What was it like for my dad in the early years that he never talks about?

Probably much harder than he's let on. Kris Kluver, in The Dysfunctional Family Office, has Robert Mitchell tell his adult children the story he had carried alone for thirty years. Maxed-out credit cards. No credit left. Sitting in a discount grocery store parking lot with a bag of change, counting out nickels, dimes, and pennies because the quarters were already gone. Buying seven boxes of mac and cheese for a dollar. Crying in the truck because he didn't know how he'd pay rent. He'd been too proud to ask for help and too poor to feel safe. He carried the shame for decades. Most UHNW founders carry a version of this. The early years were terrifying in ways the polished version never includes. Hearing it changes how the kids understand the parent. The kids stop reading the founder's later behavior as performance and start reading it as the legacy of real fear.