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What was it like being my father when I was young School/ADD even though I struggled with school my test

scores where high. Parents were frustrated as to why this was. By 6th grade child study team did assessment. Results did not prove ad but a learning disability. Parents were not informed as to what to do with information. Not until I was sick with mono doctor suspected add symptoms and was diagnosed with. Due to the absence of information parents blamed me for trying hard enough. Father was very regretful to blaming me. Father felt extreme guilt for treating me this way. Father felt lot of anger at self due to missed opportunity and missed experiences. Relationship with family relationship with father was very strained. Father worked very much and was not home. Mother was much closer. Father was more likely to let me get away with things to learn how to deal with life by 17. Mother was much more controlling. Parents stopped bringing me on vacations. I did not want to go away with them as much. Father often overreacted to my actions. Father says he was always trying to teach me a lesson instead of just being friendly. Computer merit badge. Father caught himself afterwords and was angry with himself and feel guilty. By then it was to late and damage had already been done. Relationship with peers father was never crazy about my friends growing up. Parents always hoped that I would choose better friends <social, econimic>. Looking back father says that he noticed that my friends werent bad at all. Parents had higher expectations and did not like me hanging out with them. parents expected me to go to college and none of their familiys did. Father was fearful of me being around these people due to their influence on me. John during time of fire parents were more concerned about how I was feeling due to my struggle with what was going on. My parents noticed I was very concerned with my friend and would not blame him no mater what happened. Parents noticed I was very depressed. Friend in car accident. Lack of siblings/adoption Grew up very independent but was also very protective of me. Parenting styles were both very different. Father was very all about rules. Mother was more sensitive. Father says I never had enough experience to share with other people due to lack of sibling or going away to college. Every birthday my father thinks of me but also my birthmother. Once in a while father could tell that something was bothering me due to lack of genetics. Father was much more overprotective over me than say a natural child. Overall mother gave me unconditional affection. Father is proud of set of values he instilled in me.

Brian Altamura November 29, 2010 Parent Interview

I chose to interview my father for this interview. My father is currently 65 years old and works as a CEO for a mental health facility in Cherry Hill. I was adopted at birth and raised by my parents as an only child my entire life. From what I can remember, I grew up in a pretty normal household and had an average childhood. I chose to interview my father since we have always had a kind of confrontational relationship as I was growing up and wanted to see if we could both reflect on that and maybe learn something from it. I first asked my father about how he felt towards my changes through my high school years. My father had always valued schooling as a top priority even though I may not have at that age. My father explained that he was always very frustrated with my school grades and lack of motivation towards school. He could never understand that even though I would always produce high test scores with specialists he never understood why I could not pay attention in school. He remembers that it was even more apparent when I entered high school. My parents were both very frustrated as to why this was, but my father took it personally as his own shortcoming, which resulted in many fights between him and I. My father told me that by 8th grade he took me to be evaluated by a child study team. Results were not conclusive but they thought I had a learning disability. My parents

were not informed as what to do with me and this just angered my father. This resulted in many fights between us as he did not know how to handle it. When I was 18 my father took me to a doctor for something else and the doctor suspected that I might have ADD. After being finally diagnosed correctly I began taking medicine and doing much better with school. Due to the absence of information, my parents would blame me for not wanting to try hard in school. My father remembers feeling extreme guilt after knowing that I was actually having a problem. He regrets yelling at me and blaming me for not doing well as it was not my fault. To this day my father feels a lot of anger at himself due to many missed opportunities and experiences with me since he was so focused on blaming me. When I asked my father to talk a about my relationship with my family he was very focused on our relationship. He remembers that my relationship with my mother was much greater and friendlier, while our relationship was very strained. My father worked very much and was not home most of the time. My father would often over react to my actions. My father remembers that he was always trying to teach me a lesson. He remembers one specific occasion while I was in Boy Scouts. He was teaching a course for a computer merit badge, and naturally since I was his son I did it with him. He remembers making it so hard for me that we got into a big fight and I never finished it. I soon went on to quit Boy Scouts shortly after. He always regrets and blames himself for his actions, which resulted in me quitting. When I asked him why he did it he really could not understand why. He thinks he just wanted me to be the best in it and forgot that it was about having fun first.

By the time I reached 15 my parents stopped bringing me on vacations with them. He said he remembers one year they left me home with my grandmother watching over me. The next year I was watching her while they went away. He remembers that I would distance myself from the family and began to be with my friends a lot more. My father said that when I reached 18 and was able to drive he began to loosen up with me more. He said that he wanted me to learn more about how to deal with the real world by experiencing it. When I asked my father about my friends, he remembers never being crazy about them. My father said he always wished that I would have chosen friends of a better social or economic class like him. Looking back my father says that he noticed that my friends werent as bad as he thought they were but he just wished that I would have been around more ambitious people. My father had high expectations for me and expected me to go to college and be successful. He was afraid that if I hung out with children of families that did not have high expectations that they would influence me badly. He noticed that even though I surrounded myself with questionable people in his eyes I never really changed my set of values. During the time when my friend John lost his family to a fire my father was very concerned about how I was feeling. My father noticed I was very concerned with my friend and would not blame him no mater what happened. A few weeks later another friend of mine was killed in a car accident. My father noticed that I was very confused and depressed during this time. Being an only child my parents let me grow up very independently but were also very protective of me. My father remembers being all about rules while my mother was

more sensitive. My father says that I never had enough experience to share with other people due to lack of siblings or going away to college. He never regrets not having another child, since adoption was very hard at the time and my parents constant work schedule prevented them from having more. My father thinks that because I was adopted is the reason why he is more protective of me as I was a gift. During my birthday every year my father always thinks of my birthmother. He often wonders if my birth parents think about me, or how I feel about them. Since I have no memory of my birth parents I dont see my parents any different but my father always noticed that during my teenage years that I often struggled with identity since on a genetic level I dont match my parents. Overall my father is proud of the set of values he instilled in me. When I asked him if he would change anything if he had to do it all over again he only wished that he would have been friendlier with me and not as controlling.

Throughout the entire conversation with my father I noticed a reoccurring them of individuation. I noticed that there were not many problems with school or the way I participated with friends or family but the way we both had different approached on the subjects. According to Moores definition of emotional independence, I can remember being this way as far back as I can remember. I never really opened up to my father because he was always wanting me to be something else. This resulted in me relying more on my friends than my family at this time in my life. If I had a problem with school, work, or anything I would try and find my own way of dealing with the problem rather than going to my father.

When I asked my father about what kind of friends he envisioned me having, he gave me an example of somebody we knew but then quickly withdrew his statement as he remembered those kids did not turn as successful as he thought they would. I always noticed that my father had always been more comfortable with what he knew than explore what else might be out there. My father always thought that my friends would have been a negative influence on me but he finally realized that it was me that chose them and not the other way around. I always held onto his set of values and beliefs whether he knew it or not but was just always naturally more open to different kinds of people. I think my dad was just naturally scared of what he did not know. Peer relationships are often a fertile testing ground for youth and their emerging identities (Brown, 2004) While my father always wanted me to surround myself with teens of his choosing I wanted to surround myself with people that better understood who I was. Since I am an adopted only child I never really had anyone my own age to learn from growing up. My fathers interest and mine were like black and white. I would always have the same set of morals as him but I needed to find people that better understood me and shared my interest at that time in my life. My father was not able to understand this during those years. I could tell that my father was very emotional when it came to him and I. He feels much regret and anger for the way he raised me. I never really noticed it until he put into perspective for me but he often resembled the authoritarian parenting style while I was growing up until I turned 18. I can remember when I was a child wanting to play with my friends or watch a movie he would sometimes say no even though I may have done this activity at another time. When I would ask him why not, his response was always

because. This always angered me when I was a child but infuriated me when I was a teen wanting to go out on a date. This often led to heated debates with no end. During our interview/discussion I think we both came to some better understandings of each other that have been long overlooked. We both enjoyed exploring each others points of view during this time in my life with some better clarity. I dont think either of us would make any drastic changes in the way we dealt with each other if we had to do it all over again but are glad that we can both learn from some of our mistake and enjoy each other now.

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