Gary Lucas Quotes

There are psychological repercussions to illness and we need a little more help to get through the effects not only on the afflicted but on the family. And I think there's even a place for humor in that.

My entire youth was spent with an incredibly ill parent... I don't think you can grow up that way and not be marked by that experience.

One of the things you realize when you have a health crisis in your immediate family is that life does not stop so that you can go through that experience.

People process pain differently. My family, we were pretty humorous about things that went on.

People tend not to dwell on drama.

I was married for nine years before my husband and I separated and eventually divorced. Just as I'd watched my parents arguing and fighting, my son watched his parents arguing and fighting. It was like history repeating itself, and I felt terrible about him having to witness that.

People always ask me, 'I don't know how you could watch that, how that affects you,' and I just tell them, 'I went through it in real life, so it's like pilots watching a 'Top Gun' movie or cyclists watching a bicycle movie,' something like that.

I have been through a lot in my life, my parents divorced when I was 16, and it was a very difficult time.

In order to be a good emergency contact, you need a lot of friend-patience and empathy. Often, this comes from personal experience with anxiety, trauma, and depression.

I'd have a nervous breakdown except that I've been through this too many times to be nervous.

Unhappiness is something we are never taught about; we are taught to expect happiness, but never a Plan B to use to use when the happiness doesn't arrive.

As a journalist, it is so easy to get hardened when you see so many stories that are disturbing. Sometimes it's just your survival mechanism that makes you hardened to some of it.

Evidence shows that having even weak social connections in a stressful situation is really good for your health and your ability to handle that situation.

I got a mother who's very strong after taking the whippings that she took from my father.

When I get hate mail, I get really down on myself, and I read it to my mom, and my mom is like, 'So what? Who cares? These people don't know you, so you can't take the praise or the hate to heart.'

I have some anger issues.

I know firsthand how critical support systems are.

If people choose to live their life in a way that does not confront the more troubling aspects of their experience, that's fine, if it works for them. But it will probably make them uncomfortable if they come up against somebody like me. So they just shouldn't! They shouldn't read my work!

It's wonderful to feel supported, but there's a lot of negative energy towards me as well. So I ignore it, to be honest. If I started to read it all it would completely mess up my head.

My wife can see always how a part affects me personally because she has to live with it.

My father's violence is the central fact of my art and my life.

Many people say that recovery from an aneurysm is like having a layer of skin ripped off - your experience of life is more intense.

But while mum and dad were incredibly caring, it was also a very chaotic household where everyone fought about everything. So I know what it's like to internalize all that chaos.

Stress is never a given. There are people who get divorced amicably. There are people who pack up and move with no emotional toll. There is no stressor 'out there' in the world. We experience stress - or we don't - depending on what we believe.

You can't escape this feeling of disintegration. The world is fragile. But you also can't let it ruin your life. I'm actually a pretty composed person. I guess people imagine I spend my life thinking about crazy, sinister things but I don't, really. It's not like I'm trying to exorcise any demons.