by RJ, Sacramento
My parents weren’t really strict. Growing up with my pops, he tried to play his role. I mean he was playing his role before he had gotten sick. My pops and moms were arguing most of the time growing up.
I can’t really remember a time when we shared a good time and a good moment. My family was always going through some things, and we didn’t really have moments to share, or have things I could really remember.
My dad always made sure me and my sis had our clothes and things we needed for school. He was kinda strict because he didn’t allow me or my sister to get messed up grades. My mom had been moved away, so growing up before fourteen, fifteen, I had lived with my dad going to elementary and middle school.
He made sure we attended and when we did go to school and mess up, my pops would punish us. Making us stay in the house and we weren’t allowed to watch video games, nor could we watch TV.
It was stay in your room and you can’t do nothing. So, I would have to say, yeah, my pops was strict until he had gotten sick. My pops had a seizure and an aneurism, so after that, he couldn’t really do anything.
My pops could barely talk/walk or do anything after that. Over the years of him being sick, I had a stepmom right before he had gotten sick. She stuck around a couple of years after he had gotten sick. Her rules were no joke. She didn’t play games, she was very mean.
I understood why she would be so mean too, she always wanted us to do better than anyone else we know. We had to go to school for sure. She didn’t care what the excuse was.
You had to make sure you had everything ready for school the day before. Like before you go to bed, make sure you were ready to just wake up, brush your teeth, or if you had to take a shower in the morning, time to make sure you were ready to go.
Her rules were so strict because she was damn near the only parent. When my pops gotten sick, he couldn’t do anything. He was in a wheelchair, he could barely talk, he for sure couldn’t walk. I know she felt alone.
She had to take care of me, my sister, and her five kids. She didn’t have to, but if she didn’t, we were gonna be left homeless. She got tired of doing everything all by herself, and I understood that she just couldn’t take care of seven kids in one household in a three-bedroom apartment.
I knew and understood the struggle she had to go through. All the stress she had on her shoulders from dealing with seven kids, one parent, and she has to work a six to six, then after that, come home and deal with seven kids.
And hear them complain about their needs and wants. So I understood why she was so strict and had so many roles. Everything is understandable.