Growing Up Cop

“Growing up cop”
By Chris Gialanella

Growing up the son of a cop is both a privilege and a curse. It is an evolving dynamic that opens and closes the doors of your future. You are forced to grow up in an environment that brings you to the pinnacle of adrenaline and the perils of your worst emotions. The roller coaster of being a cop’s child will leave you with the darkest of scars and the brightest of smiles. The world becomes a barometer of smiles and cries. The key is to learn to smile more than you cry, at least on the outside.

Most children grow up in a warm, loving environment with two parents who fill their home with loving family photos. Dinner time is spent talking about their respective days and sharing quality loving milestones. Making memories that will serve as a blueprint to a normal life for the children to use as a template and carry on the American Dream. A cop’s son has a little different path. My father was a grizzled homicide detective born and raised on the mean streets of Newark where he then played police for nearly 30 years. He is a baby boomer whose way of life growing up in an Italian family was a mix between cops and criminals.  Born to Italian immigrants, his morals and ideologies were thrust upon me with a steady flurry of his hard stance on skullduggery behavior.

My home was filled with autopsy photos, crime scene investigations and dinner time stories of the most heinous acts of humanity imaginable. My childhood was spent passing tests of integrity, lectures of driving safety, flashbacks of gun lessons and the ever-irritating phrase, “Son, nothing good ever happens after 11 p.m.”  My toys were empty holsters, spare bullets and steel handcuffs. Cops and robbers replaced hide and go seek.  Visits to the police station were my Disney World. Sitting in the back seat of an old Crown Victoria on a crime scene was my movie theater. To me growing up, the only option was to become a cop.  It was all I knew, and it was the coolest job ever.

Being a homicide detective, my father missed many holidays, school and sports events, family dinners and visits from Santa Claus. The special occasions were missed so my father could give a voice to the dead when no one else would.  To me this was the norm and my father was a hero. I didn’t take his absence as he didn’t want to be with us, but that he was a larger-than-life figure I needed to share with the world.  My mother didn’t always understand that, but she would always put on a brave face and begrudgingly attempt to explain his absence with a “G-rated” version of his account.

I remember sitting in my grandmother’s home listening to the police scanner waiting to hear my father’s voice like the children before me would sit around the radio for a “fireside chat.” This forum was my Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Superman and Batman all in one. Hearing the men and women service the community provided me with a perspective unmatched by any of my non-law enforcement friends.

Being a cop’s kid made you the cool kid on the block. Your house became a playground of mystery and fantasy all in one.  Kids came from all over the neighborhood to be a part of something that they couldn’t experience in their own home. We had uniforms, knives, handcuffs, night sticks and holsters for whatever adventure we could dream up.  My family had a connection for any topic that came before us. We had mechanics to fix our cars, plumbers, electricians, and construction workers to work on our houses and business owners to help us with any purchase we needed. These were the perks of the trade. Everyone wanted to have a cop on their side.

I learned this later in life when I eventually became a cop myself and people would go above and beyond to make me happy. The feeling was contagious and a very powerful tool that needed to be regulated. 

As I got older, I began to realize that these childhood experiences of joy would soon make me become the warped and over-exposed young adult who was cynical of the world and questioned everyone’s motives. It affected my relationships, my personal and professional encounters, my ability to show and have compassion and an all-around simplistic view. You were either right or wrong based on the foundation of the law of a cop’s son.

I now look in the mirror and see my father. I carry on all his traits and I parent with a lot of the same hang-ups that I was taught.  I consider being a cop’s son a badge of honor, and I say it with all the pride as I take up the challenge not to repeat history but embrace the life.  To all the kids out there, “growing up cop” our futures became pre-determined whether we liked it or not. 

Christopher Gialanella is a 23-year police veteran currently holding the rank of police captain in the Special Operations Division for the City of Newark, NJ. He holds degrees in criminal justice and Homeland Security. Chris is the owner of Wide Eye Security Systems—a private security consulting company focusing on the need for innovative solutions pertaining to real-time security issues. Chris is the son of a cop who grew up in the industry and has dedicated his life to protecting those who can’t protect themselves. Follow him on Twitter @GGialanella