The Burden of Belonging

I’ve been reflecting lately on my family’s history, and it’s like peeling back layers I never knew were there. The more I think about it, the more I realize how much pain has been passed down through the generations, quietly shaping who we are. My great-grandmother abandoned my grandmother when she was just a child, leaving her behind to go gallivant, that’s how the story was told.

No one ever spoke about who my grandmother’s father might have been or why my great-grandmother ran away leaving her daughter behind; I imagine those were wounds too deep to touch back then. Maybe they were too painful for my grandmother and the rest of her family to bear, or maybe no one had the words to explain.

My grandmother didn’t have a choice but to be handed over to her mother’s brother, a man who I was told was a Colonel in the Mexican military, apparently running his household like a boot camp. Can you imagine what that must have been like for a young girl already carrying the unbearable weight of abandonment? Not only had her mother left her, quite possibly not even knowing who her father was, but now she was being raised in an environment that demanded strict discipline, rigidity, and strength, things she probably had no choice but to absorb.

Any softness, any vulnerability, would’ve been a liability in that house. I think about how much of her childhood must have been spent stifling her pain, learning to be tough (and tough indeed she became), when what she likely needed most was comfort and security.

Growing up under the authority of a military man, my grandmother wasn’t given the space to grieve the loss of her mother or make sense of the emotional chaos inside her by not having a father. She was expected to march forward, to bury the hurt, and to become hardened by it.

But I imagine that abandonment doesn’t simply go away because you’re told to be strong.

It festers, it lingers, and it shapes you. It’s no surprise that when she eventually got married and began her own family, she carried that pain with her.

When she married my grandfather, their financial struggles forced them to live with his mother, my paternal grandmother who openly questioned the legitimacy of my mom and her siblings. "Hijos de mi hija, mis nietos serán, hijos de mi hijo, en duda estarán" translates to, "The children of my daughter will be my grandchildren, the children of my son, I will doubt," she would say.

My mother shared this story with me one day, as if it didn’t matter, recounting it like a passing memory, while hiding the deep hurt behind her words. But I can only imagine now the silent pain she must have carried, feeling like an “arrimada,” an outsider, a burden, in the very home where she should have felt safe and secure. She was denied not only the sense of belonging that every child deserves but also the familial ties that could have provided her with the stability and love she so needed during those early years.

I suspect my mother had to learn early on how to disconnect from her pain, always wearing a mask of strength, as if nothing could ever touch her. To me, she seemed like Superwoman, always composed, never shaken. But now I understand that behind that façade was a woman who had endured more than she ever let on. That’s probably why she was always emotionally unavailable.

But let’s get back to my grandmother. Just as my grandmother was beginning to create a life for herself out of her mother-in-law’s sight and disdain, her own mother, the one who had abandoned her, reappeared. She moved back in, bringing with her the same vices that had been her undoing before.

Drinking, smoking, and sending us, the great-grandchildren, to buy her liquor and cigarettes, making us somehow responsible for her self-destruction.

By then, she had developed agoraphobia and never left the house, a strange irony considering she had once abandoned her own daughter in pursuit of freedom. It was as if her world had become the cage she had once fled from, and we were all trapped inside it with her.

Looking back now, I see so clearly the intergenerational trauma that’s been passed down. I never really asked why my great-grandmother left or why she drank so heavily. I guess no one wanted to stir the pain of my grandmother’s abandonment, but the truth is, that pain never left. It was absorbed, carried forward, and woven into the lives of those who came after.

My grandmother, raised in an environment of harsh discipline and emotional abandonment, couldn’t help but pass some of that pain onto her own children. And my mother, the eldest of eight, had to grow up too quickly. By 16, she was already working to help support her family, all while living under the same roof as her emotionally wounded mother, her drunken grandmother, and a father who, despite his love, was too passive to shield her from the dysfunction swirling around them.

As I reflect on all of this, it’s hard not to feel overwhelmed by the sheer weight of it. The pain, the trauma, it’s all been passed down through the generations like an invisible thread connecting us all. And here I am, standing at the end of that line, wondering if I’m the weak one for not being able to carry it like they did. But then I stop myself. Maybe they didn’t carry it; maybe they simply survived it. Maybe they didn’t have the tools to heal, only to endure.

And that’s where I’m different. At 55, I’m choosing to heal, not because I’m weak, but because I’m strong enough to believe I deserve better. Strong enough to believe that I can break the cycle. I’m choosing to seek healing, to give myself the grace they never gave themselves. And that doesn’t mean I’m rejecting their strength. In fact, it honors them. It says, “I see your pain. I feel it. But I’m choosing a different path, not just for me, but for all the branches of my family tree.”

This journey isn’t easy. It’s messy, it’s complicated, and some days it feels like I’m walking a tightrope between the past and the present. But I’m learning to be gentle with myself, to forgive myself for not having all the answers, and to offer the compassion to myself that they couldn’t.

And in doing so, I’m learning to forgive them, too. My great-grandmother, for her abandonment. My grandmother, for her hardness. My mother, for passing down her own unresolved wounds. I want to believe they were all doing the best they could with what they had. But now, I finally have the resolution to do something different.

As I open my heart to compassion for their struggles, I also know I can’t bypass the anger that was left behind, unspoken, yet always present. I can feel it now, this anger they never admitted to themselves, never allowed to fully surface, but it seeped into every moment of their lives.

It showed up in the sharpness of their words, in the cold silences, in the way they sometimes distanced themselves from their own hearts and from others.

This anger of mine, so tied to the sadness they buried deep, deserves to be heard. It deserves a seat at the table at last.

And I want it to know that I see it, I hear it, and I understand why it’s there right now, silently sitting next to me.

I no longer need to suppress it or pretend it doesn’t exist. I’m ready to feel it, to process it, to allow it to flow through me without fear or shame. It’s not here to destroy me; it’s here to release what’s been held down for so long. By facing it, I’m acknowledging the sadness that has been buried beneath the surface, the pain that has been ignored for generations. I’m letting it rise, knowing that by feeling it, I can finally integrate it.

I don’t want to live disconnected from myself, holding this anger inside like a poison. I want to transform it into something that can heal me, that can create space for more love and compassion, not just for myself but for the people in my life now and for those who came before me.

By letting this anger move through me, I’m breaking the chain that has kept it trapped, allowing it to soften into understanding.

This is the work that leads to true connection, with myself and with others. I’m not running from the anger or letting it control me. I’m allowing it to exist, to be felt, and ultimately, to leave me lighter, more open, and more connected to the person I truly want to be.

Through this process, I’m creating space for more love, more grace, and deeper healing, for all of us.