Who am I? (Part 2)

When I was a child and most of my young adult years, I rarely had to struggle for anything.  My parents over time had done pretty well for themselves, and I had done pretty well too.  I was the captain of the football team in college.  I got good grades, and got a job for a hedge fund.  Then I started a real estate company and it did very well during the good years.  Then it seemed like this giant house of cards suddenly all came crashing down on top of me.  

All in a span of a couple of years I went from being a millionaire to owing millions of dollars to creditors even though I had never missed a payment or had credit card debt.  My dad got caught cheating on my mom with a girl that had been with my brother.  As it turns out he had been cheating on her for most of their marriage.  Later we found out he had been having sex with one of my adopted sisters since she was 13.  One of my children was diagnosed with autism.

I had lost everything I had worked for and by this point had lost my religion too.  My whole world had been turned upside down.  I was never huge on money, and to be honest, having a lot of it just brings tons of extra responsibility.  But my wife blamed me A LOT.  So we fought A LOT!  And suddenly bills started piling up for therapy and everything else for our autistic kid and all these services started popping up for him that we just couldn't afford.  So now, us losing that money was really affecting the services he could get. 

Many people think autism and think to themselves, "Must be tough to give up on dad's dreams of him becoming a football star"  "Must be hard to have a socially awkward kid who won't have many friends"  And yes, that will be difficult, but the bigger struggles come with all the other things associated with autism that cause a daily grind and spend every ounce of energy and thoughts inside you.  It's the obsessions like grabbing everyone's arms around them and squeezing, kissing, licking, digging his chin into, etc, etc.  For going on two years now!!  It's like chinese water torture and there seems to be no end in sight.  It's the ADHD, when he is so hyper that just to get him dressed in the morning was a 2 person job.  I would pin him to the ground while my wife as quickly as she could would swap the clothes but he kept escaping and we would have to start all over again.  It's him dropping his pants in the middle of a restaurant and us chasing him around when he is 6 years old and completely naked and insane.  It's the stares from other parents asking us why we can't control our kid.  It's the night after night of him waking us up at 2am jumping on our bed uncontrollably, keeping us up for hours over and over again.It's having to go pick him up from school and take him to a psychologist because he threatened to burn up a kid and put him in a trash can when he is 7.  It's tantrums over things that aren't even in your control that seem so trivial, yet he can't deal with the frustration boiling up in his head so instead he throws chairs and screams and kicks the wall, then tries to burn the house down by tearing the electrical socket out of the wall.  

That's now my life, and yet somehow through it all, I love him.  Still I can't help but feel real anger at God for putting this burden on me on top of everything else I had to deal with.  More importantly I am angry at him for allowing my child to have this struggle inside himself.  To be born with no ability to understand the world around him.  

And when the cards kept falling as I had said before, I eventually ended up cheating on my wife too.  Then I had to deal with feelings like, "Am I my father?"  Am I destined to follow the same path?  For anyone who has had a terrible father or mother I'm sure you understand the feeling all too well.  

During this time period I struggled, I got depressed which usually meant I was just numb.  I would do things just to feel something again.  Like cheat again, or go gambling.  (Luckily I tended to win more than I lost or it could have been much worse).  More importantly though, during this time I reinvented myself as a different person when I came out the other end.  My belief system had changed a lot.  I find things about myself to be proud of, like that I haven't given up on my marriage when many lessor men would have.  I am there for my kids and would do anything for them, including working extra shifts to pay for my son's services, many times not getting home until after they were asleep.   I helped people every chance I got, and I cared about people.  

I still have some anger inside me, but I feel like I am coming out the other end of this fighting and that's one big reason I'm starting this blog.  Because I want to find myself again, and maybe help other people to do the same.  And on top of that, maybe help some other religious people peek outside the bubble they live in and think outside the box from time to time.