The dream: 2247 Baily Avenue.

The childhood home — one room where I grew up, and then the other room, once my brother’s, where I stayed with my own children for a time after my divorce.

Two kinds of shame: one as a child, and one as an adult.
The shame of the adult takes an even tighter hold on the constraints of your manhood when it is shared with your own children. That differs from the shame you carry as a child yourself, growing up in the house of pain.

How you deal with the shame you feel depends a great deal on the audience around you.

Note

The trauma: CEN or childhood emotional neglect: CPTSD 

The father: authoritarian narcissistic

The mother: codependent, and lived in fear, but also looked away and did not protect

The ex-wife: also authoritarian with a need for control

In one room, you are the child

And in another room, you have your children who see 

Two rooms in the same bewilderment

The common denominator: me

The activities of a child versus 

The activities of a man

The comparison is poignant

But the shame still stands

I now understand my trauma

Unhealed wounds must be processed through connection

In silence, they fester unseen

So with this testimony, I raise my objection 

One shame is learned

One is self created

The burdens of inequity

When you point the finger at yourself – it’s related

The lessons of accountability

And the politics of shame

It’s extremely hard to point the finger

When the finger is pointed at your name

Oh how we justify

The economy of quid pro quo

Just what do we testify?

Sometimes, I don’t rightly know

Like sitting in your own church

Like sitting in your own pew

Just what will we receive?

Just what will we do? 

In childhood I learned to overthink

In adulthood, I did the same

I now try to integrate emotion 

The man, the boy, and the claim 

Over 50 years with living in silence

The reflection from the polished mirror, I am now me 

Funny how when I start to go blind

It is now that I begin to truly see 

CLG

…

DCG