⚖️ What it means to have grown up with a parent involved in illegal or criminal activities
Growing up with a parent involved in criminal activities meant living with secrets, constant danger, and a worldview where normal rules don't apply to your family.
You may have learned early that your family operated outside conventional society's boundaries, creating a complex relationship with law, authority, and moral guidelines. You carried heavy secrets about your parent's activities while trying to maintain a normal facade at school and with friends. Your view of police, legal systems, and authority figures became fundamentally different from peers whose families operated within legal boundaries.
You might have developed hypervigilance around authority figures and an understanding that the justice system works differently depending on who you are and what resources you have. The constant underlying threat of your parent being caught, arrested, or worse may have left you with chronic anxiety about stability and safety. You learned that survival sometimes requires operating outside the rules that others take for granted.