MK forum

So much of what we've said is about sexual abuse, but then it starts you thinking. . .I'm laid up for the weekend with a bum knee and Vicodin, so please forgive me if I ramble . . .ok, so Sonnett described watching her sister die of malaria on one of the old threads . . .what else have we been through? Here's some I remember:
1). Being picked up and set down on other continents at the decision of others
2).watching sick loved ones get improper medical care
3). Having guards on every block because of so much looting
4) watching our van burn up, and then have hoards of Brazilians rifle through our belongings
5). Trying to be there for our family in the States thru ham radio.
6) watching your dad get propositioned by a prostitute at a truck stop . . .
7). Hearing about your dad being arrested and released for involuntary manslaughter
8) hearing about an assault on your mom that you're not allowed to talk about . . .

What traumas have you been through, and how has it affected you in your grown-up life?

I'm an Army Brat, not an MK. But, a number of the things you mention were true in Army Brat life, too.

Maybe I need to get myself some Vicodin....

I know my husband's home in town was robbed;
the Indians were pointing poison arrows at his dad while the family hid in the hut, the boys were going to shoot the Indians if they hurt their dad, the girls were praying;
going to the US on furlough was a horrid experience for him;
his mom ran over his dog, saying "it'll move"- now every one of the boys has run over an animal murmuring the same refrain- freaky huh? Also, she just kept going, saying "he'll be alright". Of course when they got home the dog was dead.

He should get on this forum himself. I hope he does some day soon.

My dad has also looked at the wrong end of an arrow or a machete, I assume at some point with us kids playing nearby (well, not quite, but I was rather unaware).

For me what still stings a bit today (although now my soul just tends to roll its eyes) is the feeling of "otherness". I will never be from the place I´m physically in at the moment, even if I were to go back to where I grew up. I´ll never be from somewhere - I kind of just pick out of a hat, whatever will get me by with the least amount of questions. I was a foreigner at Via. Wearing my american clothes in Montana, I looked so "tropical" - little did they know that if I were to wear the exact same clothes in Brasil, I´d have "gringa" plastered all over me. In Bolivia, nem se fala/don´t even go there. I don´t mind it so much any more - it´s not necessary for others to understand me so much, I´m glad if I can wrap my mind around who they are, a bit.

Something else that used to bother me is the way I felt I would become someone else in different places - I thought I was being a hypocrite. I don´t think that´s the case - I´m just fitting in with different parts of me. That was traumatic while it lasted. What still is traumatic is when/if my different groups of friends cross - one from one group is with me when I´m with the other group - how do I make those two mesh? Can I be the both of me at the same time?

Is this making any sense? Do I need lithium or a straightjacket? <-- that´s a cackle.

It makes total sense. To other Third Culture Kids. And you will never outgrow those feelings. Take it from a 60-year-old MK.

sunshine, I still haven't found "home" yet. I keep hoping I'll find that place someday. And yes I know, heaven will be home someday, but, well, you know what I mean.

I wonder if being home is more of a feeling then a place - there must be triggers that make you feel "at rest" and for most people those triggers are related to a place - maybe for TCKs it´s not so much a place as a feeling - or maybe little portable things that you always took with you - like you put on a certain cd and "boom", you´re home, or you eat a certain food - and there it is. So maybe you can be at home if you´re listening to some MPB and eating a pamonha in a Walmart as you listen to people speaking spanish in the booth next to you - could that happen? Or also, when I´m with family, I feel more at home (the family I´m close to). As for heaven being home, yeah, sometimes I get to longing a little TOO much for that - and that´s no good. PS - I hope that walmart picture isn´t going to be heaven, not my ideal at all, hehehe

Many times when asked where I`m from it is easier just to say that I`m a nomad.

After four years in Brazil, some kids on furlough, at "home" described us as the kids who talk funny. And I thought wearing a dress to a family homecoming party was appropriate. We moved into our home 14 years ago, so it should feel like home, but alas . . .I guess after being a nomad for so long, it becomes ingrained in a sense of discontentment with anything you can't easily run away from. I still don't do so well with peers. My best friends are older or younger.