It Runs in the Family

My mother has a mouth on her.

She's customer services worst nightmare. She can pick you apart in a matter of seconds. She cusses like a sailor and her words are the birth place of most of my childhood insecurities.

My mother has a mouth on her and when I get mad so do I.

My family is laced with generational curses. My parents thought that if they moved out of their small Louisiana town to Texas that our family would be free of them, but they had no such luck.

My mom still had a baby in her teenage years.

My father ended up leaving and my mom had to raise us on her own.

Generational curses aren't about the environment, they're about the people.

A younger version of myself watched how my mom tore people apart with her words and even though I was told differently, I subconsciously eternalized that I should act that way. And when I get angry and I'm not directly thinking about my word choice, I sound just like my mother.

Generational curses aren't easy to shake. They come knocking on your door like an old friend, and they look so familiar that you almost don't even question letting them in even though you know better.

I think the best way to break them is to recognize them early on and to know their name before they even show up.

My oldest brother had a beautiful baby girl with a really toxic ex of his, and every part of being a part of her life is not easy for him. Her mother intentionally makes it hard for him to see her and play a part in raising her.

She's eight now and he still has not given up, despite the fact that he's married now and has started a family of his own.

When a problem arises though, his first instinct is to just walk away, but he was aware of the generation curse in our family of males leaving the women to raise the kids and he promised that the generation curse would end with him.

So he chooses everyday to fight to be a part of her life.

Sometimes generational curses sneak up on us because of our pride.

We tell ourselves that we are nothing like our parents and we will never make the same mistakes. But the truth is we are completely capable and very much so likely to make the same mistakes.

So be aware, and when infidelity, addiction, anger, and all of the other baggage that your family line has been carrying around for far too long comes to knock on your door, be ready to turn them away.