Old me, new account. I learned the hard way not to tell anyone about StepTalk.

So, genetics has always interested me. Maybe it's because I grew up on a ranch and understand the importance of good bloodlines?

Anyway, DH & I have been married a long time - about a hundred years in step-time. I've been around his family long enough to know that there's a big old streak of instability that goes back at least four generations on his maternal side. Addiction, anxiety, & personality disorders hang like ornaments from his family tree. I can see it in his siblings, and their offspring, and in his own kids. DH's grandmother was manic; his mother was a chronic alcoholic; he was drawn to mate with loonies, and now the dysfunctional skids have done the same. It's all so sad, but nobody ever addresses it.

So many stories on this site have a component of mental illness. Usually it's the BM, but some of us have crazy skids, MILs, and DHs. It took ripping off my SM "kick me!" sign and stepping away for me to see that these people (some of whom I love dearly) are merely doing what they are programmed to do. Fish gotta swim, etc. Nothing to do with me.