Foreword

Foreword from my memoir

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
Jeremiah 29:11 NIV

FOREWORD

To say that my family history is unconventional is an understatement of such huge proportion that it is impossible to say it with a straight face. I have done my time on the therapist’s couch, chipping away at the crusty layers of anger one would expect to find attached to someone raised in complete chaos. There was a time when I lived for the opportunity to write a juicy tell-all memoir exposing all the family’s dirty laundry. I tried—believe me I did. I had so many false starts that if I put them all together, the page count would put Tolstoy to shame. I could never seem to find the right “tragic yet strong survivor of unbearable circumstances” tone to tell my tale. I was stumped.


Suddenly, out of nowhere, I realized that I did not want to tell yet another sad story about yet another dysfunctional family. It dawned on me that even though some of the circumstances of my childhood (okay, more than some—maybe most) might seem a little strange to some people, it is impossible to ignore the absurdity of it all and in that absurdity there is a fair amount of humor. When I realized that finding the humor in the midst of madness was the way my brother and I survived without becoming tower snipers, I knew I had to tell our story in that vein.

Over the course of writing this book, I have met many people who have their own stories of childhood abuse to tell. It is the curse of the abused child to believe that he or she is the only one hiding such a hideous secret. The truth is that there is an army of walking wounded—countless men and women who live with their secret every day. We have all survived and become functioning members of society, but the stigma and shame of our past impacts each one of us in varying degrees. The past that haunts us controls us, and all too often shapes the future.


It is for the walking wounded that I write my story. Before I decided to write my own book, I read every “abusive childhood” memoir that I could find. I did not know what I was looking for, I just knew that I was driven to read about others who had suffered as my brother and I did. I tended to grade them in degrees of seriousness—worse than mine, not quite as bad, not even close, and so forth. But each one left me still searching. It was not until I realized I needed to answer my own questions and confront the demons of my own past that I found the peace for which I was desperately searching. I had to find my own path to redemption from the pain that poked and prodded me as I sought to live a life free from the horrors of the past. My path will not be the same as another’s. In the same way that our pasts may mirror each other, yet be uniquely our own, so will be the path to healing.


I sought the help of a therapist not to confront my past, but because my life was controlling me instead of the other way around. It was in working with my therapist that I began to understand the devastating hold my childhood had on me, and the ways in which that hold governed my thoughts, my choices, my very life. The miracle I found in working with a therapist is that every tool I needed to face and ultimately to defeat the demons of the past, I already possessed within me. I just needed help learning to use them.


My intention is not to diminish anyone else’s experience or belittle their pain in any way. Quite the contrary; part of my goal in writing this book is to spotlight the resilience of the human spirit and to champion the power of laughter. To this day, my brother and I are able to find the humor in almost any situation. Quite often it is of the gallows variety and though some may find that disturbing on some level, I have come to recognize it as a survival technique. Through all the pain and chaos of our childhood, my brother and I found a way to rise above it rather than to be overcome by it. That path was laughter. We certainly were not the first to discover that path as an escape from sadness or pain. Many of today’s (and yesteryear’s) finest comedians set out on that very same path as an antidote to the pain in his or her own heart.


To tell my story, I have to tell the whole story, which is something I did not want to do initially. I wanted to relate the laughter without the tears. But to do so would minimize the real miracle of my story, which is that even in the midst of madness, there is hope—hope for a future that does not include violence or brutality or abuse. The past does not have to define the future. The decision to no longer be anchored to the pain came with a price. To embrace the joy of the future, I had to face the pain in my soul. The weapon I chose once again was humor—this time as a weapon to defeat the pain and not just survive it. The Bible tells us that “a merry heart doeth good like a medicine.” (Proverbs 17:22) Laughter has a power all its own; in laughter there is strength and courage—and ultimately, there is healing.


This book is dedicated to my brother Michael who lived with me through the insanity and who, like me, fights to keep the past from invading the present. And to my sister Kathy who chose to join us in the insanity when she surprised us all (well, not my mom so much) by showing up one day in 1983 to announce that she was our sister who had been given up for adoption when she was born. I like to say that she didn’t grow up with us, but she got here as soon as she could.