Generational Trauma and Abuse

Generational Trauma and Abuse occurs when a parent or authority figure passes down their own trauma to children in their care. As a nineteen-year-old indigenous male, I have dealt with generational trauma and abuse. To explain my personal experience, we will have to go back to my parent’s childhood. In doing this I wish to analyze three of them my mother Rachel, my father Jacob and my stepfather Thomas.

To start off with I wish to analyze what I know about my mother’s life. My mother was born on the 23rd of May 1983, in Camden Hospital. An indigenous woman with a father that had already left and a mother that had had one other kid. My mother was a young child growing up with a drug-addicted mother, being indigenous in the 1980s the government did the thing they always would do, they stole my mother, her sister and her newborn brother. The issue was that they perceived they were bettering my mother, but in actual fact, she started getting moved around the system and developed a huge distaste for other indigenous people. Drugs, alcohol and underage sex lead her down a dark path and at the age of 17 my mother met a man at a Youth Refuge in Goulburn. Her and Jacob had their first child at 18, him being a drug dealer and her being an addict their relationship was built on the foundation of needs and dependency. This was not an ok situation for a child to live in. Then two years later I came another dependent to a family that already wasn’t going well, my mother was drinking when I was still in the womb I don’t know if this is what caused my Asperger’s, but it does show that they were not ready for one baby, let alone two. In conclusion, it wasn’t entirely her fault for her actions yet.

Now to talk about my father Jacob, I honestly don’t know that much about the man, I know he was very big on drugs, being both a drug dealer and abuser. I know he is racist and is an anti-vaxxer. I know that he has multiple sclerosis, which severely affected his capacity to move and speak properly in later life. I also know that when I was three years old on my birthday, he physically abused my mother and went off and left us. I also know that in 2012 around Christmas time he was very high on a mixture of drugs and got into a car with his friends, went speeding and he hit a young woman around my age now and ran away from the scene of the crime. Only to hand himself in later. She made a full recovery and is doing much better now. The best way to describe my father is a horrible person, but I don’t know enough about him to say there isn’t a reason.

My stepfather Thomas is a much different story. Thomas was born on the 3rd of October 1982 at Goulburn hospital. He was born to a white family that practiced old-age beliefs, such as physical violence for discipline. Although it was only smacks at first, his father would get into a truck accident. This would cause serious brain damage and amnesia. After recovering enough to return home he believed that his son Thomas wasn’t his son and would beat him so badly he would be hospitalised. His wife would consider leaving at points but stayed, I still couldn’t understand why. Growing up in an abusive household he learnt about violence at a very young age. This went on to fuel his own style of parenting which I will cover in the next paragraph.


Now about my childhood, I was born 5th of March 2003 at Goulburn Hospital. My biological parents were reported to FACs in November that year because of the belief of neglect and drug abuse. The next year my mother and father’s relationship would start to spiral until the 5th of March 2006, which was the second last time I ever saw my biological father. In 2006 my mother met Thomas as they lived on the same street. He was a professional spray painter for cars. They would move in together in 2007 at his house just up the road. In 2007 I would also start preschool being that I was set to start Kindergarten next year. As soon as we moved in with Timothy he changed, became more dominant, and aggressive and in early 2008 I got hit across the back of the head, for not paying attention when he was talking. Something must’ve clicked in him because from then on the littlest things would get a hit on the back of my head, Brushing my teeth too quickly, holding my fork wrong, dropping a cup on the floor and eating too much cereal were common ones. In 2011 I was very antisocial and my Asperger’s was playing up. I hadn’t been diagnosed by then but I assume that’s what happened, but by now we were starting some new assignments. Posters. I wanted to do one on tigers but every time I would write I would always drift off into thought and my handwriting would go sloppy. Instead of being a good person and helping out he pulled out a belt and whipped me across the back. I still remember the pain. That was the new habit after that I was 8 years old and I was already feeling immense amounts of pain every time I messed up. My mother at this point would help out with the pain, a bit of Panadol here a bit of betadine if it was bleeding. But she would never intervene. One day I don’t remember the year I fractured bones in my arm roller skating, my father wanted me to help clean but the pain in my arm stopped me from doing much so he grabbed my arm and squeezed. This exasperated the fractures but he wouldn’t take to the hospital. Until the next day at school after swimming, with a fractured arm I might add, I tripped over landed on it again and was sent to the hospital. About a week later I saw him pick up my older sister and throw her to the ground and she broke her arm. Two broken arms in the span of a week. At this point, I had become numb to feelings and emotions and became more protective of my sister. From that day on, if she fucked up the slightest, I immediately claimed responsibility, I didn’t want to see my sister get hurt. It pains me to think that even as a child I was so scared of him hurting my sister that I willingly put myself in harm’s way. In high school, I developed a bit of a temper. I would start showing signs of aggression throughout school and got into a couple of fights. I was becoming my stepfather, slowly becoming more and more violent and dominant, I would hate myself. One time I was at lunch and a kid threw an apple at my sister and I just reacted and pummelled this kid, it just overtook me. By year 9 I was contacting Anglicare and DOCs trying to get out of my abusive house and after a while I did, on the day I left for the last time, Rachel and Thomas had friends over I was clear with them about what I was doing, and he went and tried to tackle me. I dodged out of the way and he broke his kneecap trying to tackle me, then he threatened with legal action when he found out where I was staying, who does that to a child?

Nowadays I live in a studio apartment, I have no job, no degrees and no social connections. I have a huge fear of relationships because I don’t want to turn into him. I don’t have contact with any family members. I can’t drive because I’m too scared to turn into my dad and I deal with severe anxiety and stress, as well as CPTSD and anger issues. I wish I could say that my life is fucked up because of me but it’s really not it’s my Mother and my Father and my Step Father, and whoever fucked them up so badly it put them in this way. So In conclusion Generational Trauma and Abuse are fucked up things.