I spent some time last night conversing with a woman about her concerns about her 11 year old son. He had been beating on her, and she had been afraid to tell anyone. Apparently, even her neighbors had occasionally heard their fights, and things finally came to a head when he went after her with a baseball bat. So the police were called, he went to live with his father, and she got an order of protection. Then his father started calling her, and he was being abusive too, so she got an order of protection against him.

I told her that I would guess that her concern about what would happen to him was more painful than anything he had done to her, and that she had kept quiet for so long because did not want him to end up in a juvenile home. I think I would have felt the same way.

I know from my own court experience that kids who have these problems do not necessarily end up bad adults, and that parents with kids like this are not necessarily bad parents. I think that was the main thing I tried to emphasize with her. That she was not a bad parent.

I've seen the insides of way too many families not to understand that most of us have something screwy by the standards of "Leave it to Beaver", "The Bill Cosby Show", or whatever family sitcom people are watching these days.

The fact is that although having screwed up parents may make it more likely that a child will be a screw up, it isn't any guarantee. My parents were pretty high on the screwed up end of things, and they had 9 college graduates and no one in trouble in the law. One of my chemistry professors had a father who was a bank robber who held his entire family at gun point once, but this professor was a meek fellow who did very good work and had a nice family.

On the other hand, Jeb Bush and his wife were probably pretty good parents, but one of their daughters ended up a crack addict. An attorney I know has a child with all sorts of behavior problems, but the attorney is a very nice guy and is well respected in the community.

Also, although most of my clients and most of the people that end up in my court are lower class, there are a lot of screwed up individuals who are upper class and make a lot of money. Those folks don't end up in court as often, but high stress jobs and lifestyles are as likely to create family messes as low incomes and the stress of just getting enough food to live. In law school, I had a friend who had been a teacher in a private school, and she talked about a lot of abusive and addicted parents. Among other acquaintances, I've seen it as well - attorneys who had parenting problems, other high income individuals with very significant problems. Just a lot more under the table.

So there are a lot of fucked situations out there. There is probably nothing special about you. Just accept it and deal with it, and get on with your life. Focus on the positive. Set goals. Move on. Chances are there that there is someone out there with a rougher background than you who has made more of their lives. Did you watch your parents go to the gas chambers at Auschwitz? No? Well kids who did ended with very normal lives.

(Btw, no violation of attorney client privilege here. Just a friend)