# -18 Andrew Antilla & Marion L Cook - Alcoholism Invades

 Secrets

There a some secrets I'm privy to that I found out by accident. A few years ago I was scanning photos with my mother. She told me one of my father's uncles had an entire family.

It was a secret because  it was a scandal.One of my grandmother's brothers married and had a large family, then took a mistress, and had a large family with her. He worked to keep both families afloat financially.And of course, now his offspring's DNA is surfacing. 

When Secrets Are not Scandals

With time, some things are re-labeled and become acceptable. My grandfather was a "bastard"-- it used to be a carefully guarded secret but now that it's commonplace to have children without married parents, it's still a secret, but no longer a scandal.

I accept given knowledge usually, but sometimes I reassess the givers bias. For example, my husband's mother brother died from alcoholism. Their father had died from alcoholism as well (Andrew Antilla). She identified her blood relatvies who was an alcoholic. Next to her father, Andrew Antilla, she wrote:  “ALCOHOLIC”   

Let's Revisit This.
Decades had passed since I saw that paper and only late did it dawn on me that all the identified alcoholics were men. Not unusual. 

But what about his wife, Marion Lottie Cook?  I realized that it wasn't just her father who was an “alcoholic,” but her mother was, too. It was not as widely acknowledged that women could suffer from excessive drinking.
Now I wonder did her parents' alcoholism shape their daughter's, (my mother-in-law) youth? 

It must have been so very hard for her: she was the eldest of 5, to not have a sober parent.

The Truth. 

Looking at it from a distance of several years, I'm certain that both of Ruth's parents Andrew Antilla and Marion L Cook Antilla, were alcoholics.  

Andrew Antilla Marion Lottie Cook May 1934, New Hampshire