The myth of the perfect family

Pro wrestler Chris Benoit's longtime driver described the Benoit family as "the happiest people."

Friend after friend who responded to an online board on Fort Thomas resident Robert McCafferty described his family as "the perfect family."

The words have an eerie ring to them now that police say that Chris Benoit strangled his wife and smothered his young son before hanging himself Monday, and are holding Cheryl McCafferty for her husband's murder.

Such tragedies make us wonder how much we really know about even our close friends and family members, how much pain goes on in homes and people's heads that we've never imagined.

Perhaps the "happiest" and "perfect" images are ultimately part of the problem.

Advertising, entertainment and even the social "competitions" that go on within neighborhoods, companies, schools and families push us to hide our weaknesses, deny our problems, project our most successful image to the world. We try to trump one another with the size of our homes, the scope of our travels, the breadth of our social circle, the length of our resume, the college-acceptance list of our offspring.

In the end, being a perfect family isn't nearly as important as being a healthy one -- where people can admit their shortcomings, acknowledge their dependency and seek help with their problems.