So I grew up watching Disney movies where the Princess falls in love and lives happily ever after. I mean, granted she goes through a few trials and tribulations but it never over shadows the ending where everything is filled with love and hope. 

I also grew up in a house where I saw my parents go from living next door to each other and watching each other go through the awkward teenage years to falling in love and creating a life together. 

It was the same theme. Meet, fall in love & live happily ever after. Simple right?

BEFORE Marriage, I can’t lie I was a SECRET JUDGER. I watched relationships around me and swore it wouldn’t/couldn’t be me. From divorces to separation to cheating to domestic violence and outside children. I judged the people in the
relationships around me for not making better choices. 

BEFORE marriage I believed I could make my own blueprint and that I knew what it took to have and MAINTAIN a “successful” marriage.

Then, I got married…………….

If you will, please let us bow our heads & close our eyes as I lead us in a quick prayer .

Lord, forgive me for seeing situations with childish eyes.

Forgive me for judging what I couldn’t possibly understand. 

Forgive me for thinking I was above “real life situations”

Forgive me for assuming I knew what went on behind closed doors and beyond social media post 

And let us say Amen, & Amen

Not until I was married myself did I see what Marriage truly means. What it means to sacrifice and what commitment is.. ESPECIALLY in this new day and age. 

For me specifically, my husband and I came from two different spectrums of life. 

Me, from a semi strict, two parent household, that went through trials and tribulations which ultimately ended in separation and soon to be divorce. 

My husband, from a single parent household where he needed to be a man from an early age. Made his own decisions and was the opposite of sheltered. 

They say opposites attract, which could be true but if those opposites don’t have all the important conversations necessary then they can potentially fall victim to repeating a viscous cycle of the broken family.

When I say important conversations I’m referring to conversations about Childhood Traumas and adult expectations. I recently did a poll on Instagram using my followers       (friends /families/previous coworkers) asking the question “Do you think your childhood traumas play a significant roll in your relationships (current or past)”. To give a better understanding I listed a few common traumas: abandonment, lack of specific parental figure, abuse (all kinds), order of birth, too much responsibility, too little responsibility, loss of family member etc. Participants could either answer YES or NO to the question that I posed and 100% of the participants answered YES.

100% of the participants acknowledged this to be true, yet I wonder how many people have had those difficult and uncomfortable conversations with their significant others. I wonder how many have been honest about where there insecurities and expectations stem from.  I also wonder how many people listened to their significant others childhood traumas and still went on to create situations to mimic or trigger them whether maliciously or not. 

I used to believe it was as simple as

“Hurt people, hurt people”

But as I’ve grown and have done more reading and more living, I’ve realized its much deeper. I believe it’s more like,

“Some people are raised on survival not love” 

In the article  “Survival Traits Children Use When Raised In A Dysfunctional Family, by Alexandra Massey, she further explains the above quote in much detail. Massey writes ,

“Survival became a full-time job. We had to detach from our emotions because they were too painful or confusing. This is called ‘disassociation’ which is described as when our psyche seals a part of itself away from current traumatic events. This was a protective measure to defend our inner essence or being. That inner sanctum escaped the desecration, the violence, the neglect, the sexual abuse and other violations.”

We wonder why we hear the constant conversations about people not being able to communicate, or not being able to express themselves or their feelings. Sometimes it’s NOT because they don’t WANT to or don’t CARE, sometimes it’s because they have been training their brain since childhood to simply SURVIVE. This is their protective measure their defense mechanism, that now has been carried over to adulthood and they may not even be aware enough to change it. 

To bring this macro conversation back to micro, in my household we’ve  been trying to combat our childhood traumas with this notion,

“We are about to be parents and what we experienced as children can’t and won’t be passed down to ours. We have to be the change that we want to see.”

For example, my husband and I communicate VERY differently, granted it’s learned behaviors but at some point when does that stop being an excuse. I grew up with a very loud/ dominate mother and a father who’s motto was

“I’d rather be happy than be right”

My mom was the loud clapping in your face, say the first mean thing that comes to mind type of person. Shut you out for hours and days if it meant she didn’t get her way ( sounds familiar ???? Lord knows I’m not proud) however, my dad never raised his hand to hit her, even though I distinctly remember a day when my mom was in a fit, me walking up to my dad before he left the house saying,

“Dad I swear I won’t say nothing if you just slap her one good time she talks too reckless”

My dad responded with no smile or laugh on his face

“I could do that but what would that tell you when you get your own husband, that if you raise your voice he should hit you? Just because I’m physically capable of causing harm doesn’t mean I need to. You have two choices in life, you can be Right or you can be HAPPY and in this moment I choose to be happy so I’ll give your mom some space and I’ll be back”

Typical day in the Headley household. 

Now, my husbands means of communication mirrors my dads which is high key annoying. He’ll say his piece as calmly as possible but if I don’t let up and he finds himself getting too agitated by my reactions he retreats. Retreating can mean 1 of 2 things. He’ll okay me to death and do the quick empty apology or he’ll go for a walk . I’m grateful that none of the options were to slap fire out of me or try to yell loud and see who can say the meanest things but his way of communication is also detrimental, because nothing gets resolved. I feel we have gotten better at communicating but we still trigger each other and quickly fall back into old habits. It takes simple things for us to fall back because we are addicted to dysfunction, that is all we know and it is our comfort. Change, being the bigger person, living life right is all a task that involves effort, maturity and commitment. All things that at different points we both lack unfortunately.

As individuals we have so much to learn, as a married unit we have so much to learn and now we are adding on being parents. As much of a difficult task I know we have , I believe we were the ones being fresh and need to take this one for our future borns. Once they come we should have at least grown as individuals and as a unit ( It won’t be perfect but I know that recognizing a problem and actively working towards healing is definitely a step in the right direction . 

You have been an amazing crowd. get home safely,

-Otivia the dysfunction addict