Jackson's life began with death. His parents, Gordon and Margaret Miller, died in a car crash while his mother was still pregnant. He was miraculously still alive and saved, born via emergency c-section. He was adopted days later by David Whittemore and his wife. For the first several years of his life, he was a happy, outgoing boy. But then he found out he was adopted when he was in the first grade, and that changed. After that, Jackson became withdrawn. He became driven in a way that was unusual for a child so young, always trying to be the best, trying to be someone his birth parents would have wanted and to prove to the parents who adopted him that he was worth keeping. 

As he got older, Jackson also became highly competitive and aggressive with his peers.