Finishing School

I watched a couple of episodes of Shameless earlier, Friday evening. [Spoilers. I’m about to reveal plot points.] We watched episodes 3 and 4 of season 5. 13-year-old Deb becomes aggressively flirtatious with a 20-year-old pizza delivery guy, and Lip nearly flunks out of college. Both of those storylines got to me, and that’s because I understood why these two exceptionally bright and likable young people were being so reckless. They come from a chaotic and dysfunctional home. They have not been parented. I understood this because I can relate.

I loved my parents, and I miss them everyday, but they weren’t great parents. I think they did the best they could under the circumstances. They weren’t cruel. But they were incompetent to say the least.

My mother was seriously mentally ill. She regularly talked to people who weren’t really there. She believed in elaborate fantasies that only made sense to her. My mother loved me, I’m sure, maybe more than anyone else ever did, but all of this stuff that was going on inside her head distracted her. I don’t think she was even aware of my presence half of the time. Sometimes I would have to shout at her and wave my arms in front of her face to get her attention.

My father was an uneducated country boy who thought looking after kids was “woman’s work.” He didn’t know how to deal with Mother’s illness. He didn’t know what to do for her, and he didn’t know what to do for his children. So he basically blocked us out. He stayed away as much as he could, and when he was home, he’d ignore us. When he was around us, it always seemed like he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Dad was a social man, and with other people, he was usually relaxed, open and happy. But when he was with his family, he was bug-eyed.

I know what it’s like to have unreliable parents. I couldn’t tell them anything. I couldn’t talk to them about anything, nothing that really mattered. I was terrified of either of them or anyone finding out I was gay, and I was afraid of how my mother would react if she discovered I was having any other kind of trouble. Someone stole one of my textbooks when I was 12, and the teacher refused to give me another. She said it was my problem that it was stolen. After several weeks, I reluctantly told my mother. The expression that came over her face was startling, and before I could get the whole story out, she was on the phone. Mother must have made twenty threatening and harassing phone calls to my teacher that evening. I was honestly afraid she would kill this woman. Well, at least I did get a new textbook, but I knew I couldn’t trust my mother to be rational. And Dad… He would have acted like I was sticking needles in his eyes if I so much as asked him to help me with a math problem.

The way I coped with this was by turning inward. I became exceptionally shy and withdrawn. Unlike the Gallagher kids, I was way too timid to act out. I didn’t learn many social skills when I was a kid, but I stayed out of trouble, and eventually, I learned how to study on my own. When I was about 14, I decided I wanted to go to college. That would be my means of escape.

I did engage in sexual activity when I was Deb’s age. The boy I fooled around with also came from a dysfunctional home, so both of us could slip into the woods on warm summer days and stay gone for hours without anyone even noticing. We didn’t have to explain or ask permission. No one cared. For the most part, those experiences were positive for me. I wouldn’t trade them. I wouldn’t go back and have it not happen. Given the time and the homophobic culture, it might have served me to an extent to have parents who were disengaged. Parents who were paying attention would have noticed my lack of interest in girls. Affluent parents might have even sent me to a therapist. That might have been the best thing for me if I got one who understood what was happening to me, but what if I had landed in the office of one who still believed in “curing” homos?

I wish I had someone to talk to. My special friend was willing to do things, but he didn’t want to talk about it, and at that point, he wasn’t willing to think of himself as gay. But at least I had the freedom to discover the joys of sex. However, I know it could have went terribly wrong. What if it had been an older boy who had led me into the woods with the intention of raping me? What if I had blown a boy, and he told everyone in school? So as I watched Deb go through her sexual awakening, I tensed up and waited for the shit to hit the fan. I wanted her to have a trusted and nurturing adult around to tell her that it’s okay to have those feelings, it’s okay to want those things, but you have to be careful, and there isn’t any rush.

As I watched these kids experience the consequences of bad or nonexistent parenting and remembered what it was like for me when I was their age, an idea came to me. I think it would be nice to have a kind of finishing school for young adults from dysfunctional families. When the kid is 18, and their crazy parents no longer have any legal control, they could voluntarily sign up for a two year training program. They’d have to wake up early, make their beds and engage in exercise, just like in the Army. They’d have to be clean, neat and presentable at all times. They’d be fed healthy food, and they’d have to eat it using correct table manners. They’d learn standard English and take classes that would prepare them for college. Every day, they’d see a therapist who was specially trained to help young people with neglectful or abusive parents. They would get career counseling so that they could plan their future. It would be drilled into them every day that they could achieve their goals so long as they were reasonable and they worked steadily toward them. They would learn coping skills and social skills, skills that would help them thrive. It would be an intensive, nurturing and highly disciplined program. I could have used a school like that. I think it would have helped a great deal.