Shameless

One of the pieces of media I relate to most is the show, Shameless. Ian Gallagher, being the gay, bipolar middle/older brother, I can most directly relate to, but I see myself and glimpses of my life in many of the characters. Ian grew up with physically and emotionally absent, junkie parents on the South Side of Chicago, helping his older siblings to raise their three younger siblings while they were still children. Early into adulthood, Ian exhibits symptoms of bipolar disorder, similar to those of his mother, Monica. He runs from this truth, which manifests in the form of rash, destructive decisions and habits, such as risky sexual encounters, affairs with older married men, and going so far as running away to the military under his older brother’s identity.

Now, I grew up far more privileged than that, having been raised in the Bay Area, California. Even below the poverty line, I had access to one of the best school districts in the country. On the surface, I experienced fairly regular lower-middle-class teenage girl struggles, like figuring out who I was, navigating depression and anxiety, and the throes of birth control and boy drama. Like Ian, my sights regularly fixated on mediocre, if not narcissistic men, which led me to many romantic rock bottoms and sexual mishandlings before legally consenting. Like Ian, I used the attention I received from men, my age and above, and also alcohol to distract from how much I hated my body. When I realized I also liked women, I came out almost immediately, privileged to live in one of the most gay friendly states in America, all things considered. However, I couldn’t even consider my transness at the time. I remember saying offhandedly to one of my friends, “Sometimes when I look in the mirror, I see a man. I mean, look! Can’t you see it?” To be fair, that girl used me to experiment with her sexuality, so maybe my not being cis was more than she could handle. Still, being met with confusion and disregard rather than constructive inquiry, I buried my feelings of self-distaste under more and more means of bodily destruction.

Ian threw himself into the toxic masculinity of blind patriotism and excessive exercise, hoping he would find acceptance in the military. I pinched at any fat I could find, hoping to erode my curves and feminine build to gain, often unsightly, acceptance from men. Ian experienced spiritual psychosis, believing “Shim” (a gender-neutral god) was speaking to him, guiding a movement; I believed The Universe sent signs through every romantic partner, saying, “THIS one is your soulmate”, despite massive red flags that inevitably bit me in the ass. Ian sought to become an EMT as a means to help people, not despite his mental illness but because of it; I have spent my entire adult life trying to figure out how I can use my life experiences to help others, which meant that every time I failed myself, I thought I was failing the whole world. Ian ended up being hospitalized and imprisoned for his mental illness before admitting he needed help. I have been hospitalized three times and lost everything more than once before admitting the extent of my trauma and disabilities.

No wonder both of us, once closeted, misguided queers, turned out deeply radicalized.

Ian saw his parents’ destructive habits up close and personal throughout his whole life. After receiving his diagnosis as an adult, he was frequently compared to his mother, Monica, who shared his affliction. I, like my mother, am also bipolar. Ian witnessed his mother’s struggle with depression, mania, and how they interacted with addictive tendencies- including benders, spending the family “squirrel fund” winter savings, meth-dealing lovers, and a suicide attempt during Thanksgiving dinner. I had the false mirror of smoke and rewriting of my childhood shattered in my adolescence and early adulthood. Sure, Mom blacked out and disappeared into the night with some strange man who was supposedly a family friend when I was 14. Yeah, we found them on the lawn of an elementary school in an unsightly state and my stepdad beat him with a baseball bat in front of us and the “family friend’s” kids while they screamed for their dad, but that was toooootally a one-time thing, right? It’s not like she did it again when I was twenty-one and openly flirted and ran off with my ex-boyfriend right in front of me. Those were just one-offs…

Being her child was a sadistic game of “trying to find Mom” beneath her drunk, manic, and/or crashing headspaces. She’s always too caught up hiding from her toxic behavior in altered states and other people’s bullshit to offer her family love, guidance, or validation. She’d invite family over to get drunk, singing and dancing to songs, which allowed her to relive the “good old days”. She would show everyone else how “fun” she was, bashing us for hating on her “free spirit” while she would say the most contorted, vile things to and about us. Then, when the sun came up, she would pretend it all never happened. When confronted, she would contort the truth and gaslight until you question everything you know in your soul to be true. She is always the victim.

Like Ian, I tried to make space for my mother and her mistakes, until the harm became too much to ignore or forgive. My mom, too, is an emotionally absent alcoholic with unmedicated bipolar disorder and a taste for secretly narcissistic, enabling men. Despite her immense flaws and imperfections, I, too, struggle to let go of the false image I once had of her, despite her death in my life at the hands of the monster she has since become.

Shameless is one of my comfort shows- it normalizes the chaos of a life below the poverty line in a way that is gritty and deeply validating. It isn’t glamorous or conventionally comfortable, but it’s real. It shows circumstances that many people close to me have only experienced through the media and often avoid because they are uncomfortable to watch. Those who live lives of privilege watch this show with shock and awe: “How could people live like that? Who are these people?” A couple of weeks ago, when passing a boarded-up home covered in graffiti, I heard it referred to as “a Shameless house” as if the poor and displaced exist only for the entertainment or inconvenience of the comfortable middle class.

I do not condone many of the problematic themes that take place in the show, but I relate to many of the experiences within. While I didn’t have to raise my siblings by myself at the behest of my absent parents like the oldest Gallagher sibling, Fiona. I, too, have had to watch my brothers become distorted by their guardian’s destructive inadequacies and emotional absences. I had to hold a front and fall apart in private in moments which felt like weakness, but were profound strength and coping. For Fiona, it manifested as sex and drug benders, toxic sabotaging sex arcs- like cheating on her boss/boyfriend with his brother- and becoming a mean and spiteful alcoholic. For me, it manifested in trying to find myself beneath the toxically positive and compulsive feminine lenses expected of me by forming unhealthy relationships with bulimia, alcohol, cannabis, and any “nice guy” with nerdy and/or spiritual flair, zero emotional intelligence, and a past. What can I say? I loved a fixer-upper. Much like Fiona, by the time I came to terms with my character defects and idolization of toxic dick fixes, I realized I don’t even really like men much after all.

Their father, Frank Gallagher, frequently mocked Fiona’s efforts with assertions of expected gratitude before disappearing for weeks or months at a time. She was offered little to no life guidance and was often referred to by her father as “slutty” and likened to her mother’s “siren-like” good looks. My father alerted me to any man he saw checking me out in public, no matter their age, referred to me as “Big Boobs McGee” as soon as my breasts started to develop in sixth grade, expected but hardly acknowledged my various (extra)curricular efforts, and called me a slut for dating while still allowing me to go hiking in the woods with my 32-year-old male coworker who was exactly twice my age.

At Fiona’s wedding, Frank says, “You let so many men drive up that freeway between your legs … you’re gonna have to put an exit sign on your vagina.” At least my dad had the courtesy of outing and degrading me in someone else’s wedding speech. What’s with shitty dads thinking weddings are the appropriate place to degrade their daughters publicly? My dad would be infuriated at the notion of him having anything in common with Frank, but he did elicit my teenage brother to partner with him in selling drugs to high schoolers under the guise of “entrepreneurship and opportunity”. I think that speaks for itself.

Is it any wonder Fiona and I both got ourselves caught up in harmful, inappropriate relationships for the sake of validation from men, seeking to feel something? Seeking rebellion?

It didn’t matter that I was the golden child, the one they tried to keep “pure” and innocent. It didn’t matter how hard Fiona tried to parent when she was still a child. It was never good enough because the well was poisoned and the standards were unrealistic and unfair to begin with. It didn’t matter that my oldest younger brother received all of the dirt they tried to deflect from me. We were exposed to different, limiting, damning expectations based on gender roles and misleadings of our elders. Nearby light, shadows still lurk.

My dad didn’t sleep on sidewalks or disappear, but he still supplied me and my brother with alcohol and weed and encouraged harmful weight loss fads. My mom doesn’t do drugs or physically disappear, but mentally, she is rarely to be found, too busy flying away in the smoke to be there for her kids. On the outside, sure, I was the beautiful, golden daughter, but the inner monster of her conditioning beckoned to let it all burn- so, burn I did.