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“While some of us have rejected a parent, others have merged with a parent in a way that clouds our identity and drains our individuality. In the merged relationship, we might have missed opportunities for self-definition or lost the edges of who we are and what we feel.”
― Mark Wolynn, It Didn't Start with You: How Inherited Family Trauma Shapes Who We Are and How to End the Cycle

“[...] I realized being at a company this small meant I could physically see my efforts pay off. When I was working for the government, I had struggled with the slow pace, and also with the understanding that I might never know who actually cared about the work I had done.”
― Cait Flanders, The Year of Less: How I Stopped Shopping, Gave Away My Belongings, and Discovered Life Is Worth More Than Anything You Can Buy in a Store

“When we pit one parent against the other, we go against the source of our own existence, and unconsciously create a rift inside ourselves. We forget that half of us comes from our mother and half from our father.”
― Mark Wolynn, It Didn't Start with You: How Inherited Family Trauma Shapes Who We Are and How to End the Cycle

“When a parent is rejected or disrespected, one of the children will often represent that parent by sharing the rejected behaviors. In this way, the child makes himself or herself equal to the parent by suffering in a similar way. It is as though the child is saying, “I’ll go through it, too, so that you don’t have to go through it alone.” Loyal in this way, the child continues the suffering into the next generation. I”
― Mark Wolynn, It Didn't Start with You: How Inherited Family Trauma Shapes Who We Are and How to End the Cycle