Healthy Families Don’t Have Secrets

Guilt breeds shame, shame births secrecy.

My family has a lot of secrets. Some of these secrets we’ve safeguarded so long, the only thing still secret about them is our actual silence. We don’t talk about it because speaking it makes it real. As long as we suffer the consequences of our secrets in silence, we tell ourselves the world is oblivious to our sins. But it’s no actual secret that every cookout turns into a drunken brawl or that most of the women in my family have been victimized by previous partners, nor is anyone on the outside fooled by our primped packaging and picture-perfect holiday posts. Still, we maintain the facade, convinced there’s something noble about our silent suffering. And in a community where family business stays in the family, no matter who it hurts, we’ve had no issue hiding our hardships. We all took the oath, whether knowingly or unknowingly. From childhood, we’d been taught to protect our family’s appearance from the attack of the truth, and in protecting ourselves from the ugliness of our human truth, we’d all grown comfortable living our lies. And growing up, I never questioned whether or not our little code was constructive. That was until our secrets got heavier, and I found myself struggling to carry them.

Healthy families don’t have secrets. People don’t like when I say that and truthfully, neither do I. But I say it…