I am five. I am a problem child. My parents and I are driving home from some unmemorable place. It doesn’t matter where, this happens most car rides. In this moment, all I want to do is open the car door and hurl myself out onto the moving pavement below. In this moment, I have never felt more defenseless. I am yelling at my mom, and my dad is yelling at me. You are the only kid that treats their parents this way.
            Two sides are considered in an argument, right and wrong. Whilst in an argument, we usually fit ourselves into one of the two. We usually assume the side we are on is the right side. When I was little, I thought that I was right, that I was defending myself.  I felt this way even though my parents always pushed the blame onto me.
            One word that has been thrown around in just about every fight I’ve ever had with my parents is ‘responsibility.’ It was always my responsibility to admit fault, to be the first to apologize. The question I have always asked myself is: in the event where a five-year-old is in a conflict with two adults, who should assume responsibility?
            It has been observed that a baby who falls and is unharmed will only cry if their parents or surrounding adults react dramatically. So, is it unreasonable to assume that in a state of conflict a child would react to the emotions presented by the adults? That the adults should be held responsibility for their child’s reactions?
            In a diary that I would call my butterfly journal, I would ask similar questions. The journal had three sections, each divided by pictures of butterflies. One in a cream color, one in blue, and one in pink. I used one section for daily entries, one for something that I called calligraphy but did not resemble anything of the sort, and one for writing sassy sorry notes. When my parents and I would get in a fight, my mom would have me write notes to her stating exactly what I was sorry for. The only problem, I never thought I had any reason to be sorry. I wouldn’t try to hide that fact while writing the notes either, “Dear mom, I am sorry for the way I acted. To hear more about why I am sorry, dial…” followed by some random made-up phone number.
            As I got older, the fights stayed frequent. I made changes to the way I would react to the chaos, instead of reacting I would stay calm. That would only make my parents have an even more aggravated reaction. At some point, I decided to stop apologizing. Unless there was a reason, I wouldn’t be the first one to apologize anymore.
            I think that my parents always knew they were a large part of the conflicts that occurred during my childhood. Recently, my parents decided to separate. In the three months that have passed so far, I haven’t had any arguments with either parent.
            My mom has explained to me that the anger she showed towards me while I was growing up, was a reflection of the anger she had felt towards my dad. My dad has similarly explained to me that his anger was a result of his extreme, suppressed anxiety. So, the feelings and environment that I was surrounded by from ages five through fifteen was not my fault all along. I had been used as a punching bag for words that my parents meant for each other.
            When is an apology justifiably considered ‘too little too late’? Is responsibility taken years later really acknowledged by the responsible? Could it just be a selfish way of relieving oneself of long suppressed guilt? What if I don’t accept the apology? Should I be sorry about that too?