Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man by Mary L. Trump; Page B

apologizing is weakness—clashed with the rules he encountered at school. Fred’s fundamental beliefs about how the world worked—in life, there can be only one winner and everybody else is a loser (an idea that essentially precluded the ability to share) and kindness is weakness—were clear. Donald knew,because he had seen it with Freddy, that failure to comply with his father’s rules was punished by severe and often public humiliation, so he continued to adhere to them even outside his father’s purview. Not surprisingly, his understanding of “right” and “wrong” would clash with the lessons taught in most elementary schools.
    Donald’s growing arrogance, in part a defense against his feelings of abandonment and an antidote to his lack of self-esteem, served as a protective cover for his deepening insecurities. As a result, he was able to keep most people at arm’s length. It was easier for him that way. Life in the House made all the children in one way or another uncomfortable with emotions—either expressing them or being confronted with them. It was probably worse for the boys, for whom the acceptable range of human feeling was extremely narrow. (I never saw any man in my family cry or express affection for one another in any way other than the handshake that opened and closed any encounter.) Getting close to other children or authority figures may have felt like a dangerous betrayal of his father. Nonetheless, Donald’s displays of confidence, his belief that society’s rules didn’t apply to him, and his exaggerated display of self-worth drew some people to him. A large minority of people still confuse his arrogance for strength, his false bravado for accomplishment, and his superficial interest in them for charisma.
----
    Donald had discovered early on how easy it was to get under Robert’s pale skin and push him past his limits; it was a game he never tired of playing. Nobody else would have bothered—Robert was so skinny and quiet that there was no sport in tormenting him—but Donald enjoyed flexing his power, even if only over his younger, smaller, and even thinner-skinned brother. Once, out of frustration and helplessness, Robert kicked a hole in their bathroom door, which got him into trouble despite the fact that Donald had driven him to it. When his mother told Donald to stop, he didn’t; when Maryanne and Freddy told him to stop, he didn’t.
    One Christmas the boys received three Tonka trucks, which soonbecame Robert’s favorite toys. As soon as Donald figured that out, he started hiding them from his little brother and pretending he had no idea where they were. The last time it happened, when Robert’s tantrum spiraled out of control, Donald threatened to dismantle the trucks in front of him if he didn’t stop crying. Desperate to save them, Robert ran to his mother. Mary’s solution was to hide the trucks in the attic, effectively punishing Robert, who’d done nothing wrong, and leaving Donald feeling invincible. He wasn’t yet being rewarded for selfishness, obstinacy, or cruelty, but he wasn’t being punished for those flaws, either.
    Mary remained a bystander. She didn’t intervene in the moment and didn’t comfort her son, acting as if it weren’t her place to do so. Even for the 1950s, the family was split deeply along gender lines. Despite the fact that Fred’s mother had been his partner—she had literally started his business—it’s clear that Fred and his wife were never partners. The girls were her purview, the boys his. When Mary made her annual trip home to the Isle of Lewis, only Maryanne and Elizabeth accompanied her. Mary cooked the boys’ meals and laundered their clothes but didn’t feel that it was her place to guide them. She rarely interacted with the boys’ friends, and her relationships with her sons, already marred by their early