You Can Have A 2nd Childhood

The Contrast Between Childhood and Adulthood

I’ll be 42 years old in a few weeks.  This past week I was in the MMA gym training and I felt great.  In this same week I have done 4 strength training sessions at home, I’ve done exercises in the gym at my job, and I’ve gone on several long walks around my neighborhood.  This while writing almost daily, doing speech prep for my toastmasters group, spending time with my wife, and planning a trip to visit my parents.  My schedule is full of things that I love doing.  Knowing how good my body feels and how good I feel in general, I can’t help but contrast the way I feel today with how I often felt as a kid growing up.

I’m going home to Birmingham, Alabama to help take care of my parents while my mother is recovering from knee replacement surgery.  I’m grateful because for the first time in my adult life I am traveling to this city and I don’t feel the anger, rage, and sadness that marked my childhood there.  I got bullied regularly in school in Birmingham.  I got belittled by classmates and even a few particularly unfit teachers.  I ate and watched pornography to soothe the pain.  An old ankle injury and years of chronic stress would exacerbate the physical and mental challenges brought on by being overweight.  I was always angry or sad.  I was always suppressing those emotions and presenting as if everything was okay.  I was almost always in some kind of physical pain.  Though I was desperate to participate in sports, I struggled to show any prowess in athletics.  I always dreamed of being a professional athlete but struggling in my own body and having virtually no self-confidence made athletics a constant source of disappointment.  Add in the constant drudgery of school work that I had no interest in, and you have the makings of a pretty miserable childhood.

While I was in it, I wouldn’t have told you I was sad or angry.  As I said, I spent a lot of time pretending to be okay.  However, to know what happiness is now and to reflect on my youth, I can unequivocally say I was living in a constant state of misery.  Mind you, I’ve had some pretty low moments as an adult, but none of it compares to when I was growing up.  

But here I am today.  I did an Amatuer MMA fight at 39 years old.  Now I’m about to be 42 years old and my body is feeling much better than it did even just a few years ago.  It feels like I’m a professional athlete.  With all the knowledge I’ve gathered from online over the years about strength and mobility training, it’s like I have access to top of the line athletics coaches and facilities.  I’m learning Mixed Martial Arts from former professional fighters.  Even the nature of my job as a security guard allows me time and opportunity to stretch and do simple exercises alongside plenty of walking/thinking through writing/speech content.  My diet has even been void of sugar for the past 4 weeks which is the longest stretch of clean eating I’ve had in 5-6 years.

To add to this, I’m more financially sound than I have ever been in my life and I have regular access to healthcare as a veteran.  I’m getting to do what I want to do with my life and I’m getting to spend time with activities I find interesting and compelling.  It seems like this is what my childhood should have felt like.  I’m getting to be who I am and I’m getting to do the things I want to do.  I’m actually okay.  No more pretending to be okay.  

Show Up Even When You Don’t Feel Like It

My relationship with my mother was very challenging when I was young.  At home, I was often on the receiving end of her frustrations with life in general.  We’ve talked extensively about these things in recent years and I’ve forgiven her because, as an adult, I recognize the complexities of dealing with the many highs and lows of life.  We all make mistakes.  Nobody gave my mom any tools to contend with the traumas she had endured in her life and she struggled with depression at times because of it.  I’m fortunate to have come into adulthood at a time when it’s okay to talk about these things.  All this to say, she could be very harsh at times but I never had any doubt as to whether she loved me.

One way I knew this was by the way she stayed on top of me about my school work.  I didn’t like it because I didn’t like school.  However, I knew her insistence that I work hard academically came from a place of love.  Now that I’m heading to Birmingham supporting her post surgery recovery, I’m having some new revelations about the value of her pushing me to succeed when I was young.

More and more I’m realizing how unique it is for someone with my experiences of abuse in childhood to be as high functioning of an adult as I am, without ever having had any professional counseling.  I saw my sister struggle greatly with mental illness when she was alive and I have seen the same issues with extended family that are a part of our generation.  I haven’t had those issues.  Some of that is good fortune in making the choice to join the military. Also, more good fortune in not seeing extreme amounts of combat while I was deployed to Afghanistan for a year (I only saw one major gunfight in which no US personnel received major injuries).  The Army helped me learn how to process much of the suppressed anger/rage I carried from childhood.  The Army is also where I was introduced to Mixed Martial Arts which continues to help me process the issues of my youth.  The other key part of my high functioning as an adult is knowing how to create structure for myself.  I believe that skill is largely a result of being pushed by my mother to work hard in school.  

I wasn’t a gifted student.  I had to really apply myself hard to be academically successful.  The impetus to push myself was driven primarily by my mother’s constant prodding.  Unlike myself, my older sister was a certified genius.  I don’t ever recall seeing her study for anything when she was in highschool.  She could speak Spanish, she drew beautiful freehand drawings, and she scored almost a perfect score on the SAT.  West Point recruited her for her academic prowess.  School was easy for her.   It didn’t force her to self-regulate in the same way I had to.  I think this is at least part of why she struggled so much as an adult.

I learned to turn off the TV to study.  I learned to get up a little earlier to study on days where I had a big test.  I learned how to pull all nighters when I fell behind on things.  I learned to schedule my time well because I was such a slow reader and writer.  I also learned to schedule my time well so that I could continue working out and participating in athletics.  If I didn’t do well academically, my mother would have no doubt pulled the plug on workouts and sports.  School was the first priority in our home. 

Whenever I go back to Birmingham I always think about the struggles I had growing up there.  I think about all the disappointment and shame I often felt when playing sports with classmates.   When you’re overweight, unathletic, slow, and your knees hurt constantly, doing well at sports can be inconceivable.  But to be headed there today at almost 42 years old and be in the best shape of my life… the distance I have traveled in my physical abilities and my self-confidence is almost unfathomable.  When I was at the base of that mountain looking straight up, just losing a little bit of weight seemed impossible.  I can’t help but think that the same way I learned to be persistent in academics is the same way I learned to persist with unlocking athletic ability in my body and developing self-confidence.  

I never used my engineering degree as a professional.  However, getting the degree and graduating with honors, forced me to engage regularly with extremely challenging subject matter:  Circuit Theory, Electromagnetics, Calculus, Physics etc.  The fight to learn the complex theories involved in my college degree made me confident that I could learn anything, given the time and resources.  In learning biomechanics to heal my body, learning investing to save for retirement, learning public speaking, learning martial arts, or learning medicine in the military, I’ve not been intimidated by any of these tasks because of my journey through engineering school.  Simultaneously, I’ve never taken my ability to learn any of it as a given because of how hard I had to work in my k-12 education.  That commitment was driven in large part by my mother (Also, losing often in sports created lots of humility in me early in life which has been another invaluable trait in any learning process I’ve encountered as an adult).

I hated school but I learned to be good at it through consistent effort.  There is something particularly valuable about being able to consistently show up and work hard at a task you don’t feel like engaging with.  Especially, once you learn to focus that characteristic in a direction that truly lines up with the person you want to be.  

Doing things consistently even when you don’t feel like it.  I love exercise.  If I only did it when I felt like it I’d still be over 300 lbs!  Activities like these can build discipline and help us learn to appreciate the mundane in life.  In my experience, mundane repetitive activities like those associated with developing my academic prowess, are where real skill is developed.  Also, the mundane is where we create the soil for unique opportunities to appear.

You Deserve A Second Childhood

I’m getting to live a second childhood right now.  I’m writing regularly.  I speak regularly for my Toastmasters Group.  I train in Mixed Martial Arts every week.  I’m strength training on a regular basis.  My job is the easiest I’ve ever had and pays me well.  I’m married to a woman who lets me be me and she’s financially responsible.  Right now, I’m able to do all the things I want to do with my life.  It’s an amazing gift but it was built intentionally.

Being in good physical shape in my 40’s has meant a long road of learning about my body, doing simple mundane exercises thousands of times, learning to fall in love with the mundane task of cooking food daily, and as I said, following through with workouts inspite of how I feel.

Being in good financial shape has meant learning about money through reading, getting on a budget, having the discipline to log every expenditure I make, creating good habits around saving, and recognizing that financial security isn’t a sexy process.  It’s slow and boring.  You just have to stick to the process over time.

Speaking and writing have most definitely meant consistently showing up and doing the work in spite of my feelings.  Speaking to empty rooms and writing many things that will never get read.  Even all the videos I’ve made over the years that are no longer available online, were an exercise in communication and therefore highly valuable for my development as a communicator.

A good relationship is definitely built on consistently showing up in my own life to be the best person I can be, so I can come to my wife as the best man I can be.  The same is true in all of my other relationships.  My ability to be in Birmingham with my parents is largely a result of the physical and financial resilience I have built in my life through simple mundane activities that are now deeply ingrained habits.

In martial arts it’s often said that the athlete must learn the basics of the sport before expressing creativity in their own methods.  You have to know the rules before you can intelligently break them.  I believe life mirrors this concept.  Before I was able to live a life of being a practicing martial artist, writer, and speaker, I had to learn the rules of life.  I had to learn disciplined habits with health, money, and relationships.  I had to learn the simple stuff that’s not sexy.

Being more athletic in my 40’s than ever before and participating in combat sports is me ‘breaking the rules’.

Being debt free and still saving for retirement with a low stress security guard job is me ‘breaking the rules’.

Being able to pour lots of time and energy into writing/speaking (that doesn’t pay me) is me ‘breaking the rules’.

Being a high functioning adult with good relationships as someone who experienced abuse and chronic stress for my entire childhood is me ‘breaking the rules’.

You have to understand the rules of the game in order to intelligently break them.  There’s no doubt that my mother’s insistence on my academic success helped set the groundwork for that mentality.  You may not have had an adult in your life that pushed you in that way but you can make a choice today to see the simple tasks in your life as opportunities to develop the discipline to have the life you want.  Exercising will get you healthy, chores will keep your space organized, a budget will get your finances on track, and learning to speak calmly when you’re angry will facilitate healthy relationships.  Master the basics and then you can get creative.

If you are like me, your first childhood wasn’t good.  Trust me, that kid still lives inside of you.   That kid deserves another chance to live and enjoy life.  For that kid who didn’t ask for any of the hardships they endured, do the hard work mastering simple things so you can have a second childhood.

Remeber to share this with someone who needs it. Thank you for reading!

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