Childhood Emotional Neglect

Okay, the title may be a bit misleading.

If you're reading this blog to understand what Childhood Emotional Neglect (CEN) is, or whether you have it or not, then maybe my experience will resonate with you.

Last Tuesday, I found out something about my dad that, completely shattered my image of him. I won't discuss that in detail, at least not yet.

My sisters and mom knew for 2 weeks, but hid it from me, heck two of my aunts knew about this too. But, they were "afraid I won't know how to mask my emotions" which turned out to be true.

But, that isn't fair. because the way I found out, was waking up at 7:50 AM, on the second day of Eid over the sounds of my parents screaming. I pretended to stay asleep.

The fight continued until noon, there were breaks between the fights and by then Dana and mom explained to me what happened.

Needless to say, I didn't know how to process my emotions. Shocked, angry, betrayed.

But I kept calm, for the most part the first day. I was still trying to absorb it all and Dana was visibly upset by all of this since she spent the summer with him in Kuwait and saw more hypocrisy than I did. I took dana out to eat at Cora's since I didn't want to stay at home with dad alone and the air was too tense.

The plan was to go to the mall then to an Eid festival downtown. Dana wanted to get her charger from the house first, so we made a quick stop. I walked in with her. I did my best to control my emotions, but then he cried in my arms that afternoon saying: he did a mistake but didn't mean to hurt mom's feelings. That he played around and that he was sorry. That my mom asked for a divorce and she said the decision would be up to us (her daughters) whether we wanted our dad in our lives or not...not that he's even in our lives.

I let a single tear slip, but held myself together as my dad sobbed in my arms in a very surreal experience in my life. Dana ran upstairs to get her charger, but I heard her sob too.

I just stood there, wondering if these were crocodile tears. wondering why it was my decision to choose what happens to their personal life, wondering what he did exactly, how many times, why he was crying now. Was he crying because he was sorry or that he got caught. Then I got angry.

and angrier.

That anger built into an inconsolable rage over the week.

I was so angry, that I couldn't speak or even look at my dad. for an entire week, I avoided him. when he asked me a question, I told him to google it. When he walked in the house, I kept inside my room for hours, or kept myself busy planning my sister's henna party.

I was so enraged that I periodically would lash out at people. I couldn't contain my anger, and I had no outlet. I felt that all the guilt of spending money on myself over the years, has been for a man that spent hundred on his mom and mistress.

No one was proud of me for paying for my masters degree by myself. If anything, my mom thought I was an idiot, for turning my dad's offer down. I thought he would be grateful that his money would go into the mortgage instead. the money went to his parent's lawyer, his brother's car, and his daily starbucks coffee instead.

Meanwhile, I was counting every penny I spent on food while I was studying 12 hours a day on campus and budgeting myself. Savings by working in a call centre that gave me anxiety or working in a job I enjoyed but pushed myself to 60 hours a week to save for my tuition.

I cancelled my trip to NYC to see a friend I only get the chance to meet once every 4 years because it coincided with him visiting Canada and when I hinted it to him, he guilt tripped me into staying.

So, throughout the entire week, I felt rage and guilt and resentment. I probably still feel all those things, but they're under a degree of control. I used to start crying every time my mom would talk to me about it. But she wouldn't talk to me about how I feel, she would scold me for talking to him a certain way, she scolded me for talking about him with such a venomous tone that she caught him crying alone in the car. She told me that the tone I used was so vicious, that she thought I was angry at her too.
For 5 days, I was crying several times a day.

Dana called me selfish for making this about myself. My older sister tried to tell me that it's their decision and personal life and advised I should not get involved. Mom told me I have unresolved anger issues and clearly (as I told her before) I was holding on to a lot from my dad and this was the last straw.

She asked me if there is anything that happened to me in my childhood that she doesn't know about. But there was none. I was never abused, never did I experience a traumatic event, everything I asked for I got.

Yet, I had intimacy issues, I had cycles of guilt and resentment, and I never remotely considered myself a "nice" person, because of the thoughts I hold. I mean, I almost told my dad to kill himself, but avoided him because I was so scared I would say it in such a venomous tone that he actually might.

The cycles of guilt and resentment didn't start now. It didn't start when I was studying masters in school either. The peaked with my first mental breakdown during the MCATS, but I had them before then too. Before my sister started her anti-depressants again. It was also during my bachelors, even though I was so happy with my accepting friends and the results I saw over my hard work. But I did experience a lot of resentment and guilt towards my older sister for resorting to me when she needed help in her schoolwork. I had them in highschool with racist Kuwaities. I'm not sure when I started living in these cycles, but they're becoming more apparent with age.

Maybe that's why I'm also very independent, or at least, feel extreme discomfort seeking help in anything, because I don't want to bother people around me.

I stumbled on CEN, the thing that never happened to you in your childhood.

Maybe it's an exaggeration, maybe I am being selfish, but maybe I really do have Childhood Emotional Neglect.

My dad was almost always out of the picture growing up. Either he was in a different country, at work, at grandmas, at the gym or sleeping.
When he would eat with us, he would often be on his phone. When I talk to him, it would be a lecture, or disdain to my topic. If he went shopping with us, he would get cranky and impatient to eat much like a child.

He was also verbally abusive, up until I entered 10th grade. That was when my older sister travelled to Canada for university. By then, I was heavily dependant on online chatroom platforms where I sought my emotional support, and still do.

My mom was an introvert, raising three daughters like she was a single mom. With a full time job, an hour drive to and from work, and coming home to cook and launder. She had enough time to smoke a cigarette, grab a bite to eat, and talk to us while she was helping us study or playing a game on her phone or on her laptop. 

When we were in Canada, between my older sister's depression and suicidal tendencies and my younger sister being a toddler, I felt I had no time with my mom, but I couldn't blame her, because she was doing her best. I remember when I made some stupid figures, I would gift it to her, but she would forget about them because "love is not expressed through words, but through actions."
A lesson, I honestly don't think I needed to learn at 10 years old.

So, maybe that was the trigger? That was the CEN? It was certainly unintentional, but maybe it explains why I hated hugs and kisses after coming back from Canada, why I spent my time reading or chatting online, why I'm so independent and wish to live alone, why I suppressed my tears growing up and still struggle with processing emotions I consider "vulnerable".

If the blue applies to you, maybe you have CEN too.

Care to share your experience in the comments below? I'm sure most east asians and Arabs can relate.

Peace,
M.D.