Why it's so Hard for Daughters to Heal from Father Wounds: My Guest Blog at More to Life Magazine
Michelle Watson
"There is a delightfully quirky poet named Shel Silverstein who many of us grew up reading. I am especially fond of his poem called Hinges.
“If we had hinges on our heads there wouldn’t be no sin.
‘Cause we could take the bad stuff out and leave the good stuff in.”
If only there was a neurological delete button or some kind of magical mental scour pad to erase the hurtful messages that so easily play on repeat in our brains. I’d sign up in a heartbeat if something like that existed, wouldn’t you?"
I’ve always been a bit of an intense bumpkin, a “feeler,” I guess you could say. My dad, on the other hand, isn’t wired quite the same. You see, he grew up in an alcoholic home with harsh realities that one would expect to go along with that kind of environment. Living in extreme poverty on the south side of Chicago there were three different last names among the seven kids, which essentially translated to a survival-of-the-fittest way of functioning. My dad developed a strong work ethic at a young age while intentionally putting his mind over matter. There wasn’t time or opportunity for self-pity so after years of conditioning he learned to make the best of things without complaining.
There’s much about his stance that I respect. But there are other parts of it that couldn’t be further from how I live or the way I’m wired. I thrive on talking about the story and the backstory, the truth and the pain and the lies that are embedded in the wounds. In fact, I’m so invested in living like this that I not only function this way in my own personal life, but I do this as a profession.
Let’s press rewind for a minute. At 24 years old I was working as a dental assistant while living at home after college. It was a bit of a dreary time for me but I was trying to love and serve God as best I knew how despite my melancholy vantage point and single-white-female reality while most of my friends were walking down the aisle in white...."
To finishing reading about how I came to understand my own father wound, and how there's healing for all of us who've been wounded by our dads, head to More to Life Magazine today! #daddaugtherfriday