Tag: change

Abuse and Money

I arrived home from school one day to find my mother sitting in a corner trembling, her face face blotched red and swollen from crying.  “Mom?”

The eyes that stared back at me were distant.  This was not my mother.  I took stock of the situation.  It was 3:15.  My little sister would be home from school in half an hour.   Dad would be home at 4:30 and expect dinner on the table.  Nothing had been started yet.  I dropped my books and got down to business.

“Mom.  You need to talk to me.  D is going to be home soon, and we have to get dinner on.  What’s going on?”

She nodded slightly.  “I can’t do it anymore.  Your father……..”  Her voice trailed off, but she didn’t need to say anything.  I knew how brutal my father could be.  I heard daily how stupid she was, and how she never cooked anything properly, even though that was her only job.  I wanted her to leave him, too.

“I’ll do whatever I can, Mom.  In two years, I can quit school, and get a job.  I’ll support us.”

Was that a faint smile?

“We’ll make it work, Mom.  We’ve got each other.”

Reaching for the pots and pans, I added, “Now what can we get started for dinner?”  There would be hell to pay if dinner wasn’t on the table the moment my dad walked in.

* * *

At twelve  years of age, I learned that money was what kept my mother in an abusive relationship.  It never occurred to me that she had the option of getting a job; she was a stay at home mom.  Five years later, we would go through a similar scenario, only then I was already living on my own, and had enough sense to get her to a lawyer.  In the end, my father convinced her to stay.

Years later, I would find myself a stay at home mom, with a husband who controlled the purse strings.  Like my mother, I felt powerless, and inferior.  Unlike my mother, I left anyway.  I braved poverty in order to find my worth.  Nevertheless,  I struggled, seldom able to give my children the material things they craved.  I felt guilty, worthless, inadequate.  After six years, I had a serious talk with God.

“God,” I said, “I want to make a difference in the world, but I can’t do it if I don’t even know where the next meal is coming from.”

I tried affirmations:  All my needs are always met; there is enough for everyone.

Eventually, things turned around. Yet, my relationship with money has not yet healed.  I want to be able to say the money’s the money, the way my new husband does.  I want to be able to see money as a means to an end, and not the end of my means.

My attitude towards money still needs work, but I am ready for change.

(Image:  empoweringparents.com)

 

Creativity and Self Definition

I dream that I am walking across an open field.  The landscape is barren, and dry, and a wind storm is whipping up, with low menacing clouds.  I am headed to the farm, where I raised my children, and where my ex-husband still lives.  I am living in the city, in the basement of  a raised ranch with hand-me-down furniture.  While the apartment is bright, because of the high windows, it is still a basement.  I am walking against the weather, despite the weather, because I want to finally settle something with my ex; call a truce.  He is processing wood – putting it through a machine and creating little piles of wood chips and lots of sawdust in his large open shop.  He keeps working and ignores my presence.  My mother arrives in a car and has a present for him.  My older sisters show up also.  They are in the main house primping, and trying to show me how to make myself more attractive.  I just want to clear the air, but there are too many distractions.

I always say that creativity is the process by which we define and then express ourself.   In the dream, I am influenced by the women in my family, the inclement weather, and an ex-spouse who is preoccupied.  I chuckle at the dream’s image of my older sisters preening, as growing up it was impossible to find a mirror that was not taken over by one of my sisters.  It was part of the reason I chose to be a tomboy; it was easier than trying to get bathroom time for grooming.

In my family, women were expected to be pretty, under educated, and submissive to men.  My older sisters were both beautiful, and took secretarial skills at school, leaving after grade 11, so they could get a job and find a man.  I did not fit this mold.  Taking after my father in looks,  I had a receding chin, and wore glasses.  I was also ‘gifted’ and aspired towards a university degree.  I was outspoken and pro women’s lib.  My mother told me daily that no one would ever love me; she worried about my future.  I felt my mother’s legacy fulfilling itself, when my second, and former husband told me he had never loved me after seventeen years together.  I left that marriage believing that I was unlovable.

I thought I had worked through all that.  I am in a relationship now with a husband who constantly demonstrates his love for me.  So why, in my dreams am I going over old territory?  And what does this have to do with creativity?

Maybe the dream is reminding me that if we define ourselves within the context of our environment, then we are limited.  If we are to expand our sense of self, we must be able to see beyond the landscape of our past.  In terms of health, my mother has had numerous issues, including three rounds of cancer; my oldest sister suffered illness all her life; and my next older sister is debilitated by schizophrenia.  None of them escaped the limitations of victimhood to experience either successful careers or relationships.

I believe that the purpose of dreams is always to bring positive movement in our lives.  This one left me feeling hopeless, unwanted, unseen or heard – much like my childhood.  I need to envision a new reality for myself.  I need to create new possibilities instead of searching and re-searching the experiences that will never serve to define me as anything less than inadequate.

(Image:  wallpapers-kid.com)