4. CHILDHOOD DISORDERS, A LYING SPIRIT

      In the Serenity Bible, a companion to twelve step recovery, I learned how most of us have some peculiar, addictive or compulsive behaviors we have trouble controlling.  In the book, Biology to Belief, I learned how hard it is for us to overcome deeply ingrained sub conscious behavior.  The author describes how a Jewish concert pianist who'd been through hiding during Hitler's regime and had a deep seated fear of exposure, forced himself to fight against these ingrained behaviors to keep hidden, performed a brilliant public performance and was insane for the rest of his life.  I experienced a much milder version of this with child rearing.

     Growing up as the oldest of 5, with a father who had irregular sleep hours and was intolerant of kid noise, we learned to be quiet.  Normal, happy, healthy kid noise was sometimes slapped or belt whipped.  Some chore could be found for rambunctious kids.  I developed an association of normal kid noise with pain and can’t stand it to this day.  Loud adults also unnerve me.  My brother  has some similar issues though not as bad as mine.

     We kids learned to stay hidden and be quiet.  From 7^th grade on I buried myself in school books and did well academically.  After leaving home at 16, I was able to test out of several college classes.

     I developed a mental issue while raising my sons.  Attempting to break the chain of abuse, I tried to be a fair, decent father though was drinking alcoholically the first half of their childhoods. Having grown up with frequent belt whippings, thought that was the appropriate thing to do but will go to the grave remembering my oldest’s  anguished cry of “Daaad!”  during a belt spanking.  I stopped using a belt after that.  It didn’t seem right.  He was 7 or 8 at the time.

     Around the age of 12, I traumatized him again.  His younger brother was a small kid while he was well built and large.  Little brother was constantly trying to pick fights while the difference in size and strength was comical. 

     I suspect little brother was being a major pest and the oldest locked him in the jet ski trailer storage box for a few minutes.  As what I thought was eye for an eye punishment, one Saturday I told him to come get in the box where he was going to spend the afternoon.  I was going to leave him there for about 5 minutes but he didn’t know that.

     After the elapsed time when I was ready to let him out, I heard that anguished cry again.  “Daad!”  Both of these incidences truly hurt me more than my son.  Now, 20 years later, I still cry when I think of the anguished cries from that sweet, innocent child.  We shouldn’t traumatize our kids.  I believe it lets in demons or evil spirits, not the same thing, I'll describe later.  If they go through childhood with enough trauma or anguish, these things develop strongholds and will haunt them for life with various disorders.
     I didn’t want to be the same abusive father I’d had to my sons.  I wanted them to have happy childhoods and not despise me as I did my father.  I’ve apologized many times to them for my intolerance and harshness and they’ve forgiven me but I have a hard time forgiving myself.  I wish I had been more loving and affectionate.

     I felt the responsibility to teach my sons to work and fill in holes that parents often overlook.  I heard from a couple sources that kids performance in school is mainly due to fatherly encouragement.  I also heard that we tend to neglect teaching them about finances so I tried to fill in these gaps.  I taught them how to work on their cars and attended hundreds of hours of sports and school functions to show my support.  I wasn’t at all into watching sports but it was fun when one of my kids made a play.

     I had been used as cheap labor for hard work.  I appreciate being taught to work but always felt was paid unfairly so I tried to be more than fair to my sons paying them as much as I could justify.  I was a hands on builder and always had work they could do.

     My natural tendency was to be unreasonably demanding and hard to please.  I remember fighting against that telling myself, “It’s ok if I’m not getting my money’s worth from their efforts, I have a responsibility to teach them to work and give them some skills.”

     With a bit of what was unnatural patience from me, though they may not have seen it that way, they both became good helpers at many building trades.  The youngest loved to roof and I was happy to turn that chore over to him until he left for college.

     Around middle school both were doing mediocre work and complaining about how hard math was getting.  I remember explaining, “No it’s not.  The next step is no harder for you than a first grader learning 1 plus 2 equals 3, but if you don’t learn a step, you may get behind and never catch back up because math builds on itself.”

     I told them school was their job and if they didn’t do well, construction work wouldn’t be optional anymore as I was going to be sure they grew up with some skills.  From this point on they excelled academically.  My oldest found he had a knack for math.

     At the age of 21, he was grad student teaching 2 calculus classes, working half time in aerospace for United Launch Alliance, maintaining a 4.0 gpa with a 3/4 load towards his first masters.  In his spare time this super nerd trained and bench pressed 300 pounds.  That’s my boy!  I did something right in spite of my mental issues and broke the chain of abuse going back I don’t know how many generations.

     Regarding multi generational disorders, pysychiatrists may call them learned behavior, doctors and scientists may call them faulty neural pathways, but I believe Dr. Bree Keyton’s explanation, familial spirits.  These are demons passed down in families from one generation to the next. 

     My oldest, now with 2 masters in math and a certificate, is now in his second phd. program and currently lives with his family in Rome, Italy as a statistical analyst for the U.N. just because he wants to live overseas.  He can write his own ticket.

     The youngest hasn’t found his career path yet but banked 50K last year doing technical work for a big plant expansion on the west coast of Canada.  He’s an extreme sports enthusiast, skydiving for a hobby, doing flips on water and snow.  He’s bungee jumped in New Zealand, has a neat video of doing back flips as he parachutes out of a hot air balloon.  After enough parachute jumps, he wants to start base jumping and skydiving in a wing suit.  I wish he wouldn't but we have to turn them loose.

     They are the pride of my life, independent, healthy, happy, high achievers.  I like to think more because of me than in spite of me.  I tried harder to be their father than their friend.  Their critique of me is that I was too petty, demanding, intolerant of kid noise, but they knew I loved them and appreciate the way I prepared them for the world. 

     Having fought against my sub conscious tendencies while attempting to be a good father, I now have a disorder about seeing kids raised in ways I know will turn out badly and it’s been a problem in relationships I've had since my first divorce.

     It’s a frequent tendency in split homes for parents to compete against each other in winning the child’s love.  Too much is often given or done for the child and I know this is going to turn out badly. 

     The child is going to grow up and become an unhappy person.  He will have this deeply ingrained sense of entitlement.  It won’t be explainable but it will be there.  When the world doesn’t do for the child as mom or dad did, it will be the world’s fault in the eyes of this person.  Too much love can be as bad as not enough or even abuse.

     In my second marriage, the grown stepson had trouble with all authority figures, the employer, the landlord and law enforcement.  What’s really sad is that at some age, the parent will blame the child for being exactly as the parent raised the child to be, but it will become the child’s fault for being that way.  As his very classy mother crudely described him, "That kid's so f****d up you can't trust anything that comes out of his mouth," yet he was exactly as she had raised him to be.   Then, when we come of legal age we are responsible for our behavior, whether we can control it or not.  Dysfunctional people beget dysfunctional people as the Serenity Bible says. 
      In my second marriage, there was a multi generational lying spirit and I saw how it was transferred.  Simply accept a child’s lie to cover some minor misbehavior, do it dozens of times over the child’s rearing and you will raise a compulsive liar who can’t help but lie, perhaps to avoid responsibility, look good or maybe just spice up the conversation. 
    Getting back to my bizarre experience, shortly after my baptism in the spirit, the Holy Spirit told me to go to GA. for the month and something good would happen for my wife.  I didn’t want to go.  It was early November, my youngest son and I had tickets to go down for Thanksgiving, why drive down now.  “Go now” he persisted, so I did.

     At first my new wife was angry with this impulsive decision but agreed that some time apart might be good for our relationship.  I prayed much of the way repeating, “Let the word do the work,” though I didn't know what it meant and “The truth will set you free.” 
      There were serious issues with the teenaged son, the second of my wife's four sons and one of her 2 offspring from her marriage to a homosexual man.  This trophy woman had suffered anguish in childhood from not enough love and one of the manifestations was loving her sons too sensually.  The now 14 year old boy had late stage oedipal complex issues I could clearly see.  I felt if he were honest about this there might be some healing that could come from disclosure.  That was my reason for repeatedly praying, "The truth will set you free."  
     Unfortunately another manifestation my wife had was a need to look good and accept no blame for anything so she was deaf to my observations.  This issue came to light later when the boy, at 15, had his first girlfriend and instead of walking on air was talking suicide.  I heard indirectly that he acknowledged I'd been correct about the oedipal complex.  The marriage was ending then though with a restraining order against me so I don't know how it turned out.

        When I got to GA., I found my mother in the hospital, just having had hip replacement surgery and she had no one to stay with her.  I recall my decision to make the trip was affirmed in other ways as well. 

     Shortly after Thanksgiving was over, my wife denied my trip had had spiritual leading saying nothing had happened for her.  We were doing a lot of correspondence by email as we had separate residences half the time, a concession to her ex for my previous reprehensible behavior while having an obsessive episode. 

     A few days passed and she contacted me saying she thought she’d been leading me to God but that I was leading her.  She’d received a conviction about compulsive lying.  This was a deeply ingrained behavior and as we parted company soon after with a restraining order against me, don’t know about long term effects.  
     Hopefully in the eternal scheme of things, something good was done for His kingdom.  The Spirit had been right when he told me to go to GA.  I think that was a bit of prophetic insight from the Him.

     The Healing House prophets told me a couple months later, that I had a bit of the gift of prophesy from the Spirit and that it was to increase. 

     I explained in an earlier posting that after my baptism of the spirit, I was relieved for a time of obsessive disorder but unfortunately, it came back.  I’d uncovered a web of deception  from my new wife who I later learned was a compulsive liar.  It was passed down in this family. 

     I’d learned via my grown stepson that his younger brother was angry and rebellious because of all the men mom went through and disgusted that when she had no man, they had a wonderful, happy little family but when mom had a new guy, she’d neglect the kids for him.  This woman had been trying to fill a love wound from childhood with sex.  I wasn’t angry about her promiscuity, we’d already worked through that and I couldn’t condemn it with similar behavior of my own, trying to fill that same hole.  I was angry because I’d made it clear that with my mental issues, absolutely could not deal with a rebellious teenaged boy. 

     I wouldn’t have married her with this son at home but he was supposed to be finishing his high school years with his father.  This is what I wanted to discuss with her but she had a guilty conscious about her promiscuity and didn’t want to talk to me.  With our living arrangement,. she could avoid me. 

     The obsessive disorder took over and I was leaving unwanted messages and saying terrible things such as , “You’re right, you were a slut and still are a liar.  Talk to me, damn it!”.  She told me to stop calling or she’d call the police.  I did, but then she had a bad dream that I was pounding on her door with the intent to hurt her and called anyway. 

     I wasn’t there but was arrested  for harassment with the accompanying more serious domestic violence rider, which by law accompanies harassment charges in intimate relationships in the state of CO.
      My wife didn't know what might set me off into some episode, blowing things out of proportion, being verbally abusive and she'd had enough. 
     I learned from my oldest stepson that due to Mom's co dependence she had a bad habit of getting involved with bad men.  I was just another in a long line.  She told me about her previous boyfriend getting very angry when he stumbled across some email detailing a one night stand while he'd thought he was in a monogamous relationship.  She couldn't see how she'd done anything wrong.  They weren't married after all.  He was just another mean intolerant man.  I told her I'd have been angry too.  Perhaps the problem wasn't just bad luck on her part or the fact that all men are bad, maybe it's her perception of men resulting from their responses to her behavior.  We all create the worlds we live in based on our behavior.  We reap what we sow.
     She convinced her family and friends that all her problems were the men's fault, she was innocent and they believed her. She was just unlucky with men.  She attempted to blame me for the boy's oedipal complex.  I told her I didn't cause it, just pointed it out.  Her attempt at atonement for the boy's problem was a qualified apology, "If I did anything wrong raising you, I'm sorry."  Jezebel never repents according to Dr. Keyton.  
     Now that I've painted a picture of a sex addict who doesn't accept any responsibility for her actions, let's visit her childhood.  
     She was a beautiful little girl, the third child.  Both mommy and daddy were kind and loving.  She thrived on mommy's attention but couldn't get enough of it.  Her daddy was gone much of the time traveling with work and her brother and sister were always giving mommy trouble.  She tried to be perfect to get praise from mommy for being such a good little girl.  Mommy had some issues and would sometimes lock herself in her bedroom and read.  Whenever she could she tried to be mommy's helper.  She kept herself neat and tidy so as not to cause any trouble for mommy.  No matter what she did though mommy just didn't have time for her.  Then when she was 8, a little brother came along and mom was extra busy taking care of him.  No matter how hard she tried, this innocent little girl just couldn't get enough love. 
     The habits stuck and as she grew older she kept trying to be perfect and look good.  She felt alone and anguished in a house full of people.  
     She married a handsome man but he didn't seem to be attracted to her.  He didn't like the touchy feely stuff and told her to meet those needs with other men, just not to get emotionally attached, a horrible situation for a love starved woman.  It finally came out that he was gay.  
     She met and married another handsome man but he was very irresponsible and that ended in divorce too.  Now she tries to fill the love hole with men and doesn't like to be without one in her life but conflict always comes up and they all seem like bad men to her so she keeps looking for the right one.  Her intentions are good in the way she loves her sons but her actions aren't.  She'll look bad if she admits to any wrongdoing so there's some seriously ingrained denial.
     Her need to please and look good works wonderfully at work but not so well in the rest of her life.  How's God going to sort it all out when innocent children grow up with trauma or anguish, strongholds come in, then they misbehave as adults in ways they can't help?
     There are many of us misfits in the world and some of us are able to channel our defects into productive use.  My over analytical thinking served me well with all the details involved in building a house.  Some of us look very good to the world.  My wife and I raised out kids in a 5,000' log home we'd built almost by ourselves.  At one time we had a motorhome, boat, 2 jet skis, 2 snowmobiles and 3 dirt bikes, enough toys to treat our less successful friends.  I was the sole bread winner.  
     Denial is strong in most of us.  We fool ourselves as long as we can.  If we come to accept our problems we'll still try to hide them from the world.  Some of us seek help from secular sources with poor results.  Drugs don't work and may cause their own problems.  If we're to improve and get rid of the strongholds causing our problems, we'll have to get help from God.