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In Reply to: Re: Interesting Gen-X article posted by CB on September 18, 2006 at 20:21:58:
Do you think you were a loser back in the day based on identifying with "hippies" which was the "in" thing for youth to do at the time? I think of the sixties and plays like "Hair" which were about what youth were about at the time.
I don't think you were a loser because of being a hippie. I think you'd be a loser if you molested kids or battered your partner or whatever.
As far as your parents go, I am glad you got to reconcile with them and forgive them for whatever past you had with them that was hurtful to you. I never had that opportunity with my mother. She died and prior to that she was very hurtful to me and my kids. I just don't think she was capable of reconciling because she was just plain too fragile emotionally and couldn't face anything about the past.
My father was terminally ill before I left home and died shortly after I joined the Family. I did hear that he said to my sister that he was sorry for how he was as a father to me in the past. He was a real sadist but a lot of that was related to his alcoholism.
I have made peace with my past but without having to have those relationships. What I mourned for when they died was the relationship I did NOT have with them and wished I had known what it was like.
I don't hate them now. I used to say that if the house was burning and I was a kid back when I had this dog I really liked, and there was only one person I could save of my family, I would save my dog. AND if the house was burning and I could only save two members of the family..I would save my dog.
That extreme anger is gone now. I'd try to help any of them taking time back. But I understand that deep deep justifiable anger. I know that to get past it, it is a CHOICE and not something anyone HAS to do.
It hurts like hell to think of what the Family became before I got out and I am glad I got out before things got much worse. I know that if the Family was upfront about turning women into prostitutes and Berg's idea of sexualizing children was in the forefront I would have run the other direction as fast as I could.
Do you think that what the First generation as youth experienced is comparable to Stockholm Syndrome? We weren't captured by armed terrorists or anything, but our minds were pretty twisted to believe God could kill us or throw us on some human dumping ground or harm those close to us for defecting.
Isn't that even more powerful than being locked up? Because when you are locked up there is a hope for escape and you know the people who are holding you are the bad guys.
This subject is NOT about discounting or discussing what SG have survived. I have no problem seeing the damages done to them. I am very glad to hear of the successes of those that have gotten out of TF and on with their lives.
Do any of us get out of something like the Family without emotional scarring?
