(The article below is based on an excerpt from my book, Crazy Was All I Ever Knew: The Impact of Maternal Mental Illness on Kids. I have used a pseudonym to protect the privacy of family members.) Once when I was in my early twenties, I confronted my mother. I matter-of-factly said, “You know, Mom, you beat me. You beat me a lot.” She replied, “I don’t remember that.” “Well, you did,” I pressed. “Maybe I slapped you once or twice.” So, that was her concession. A letter came 20 years later.

Photo credit: Xavier Mouton/Unsplash.com I missed out on hugs and cuddles. My mother, who was mentally ill, did not display affection. In second grade, I walked home from school with a friend. I remember watching as she ran up her front steps. Her mother would be waiting for her at the door with a smile. She’d open the door and wrap her arms around my friend. I was jealous. As explored in a previous post, young children need positive stimulation—back and forth interactions—from adults for...

Photo credit: pixabay.com (The article below is based on an excerpt from my book, Crazy Was All I Ever Knew: The Impact of Maternal Mental Illness on Kid s. I have used a pseudonym to protect the privacy of family members.) My mother, who was mentally ill, never hugged me, never caressed me, never held me close. As a young child, I had no idea what I was missing. As an adult, I realized that hugs and kisses instill security and stability in kids, and pave the way for healthy emotional...

Photo caption: Sharon Mccutcheon/unsplash.com (The article below is an excerpt from my book , Crazy Was All I Ever Knew: The Impact of Maternal Mental Illness on Kid s. I have used a pseudonym to protect the privacy of family members.) Most kids of parents with a mental illness experience childhood differently and less innocently than other children as they deal with their often chaotic home lives and navigate their worlds. **** If you are the son or daughter of a parent with a mental...

Photo credit: Myles Tan/Unsplash.com (The article below is an excerpt from my book, Crazy Was All I Ever Knew: The Impact of Maternal Mental Illness on Kid s. I have used a pseudonym to protect the privacy of family members.) Research shows that many children who experience adversity are amazingly resilient. Why do some children who experience trauma adapt and overcome, while others suffer long-term consequences that hold them back in life? Researchers from the Center on the Developing Child...

Photo credit Unsplash.com/🇸🇮 Janko Ferlič (The article below is an excerpt from my book, Crazy Was All I Ever Knew: The Impact of Maternal Mental Illness on Kid s. I have used a pseudonym to protect the privacy of family members.) As a child, I lived in dread that something would set my mother off and she’d fly into a violent rage, unleashing a torrent of physical abuse. There never was any reason for the abuse. There didn’t have to be. Something would invariably infuriate my mother. I...

By Alice Kenny (The article below is an excerpt from my new book, Crazy Was All I Ever Knew: The Impact of Maternal Mental Illness on Kids . I have used a pseudonym to protect the privacy of family members.) Growing up with a mentally ill mother, I learned to stay under the radar—to avoid drawing attention to myself in my home and later in the world around me. This gave me a sense of safety. My mother’s behavior was erratic, and she displayed a propensity for unprovoked rages. Her mental...

photo credit: chuttersnap/unsplash.com By Alice M. Kenny (pseudonym) (The article below is an excerpt from my new book, Crazy Was All I Ever Knew: The Impact of Maternal Mental Illness on Kids . I have used a pseudonym to protect the privacy of family members.) The emotions adult children of parents with mental illness experience are a mixed bag. Sometimes a jumble. Guilt, loss, grief, and resentment are among the emotions that persist or bubble to the surface in adulthood. Some feel...

photo credit: VG Stockstudio/Shutterstock.com by Alice M. Kenny (pseudonym) (The article below is an excerpt from my new book, Crazy Was All I Ever Knew: The Impact of Maternal Mental Illness on Kid s. I have used a pseudonym to protect the privacy of family members.) It’s not as if you wake up one day and say, “I’m going to be anorexic. I’m going to shrink away and dwindle down to nothing.” The disorder takes hold with Svengali power, and it steals the very life out of you. Oddly enough,...

photo credit: Evgeny Atamanenko/Shutterstock.com By Alice M. Kenny (pseudonym) (The article below is an excerpt from my new book, Crazy Was All I Ever Knew: The Impact of Maternal Mental Illness on Kids . I have used a pseudonym to protect the privacy of family members.) As a child, I lived in dread that something would set my mother off and she’d fly into a violent rage, unleashing a torrent of abuse. I was physically abused by my mother, but I considered the beatings tolerable. It was the...

To this day, I still think of my childhood home as "the crazy house." Like me, millions of adult Americans are living with the effects of the precarious childhoods they experienced as offspring of mentally ill parents. If you are one of them, you can no doubt relate to my book. As a child, you most likely lived in a crazy house of your own. As an adult, you’ve probably retained and may even relive memories of your tumultuous upbringing. Crazy Was All I Ever Knew combines memoir with...