I spent the first years of my life having grand mal seizures, sometimes several a day. My earliest memories were formed in the Navy hospitals being poked and prodded, and shoved into MRI machines, with apparently no answers as to what the cause was.

The answer came later when I was “old enough to know” and my mom told me about how my dad had dropped me on my head as a baby when he was drunk. They didn’t tell the doctors this, apparently, and for the first six years of my life I was seizing constantly. I eventually grew out of them but there was long term damage I still deal with to this day.

The worst part of it is growing up the butt of the family jokes about being dropped on my head as a baby. Once the secret was out, it became something else to use against me. Every chance they got, they pulled it out. That hurt.

Even worse than that is the fact that my father refuses to acknowledge or take responsibility. I get it. Denial is a helluva drug.

So is choosing estrangement from your abusers. It feels amazing.