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fdrsamericanflagduckfloaty · 1 year ago

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i compiled angst abt TR + his sons because i. ... i got bored. and because it'll help me w/ writing angst when i have all of this in one spot.

im just posting it w/ a specific tag so i can find it when i need it kslkskd this post is also kinda long btw

TR himself - batshit insane

Okay so this mf has enough angst to fill. An entire. Like. Pool. But we'll start w/ the most known:

His wife & Mother dying on the same day just hours apart.

We all know how it goes but if you don't, his first wife, Alice Hathaway Lee, and his mother, Mittie Bulloch, died just hours apart on Valentine's Day, 1884.

And at the Funeral:

There's going to be... a lot more photos. The grieving is so intense I can't leave it out at all.

Doesn't this sound like an unhealthy coping mechanism? TR never really got the grip of coping healthily, but this isn't the earliest example, which I'll touch on soon.

It's beyond reasonable - and in fact correct - to assume he never entirely, fully got over Alice Lee. He never mentioned her again. Not on record, at least, and certainly not once in his autobiography. He mentioned his mother a handful of times at most. And this is where I say this part makes me feel nauseous because of how damn sad it is.

TR, as I said, never came to terms with Alice's death, and he never would. Over decades maybe he could handle a brief sorrowful thought of her, maybe a second. But I don't think anybody would be wrong in assuming he still could never truly talk of her. It sounds sad, but it's true. He never handled grief well.

I do think this is one of the periods of TR's life that you hear of but, never seeing it mentioned again, really enforces that he wanted her gone. He couldn't stand the thought of her. Which... do. Do you see the therapy that he desperately needed?

WELL if you thought this was it then you were wrong!!

His father died when he was nineteen. TR idolized his father beyond all else. He had a massive portrait of the man in his office and he always wondered what his father would do in times of strength during his presidency.

And TR admitting fear is a very, very rare thing, because you don't. Actually see it often. He'd be more likely to admit to a crime.

So for his father to die, and not being able to see him before (TR couldn't arrive in time), really, really left its mark on him. This was also around the time he had a spat with his then-close-friend, future-second-wife Edith in a small summer house. His father's death left him grieving and the argument left him. Well. Seething, for lack of a better word.

TR was actually able to acknowledge his father. That was the only difference.

But he also needed extreme help by the time Valentine's Day 1884 rolled around, and I am not alone in that thought.

I'd also like to mention that the argument I referenced above is never going to be explored beyond what is known: They argued, it was intense, and it ended any romantic prospects between them for years. Other than that? We have abso-fucking-lutely nothing. Nothing to go off of. Neither ever told anyone what they argued about. All Edith said was that Theodore 'wasn't very nice', and TR just said they both had tempers. Other than that once again? Nothing.

He also experiences even more grief later but we'll touch on that later.

TR almost lost Edith, as well, during 1898 when the Spanish-American war was ramping up to its climax of official war.

It did not get better. As you'll see, this was also when Ted was put under suffering, aswell.

*Cut because the rest is in Ted's section*

Even though it ended well, TR was likely getting flashbacks (or intense reminders) of what happened with Alice Lee just 14 years ago. And in those 14 years I'm very sure he wasn't fully done suppressing the memory. Being put under such strain twice doesn't do well on a person, nor their mental stability.

And now I'd like to mention: TR possibly having bipolar disorder.

Listen I'm not going to go in detail because I have before (probably, if not just send an ask that tumblr hopefully wont eat), but basically, traumatic experiences when he was so young, multiple injuries, almost dying countless times when he was young as he had asthma, and never truly coping, and honestly just naturally, he could have had Bipolar Disorder.

I find this theory interesting and it's very believable. He could be all over the place, smiling and ecstatic, swinging his limbs around, and then the next, quiet, gloomy. Suppressed. He never calmed down enough unless it was serious. Now, it could've just been his natural personality and behavior. But he was reckless, bold, daring, a risk-taker, and didn't ever really care about dying as much as he should have.

TR ignored his doctor basically telling him "DO NOT DO EXTREME SHIT. IT WILL HURT YOUR HEART. BADLY." and proceeded to be the goddamn president. Don't even mention climbing mountains and tough sports and putting himself under immense strain.

Hell I'd say it's worthy of a book (albeit short or not who knows), but there isn't one so far (as I know of) that focuses on that theory and goes in depth.

(But I do consider it a mild headcanon of mine for NATM purposes because I genuinely think it's something to consider, and hey, if you get memories, why wouldn't that pass over? Or I just like angst idk skkdnfgk)

Edith also suffered two miscarriages during the White House years, so the trauma of losing two unborn children must've hit pretty hard too.

i could go on even more about this sad meow meow bastard but lets move on. (Oh, the trauma I mentioned we'll touch on later, we will touch on near the end in Quentin's section.)

2. Ted // aka the one who was sort of forced to be the best

(also this mf was IMPOSSIBLE to search for. 'Ted' brought up words w/ -ted at the end and it took me so damn long to filter those results out)

This one below is in the White House. The two above are from 1898.

(the proudness is mildly concerning)

The 'nervous exhaustion' and migraines Ted ended up getting were because he was being pushed so hard at such a young age. I tried to find the book that had it (with no luck) but his mother admits that TR pushed Ted far more than the other children. Whether it was because Ted was his eldest son or his first or his namesake or all of the above I don't know, but after that pledge, TR doesn't seem as hard on Ted again in the rest of the Trilogy this lies in.

I also tried to find this next part with once again no luck. However I'll explain the best I can:

When Ted was in college, he got sick with a very violent case of pneumonia, to the point where he was put to bedrest. TR may've had a hard attitude to sickness but he came down to be by his son's bedside and the concern must have been intense. Ted's mother also came down and eventually Alice did too when she was allowed (they actually considered each other like siblings, probably some of the closest between the six with only a 3/2 year age difference). Ted did get better, but it was still worrying in the moment.

I can't find the copy (when I can I'll probably edit this post), but in another book, during WWI, Eleanor (Ted's wife, not FDR's, it's. It's confusing I know) confided in TR that Ted worried if his father was proud of him. TR was particularly surprised, but he told Eleanor that yes, of course he was proud of Ted. He called the war he fought in (Span-Am War) a bow and arrow affair compared to what Ted was fighting in -- a war with bombs and motherfucking aerophysics.

So in Ted you have the 'Heir who's really stressed' part of being a Victorian kid of someone who may or may not need lots of therapy and already have daddy issues (because he did. and i am right.)

OH!! FDR and Ted also had this weird rivalry and Ted basically disowned his ass and called him a maverick. Republican tings ykwim- FDR kept Ted's war moves from newspapers to stunt his cousin's political career (Which is a dick move), but even in the end, FDR presented the Medal of Honor to Ted's widow and admitted that TR would've been the proudest of Ted.

3. - Kermit: really sad guy

Okay Ted was fucking impossible to search for but Kermit is not thankfully

Kermit doesn't seem to be as ... optimistic or loud as the other kids, as you can tell.

*in reference to Harvard, where all four of the boys attended. FDR was also slighted for like the rest of his life bc he wasn't allowed in a club that Ted and Kermit got into lmao i just find that funny*

Kermit was also 'easy to bruise' and 'adored' by his mother but he was still... uh. Well. In short terms, traumatized as fuck and had PTSD that goes beyond any realm I've ever fucking seen.

(I WILL be writing fic for this)

I guess you could say it's sort of depressingly similar to TR and his own brother, Elliott, who also died an alcoholic and with multiple attempts of su!c!de. Kermit is the younger brother, Ted is the older. TR was the older, Elliott was the younger. Ykwim?

Basically if Kermit the Frog is memey and funny then this Not-Frog-Man is tragically the opposite and he also. Really. Really needed therapy isn't that a running theme at this point though-

4. Archie - mischievous. that's it

Not much I can find on Archie in an angsty way, which I think is actually good for my heart because the Edmund Morris TR Trilogy did not do wonders for my mental stability

The most prevalent thing I can find is this:

Archie--born in 1894--would be 15, so a 15 year old struggling for dear life and terrifying the shit out of his family. Doesn't sound good huh?

But!! Besides that Archie was the only American soldier to be disabled in BOTH World Wars (The three remaining sons (Quentin died in WWI as we know this) all fought in WWII. Fighting spirits indeed) and because of the SAME injury in the SAME leg. He was quieter but still mischievous and energetic, and he got along best w/ Quentin and they rarely quarreled. I will admit, I don't see much about Archie. Quentin obviously is well-spread around, Ted is aswell, Kermit partially, Alice fucking entirely. Ethel and Archie though, I dont see much of.

ALSO!!

*these two paragraphs follow each other, they're just on separate pages. the first paragraph follows into the next, so you can read it normally without missing anything.*

I forgot that Archie basically got really, really unhealthy during the War. His arm was worryingly limp and his leg was practically fucked. Not only that but he lost his closest brother in the war, so you can imagine how he felt.

5. Quentin - FAVORITE CHILD there i said it

okay. you want angst? like, a lot? this one. this boy is your ticket to sad depressive trains of thought.

Quentin was also the most like his father and very much a risk taker, so if he lived long enough, he very well could have had a very successful political career (or in whatever he chose to go into.).

However, Quentin's death was a lasting pain for TR (who died less than a year later) and it's said that Quentin's death not only hastened the then-late-50's year old man, but that TR died of heartbreak over his youngest's death. More angst after the pictures teehee

'He' is TR. He could be vaguely cryptic in matters of worry and family. Remember this

He paces when his brain is going a million miles an hour. I actually forgot this small detail but I'll have to use it sometime tbh

this part just makes me sad even though its almost been a year since i reread it like 20 times (more on that in a second.)

The silent grieving and absolute devastation seems far more powerful.

Now, getting specific:

Yes, it was said, as I may've already mentioned, that the boy in TR died when Quentin was devastatingly taken out on July 14th in the summer of 1918. He'd already suffered losing his father (his idol. this is where his own daddy issues come from) and losing his first wife AND mother (who he adored, too) in less than 12 hours. so now, to lose his youngest son, his boy, his child? Oh dear.

So combine the fact TR already needed lots of therapy and this new, heartbreaking death, and you've got one HELL of an angst supply.

It's worth remembering TR really just said 'fuck it. beat the memory until it's too dead to throb' and thought of it as a coping method.

... his 'method' is what we'd now call unhealthy. He thought it was so fucking fine that he even recommended it to a friend (or his sister? I forget tbh) who was just recently widowed. He was not taught healthy coping/healing methods and it showed. Strongly.

TR also felt tremendous guilt for his sons getting hurt (and one dying) in WWI. He'd always glorified war to himself and his kids and he'd instilled in them that a man is only a man once he's fought in battle. Well, no, that's not true. But in the Oyster Bay line of Roosevelts, you either fought in battle when you got the chance or you were a coward for denying it. Hell, take this quote from before Ted was even born:

And that is JUST on college games. What about war?

Of course, even if he didn't push his sons into WWI, they were bound to go in eventually. His sons all shared his glory-seeking and they would put themselves in harm's way just to get their father's attention sometimes, as I mentioned with Ted truly wondering if--even after fighting in a damn war, getting gassed, and shot, and nearly blinded, AND suffering almost a mental breakdown before he was even a teen--his father was proud of him.

So not only was Quentin's death enough guilt, his sons all got hurt in a war he not only pushed for in general, but he pushed for them to enter as soon as they could. Afterall, if he couldn't fight in the war at 58 with horrible health, then his younger and healthier sons could.

All in all they ALL needed therapy and there is a resounding amount of angst all around the entire family circle. If you read this I am very much sorry.

(I can also probably get the PDFs I used to search for these. I had the physical copies but those were library copies so uh. Not anymore. I can't find the other two books either so some parts WOULD have been pictures instead of text descriptions, but oh well.)

P.S i swear im not insane