I had been looking for all along.
Twenty-three years into this journey, I am proud of the young men that I have raised. I certainly didn’t do it alone, but there are plenty of moments where I see them doing positive things I have modeled for them, and that gives me hope. I also see their relationship with anger, fear, power, and powerlessness, and marvel at their ability to meet challenging emotions with a clarity and self-assurance I never had.
If abuse is its own kind of reincarnation, this can also be said of kindness. I have to believe this is true. The alternative is too unbearable.
Wishing a happy Father’s Day to all fathers, but particularly the ones who have and who are breaking the cycle. And giving gratitude to all the good men who help raise me, fathers or otherwise, intentionally or not. I stand on the shoulders of giants.
-dlr