Last month I wrote about how Darrell Hammond reveals in his new book about how he did drugs and booze while at SNL and just the crazy life he lived before getting sober. Now comes the reveal that while he was a child, his mother cut his tongue with a knife, was stabbed, beaten and given electric shocks while he was a kid. In one story he relates, he says he was opening the car door to get inside the car and his mom told him to wait and then to stick his hand inside the car door. She then slammed the door on his hand. I have no idea how he turned out to be normal with the amount he had to go through as a child. If anyone needed drugs or booze to get through the day, I can see why he did. To overcome what he has gone through and to have succeeded in life and got himself clean and sober is amazing.
Oh dear. I wish him much success in sobriety. Perhaps writing the book was cathartic to him.
ReplyDeleteNot mother...monster is more like it.
ReplyDeleteI almost had to turn off his interview with Terry Gross it was so powerful. His mother was a sadist. I hope he recovers and eventually feels loved
ReplyDeleteWish him peace of mind and happiness.
ReplyDeleteIt always amazes me how some people are able to get over their scary and abused childhood, and to become great achievers in our society. Bless him.
Interesting how he was so severely abused and then became so good at doing impressions...it's almost like it's a milder version of disassociative identity disorder - only one that he can control himself.
ReplyDeleteHow sad. I can't imagine how someone could do such things to their own child. I'm glad that he was able to overcome all that and his book will probably help other people.
ReplyDeleteI'm wondering if his mother is still alive? If she is, I wonder what her reaction is to all this. Is she like, "Yep. I did it" or does she deny it? Just curious.
ReplyDelete@chopchop - I've heard that many who are in the public eye get the story out, 1st, before the tabloids spin their version, and 2nd, so family members stop feeling entitled to a cut of the star's well-earned money.
ReplyDeleteThis will definitely stop the mother, if she is still alive, of going to the tabloids crying that her son doesn't take care of her.
Can we get this guy to do a sit-down with Lindsay?
ReplyDeletehis mother is dead. as is his father. darrell is very successful and talented, but he's not normal. he's been in and out of institutions and rehab for years, which is understandable considering he was raised by a devil.
ReplyDeleteit is amazing that he was able to overcome that to the extent that he has.
there's a short interview w/him by cnn at the url below.
http://cnnpressroom.blogs.cnn.com/2011/10/25/snl-star-darrell-hammond-breaks-down-in-cnn-red-chair-interview/
wtf. I don't understand how people treat their children this way. Do they not realize how it will affect them later?? I guess they just don't give a shit. I still have a mental list of all the ways my mother wronged me while I was growing up and it came out in therapy - if it were as bad as this I can't imagine how much more fucked up I would be!
ReplyDeleteObviously his mother was very mentally ill, probably his father too. We still don't talk much about mental illness in this country, except in the past tense. People are so uncomfortable dealing with it when it's right in front of them.
ReplyDeleteKudos to Darrell, I hope telling his story is as good for others in the same boat as it seems to be for him.
It is true that there is such a stigma attached to mental illness and wha is worse, is that it is so widespread.
ReplyDeleteMany alcoholics are self medicating for depression or something else. My mom was abused by her alcoholic depressed mother and she, turned around and did it to me. She was a much better mother than hers had been but she could never say no to the siren song of booze.
I stopped the madness and am not embarrassed to say I am in therapy and take medication. I do both conventional and unconventional therapies because i will do anything, anything to stop the cycle.
Hugs and good for you, lunabelle! Nothing wrong with medications AT ALL. People without serious mental illness (who don't understand) might think there's something "weak" about taking medication, but as someone who's been there (and think it could have saved my dad and others from suicide), it certainly isn't.
ReplyDeleteHow absolutely tragic that he had to go through all this and there was no one around to put a stop to it. I don't even know how he was strong enough to get through it. I'm not sure I could have. What a monster his mother was.
ReplyDeleteThat is absolutely horrific.
ReplyDeleteMaja- what an interesting point you've brought up!
ReplyDeleteNot to sound unsympathetic (because of course I am) but damn is he a great candidate for some social psychlogical studies!
@Lunabelle- my mama is also an alcoholic- her mother had a 3rd grade education and was just the shittiest most ignorant neglectful role model a person could have. Many of my mother's siblings have alcohol abuse permeating their lives, as do the next generation, my generation, and many of my cousins have beer and hard alcohol problems. My uncle actually drank so much he became diabetic and could not stop drinking and died at 40.
So I understand and applaud your conscious decision to stop the cycle. Do you know how high the odds are stacked against people like us? It's something like 75% chance of being an alcoholic! The fact that neither of us are speaks of our strength and tenacity and just overall bad assness :))
As a fellow survivor of a multi generational cycle of alcholism- Im proud of you!
Thanks jasmine and rocketqueen. I think the most screwed up part of my life is i knew there was something wrong with me but i thought my upbringing was normal. We were or appeared to be well off, dad worked, mom stayed home, nice house, blah blah. I just did not know putting your mom to bed when you are four is not normal, in my work it was. Plus there was always a party at our house and kids sleeping over and adults passed out in the guest room so, again, seemed normal.
ReplyDeleteI read grandchildren of alcoholics re my grandma in HS and then snuck my moms copy of children of alcoholics and i started getting that my perfect life was all a fake about then.
I have been encouraged to go to alanon but i am not sure if it will help or open the flood gates. When i had my kids is when i started to hate my mom. I just cannot fathom how booze was more important than her baby (I understand alcoholism is a disease but to not seek treatment or just to deny you have a problem when you have a baby, a baby who you are literally everything to). When i was my babies
age, i was already putting mom to bed and making cool
wash cloths for her in the morning, pulling the shades and
teaching myself to cook and learning to be alone.
My therapist recently explained that many children of alcoholics grow up with this sort of hole inside of them they are always looking to fill with lovers, friends, alcohol, drugs etc. Thankfully, many of the side effects have not manifested in my life (like feeling i deserve to be taken care of because no one ever took care of me and then taking it out on my kids and husband) but i know exactly what he is talking about because i have that bottomless pit and I desperately want someone to care for me, (thankfully not my kids) i just know it is not rational, I know parts of me are wrong, i was warped.
You are a badass Jasmine and you inspire me!
It is an every day struggle to deal with the side effect of who brought you up. How finessed up is that??