family

Family can be our support system. Or they can be part of the problem. All about the complicated, loving, and difficult relationship with us and the ones who love us.

7 reasons for women to value their relationship with their mother
The sooner you begin to take responsibility for what happens to you, the sooner you will begin to live an adult happy life."
By tanya4 years ago in Psyche
Old Man Winter
Barry was on the path he had walked since he was a kid. He knew it like the back of his hand, even though it was covered in an entire season’s worth of snow. He taught his grandchildren the way of the path the season before. Left at the tree that was shaped like a dragon. Right at the boulder that nearly crushed his brother ages ago. Follow the trail of raspberry bushes that lined both the left and the right lane. They haven’t changed in his nine decades of life. If his father was still alive, he would still be able to get around just fine.
By Alexa Calliguri4 years ago in Psyche
Memoirs of TD: Life Congealed
Her life still haunts me after 21 years. It’s a sad story of poverty, incest, love, lack of love, homelessness, and depression. Children can overcome and become successful through those circumstances but sometimes, your life is damned whether you do or don’t. I didn’t have the perfect life. Both of my parents were alcoholics and parental supervision for me was sometimes watching myself. But her life, her life was created out of a nightmare. Doomed the moment she entered the world and took her first breath.
By Tii Danjel4 years ago in Psyche
A Love Letter to My Narcissistic Mother
The day I found my mother’s psychiatric medication is a day that saved my life. Sneaking into my mother’s bedroom had always been a sin, but it became a capital crime after my father left. Weeks after his car had peeled out of the driveway — gravel ricocheting in its wake — she had slammed the door shut to that doomed room and pointed her finger in my face.
By E.B. Johnson 4 years ago in Psyche
Letter to my Lindes
Dear Linde, I would not have been a good mom, I was too fucked up to think about anything but myself for my childbearing and rearing years. Moms have the hardest job in the world and the world decided to have mercy on me and my unborn children. I would have loved them fiercely, but, you see, I didn’t love myself enough to love another being as deeply as a child deserves.
By Linden Griffith4 years ago in Psyche
An Open Letter to the Adult Children of Narcissistic Parents
Dear “kids”, When did you realize you weren’t the problem? In therapy, I described living at home as living with a bear. A dormant bear. The only thing separating us was a flimsy wooden fence. A fence even the most delicate bear could easily hit down. The only way I could keep myself safe from the bear was to stay away from it. Far away from the fence. Be undetectable. Invisible.
By Lena Simons4 years ago in Psyche
FLUSH
When the toilet backed up I knew. Proof was the floating wads of sepia streaked tissue, heavily scented with feces/urine, and whatever else comes out of a body that takes in everything meant to destroy it.
By Kelly Girnas4 years ago in Psyche
Unrequited Narcissism
I grabbed my favorite glass from the cupboard. A short rocks glass engraved with the map of Los Angeles on it. It doesn’t carry a ton of meaning since I don’t really consider this city to hold any piece of my heart. Sure it’s got it’s perks and occasional luxuries, but it’s just another city. Tons of happy people, even more shitty people. Some of those overlap into both as well. But it’s just the right size glass and I feel Hemmingway-cool when I use it. Got ice from the fridge door and then grabbed my favorite gin. Very NOT Hemingway-cool. But he put some less than ideal things in his mouth. Mixed some diet tonic water and grabbed my grill tongs.
By Andrew Stutesman4 years ago in Psyche
The Mirror
She stood in front of me, I towered over her. I could swallow her whole and she wouldn’t even notice. Her hands aggressively pulled on her skin, squeezing the flesh between her fingers. Her pale skin left the imprint of her red fingertips, glaring at me for giving her such a monstrous body. I tried to apologize for the way I made her feel but she wouldn’t have it and went on struggling to make herself presentable for the day.
By Hannah C Lull4 years ago in Psyche
Becoming Undone When Coming Together
To describe my mental and visceral state after my college graduation was a blur; A cosmic mix of all emotion and none at all.
By TABAN🌞4 years ago in Psyche
The Legacy of My Parents
I always knew my mother was someone different from the other mothers. My father too was like that. Different. I have often thought that I hate those two people.
By Albert Sundve4 years ago in Psyche
Ideations
She was expended. Fully. She wrote her final list of thoughts to people whose names she marked with both first and last so messages would not be mixed. She left these valedictions on her antique roll-top desk, neatly stacked beneath a worry stone her therapist had given her four years ago when they went their separate ways. She placed a USB full of photos, things that her friends and family might want access to, next to the letters beneath the anxious rock. She piled what she figured to be about a week’s worth of food and water in ten bowls around the house for her two cats. She hoped that someone would discover her and the cats well before the food was up. She had stolen a Walther PPK from her friend's closet earlier that morning, having not only known where he kept it, but also that she shouldn’t take the easier to access Glock 19 in his nightstand.
By kp4 years ago in Psyche