This piece was written by one of our dear readers—a woman with something real to say. Each month, we handpick the best submissions for Dear Reader because we’re after that PROVOKED bite: truth, intelligence, and heart. These stories come from women our age—women who’ve lived enough to know better and still care enough to tell it anyway. Because being seen and heard matters. Because storytelling is how we stitch ourselves to one another. And because when one woman speaks her truth, another finally recognizes her own. — Susan Dabbar, Editor-in-Chief
Being raised by an emotionally unstable parent leaves lasting marks on one’s character and sense of self. As a boomer—a child of the late ’60s and ’70s—the unspoken rules were clear: shame, secrecy, and silent endurance.
Beneath the Surface
Just beyond the vegetable garden on the property of my childhood home, there was an underground bunker we called “the pump house.” It was a concrete-lined chamber, accessible only by lifting a heavy trap door and descending a steep, unforgiving ladder—one that seemed to plunge straight into the heart of childhood fears. Peering down, it was easy to imagine yourself a prisoner in that damp, shadowy vault—a thought that could quickly spiral into terror if you lingered too long.
A Father Who Fixed What Could Be Fixed
My father—a tall, blue-eyed Italian man with grease-stained hands and an ever-present sense of purpose—was the guardian of that space. Mechanically gifted and endlessly capable, he made everything seem safe. The pump house, to him, wasn’t just plumbing and wires. It was chemistry, precision, and responsibility. It was the nerve center of our property: It controlled the water to the house, the garden, and the pool. Down there, he could fix anything—until life broke in ways no wrench or valve could mend.
My parents bought the pump house and the home it came with when I was 10. It was a kind of paradise: four acres to explore, an old in-ground pool, a bocce court, a greenhouse, a potting shed where we whelped German Shepherd puppies, rows of vegetables, and pens full of rabbits and chickens. Dad, a full-time auto shop owner and part-time farmer, lived for things that made noise or needed fixing—engines, tractors, pumps, motors.
In this paradise, my father was a competent, tireless do-it-yourselfer—adjusting water flow, troubleshooting pool filters, untangling crossed wires and broken pipes, and for a while, even holding together our lives.
Until he didn’t.
Until he couldn’t.
Someone moved the ladder.
A Mother Without Language for Her Pain
Our life had always felt a bit like Green Acres in reverse: My dad was the grounded Eddie Albert, while my mom was a glamorous Zsa Zsa Gabor. He was all about “the chores.” She was all about “the stores.” My mother, too, was Italian—a petite beauty with green eyes, blonde hair, and a radiant smile. Always stylish, always elegant, and always somewhere else, emotionally. She didn’t give a fig for the garden, the animals, the pump house, or my long, barefoot explorations. She was affectionate but distracted, fashionable but unstable.
She was also bipolar in a time and community where such things were neither acknowledged nor understood. In our new neighborhood of tight-lipped WASPs, our loud, earthy Italian family felt like unwelcome guests.
The “otherness” of our heritage, the isolation of the property, and the silence around mental illness pushed my mother’s condition to its extremes.
The Rules We Never Said Out Loud
As my dad descended the metaphorical ladder into the abyss of my mother’s unraveling, I stood at the edge, a child peering into a darkness that even he couldn’t fix. I watched him wrestle with problems no toolbox could solve. No matter how strong his hands or how clever his mind, some things—emotions, illness, heartbreak—were beyond his reach.
My childhood became a study in contrasts: functional competence on one side, emotional chaos on the other. From him, I learned how to solve problems; from her, I learned that some cannot be solved. If you grew up with such contradictions, unspoken deflection and protection were the rules. My four siblings and I didn’t have language for it. We had coping skills.
Looking back now, I carry both the joy and the heartbreak in equal measure. I try to lean toward the joy, toward gratitude for the strange and beautiful lessons my childhood gave me. Somehow, I inherited the emotional depth my father yearned for, and the strength my mother could never quite grasp. Between their extremes, in the space between the garden and the pump house, I found grace, ferocity, and defiance to limited expectations—an “I’ll show them” mentality that’s served me well.
Inheriting Fear—and Outgrowing It
In my teens and young adulthood, I lived in quiet fear that my mother’s emotional disabilities were lying in wait for me. I often wondered, “What does it feel like to lose one’s mind—to become nonsensical, uninhibited, unmoored?”
I had read enough to know that mania often first presents in late adolescence or early adulthood, and yet my four siblings and I all seemed solid, intact.
My father had an expression: “The rocks in my head fill the holes in your mother’s.” Over time, I came to thank God for my father’s steadiness, for the grounding force of his genes, his temperament, his presence.
Just after my first child was born, I was forced to face a life-threatening illness in my mid-20s. I braced myself for collapse, for unraveling—but I didn’t crack up. Instead, I discovered a depth of peace and resilience I had never imagined possible. That experience ended my fear of mania, of insanity, of losing myself.
Down the Ladder on My Own Terms
And now, just beyond middle age, I find myself reexamining what I once believed was a secret no one wanted to know. Being vulnerable is healing, and if by sharing I can help someone else, that’s an added gift.
I now know the “pump house” is nothing to fear—going down that ladder and landing firmly on your feet is liberating. My peace of mind and accomplishments have been hard-won over decades of continuing to stand up. I’ve earned it. I passed this tenacity to my children. I challenge you to find your voice. The power is in not staying silent.
