healing – Page 15 – One Woman's Quest

Day 173 “Diligence”

“Children like Ester don’t typically succeed in regular school settings,” the doctor advised me. “Most don’t function well in social settings at all.”

I tried to visualize the alternative. “What are you suggesting?”

“Montessori, perhaps, or home-schooling. She may not be very successful in school.”

I shook my head. I’d been seeking answers to Ester’s problems for two years, but this wasn’t the solution I was looking for.

“Thank you, Doctor,” I shook his hand. “Where do we go next?”

The doctor prescribed medication which would retrain Ester’s brain, allowing her to sleep. The poor child had not slept more than an hour and a half at a time since her birth three years earlier. She and I were both exhausted, and equally distraught. This specialist was the first to offer a diagnosis. I suffered from toxemia during my pregnancy and he explained that toxins seeped into Ester’s brain causing this disorder. In layman’s terms, he called it “short-fuse syndrome”. Apparently, whenever Ester reached the stage of sleep where deep relaxation occurs, her brain would release the wrong message, causing her muscles to tighten up, waking her up in pain. Ester woke up screaming frequently during the night, so the diagnosis made sense to me. She was also “short-fused” as he described it, giving up easily and given to fits of temper. Could this really hinder her social development?

From the moment Ester was born she started to scream, and I often tease her that she didn’t stop screaming for three years. In the beginning, I just thought she was colicky, but when it continued, I suspected something else was happening. When her baby brother was born, and sleeping through the night, I knew there was a problem. Ester’s screams and temper tantrums interfered with her development of speech. Although she was physically advanced, she hadn’t spoken her first word at eighteen months, whereas her sister was forming sentences at a year. Discipline was futile and heartbreaking. It just didn’t seem fair to punish a child who was in a constant state of anguish.

In our search for answers, we were shuffled from doctor to doctor, and given advice from everyone we met, whether solicited or not. Well-meaning relatives told us we were overindulgent, strangers also suggested it was our parenting skills that were lacking. No one, not even Ester’s father, offered to give me respite. She was too hard to handle.

“She is not bad,” the doctor explained. “She is reacting to her physical discomfort and the stress she is experiencing due to lack of sleep. Just as you and I would. Unfortunately, these are the formative years. Ester’s condition will effect her self-confidence and esteem. Children like her are not risk-takers and will not respond well to change.”

The diagnosis I could accept. The prognosis, I could not. Ester and I had our work cut out for us.

It took six months of drug therapy before Ester started to sleep through the night and the screaming fits diminished. What was left was a highly anxious, impatient child, who clung to me. By the time she went to nursery school, I was ready for a break.

And I was nervous. What if what the doctor said was true? What if Ester couldn’t adapt to school? I wouldn’t allow myself to go there.

Nursery school was great. Ester received lots of one on one attention and the reports back were always glowing. Things changed when she started school full-time.

“Ester cries all day, Mom.” her older sister informed me a week after school started. “I go by her classroom everyday and she is always crying.”

I was furious. Why hadn’t her teacher called me? Turns out her teacher didn’t notice. Quiet, shy, Ester, was weeping silently, afraid of getting in trouble. I went back to the doctor. He gave me the name of a play therapist.

Ester spent the rest of the year in therapy, and she and I worked out strategies to help her cope. We practiced breathing and visualization and set achievable goals. I soothed her through endless stomach aches and more sleepless nights. By grade five, I convinced her to set a goal of raising her hand once a day to answer a question. At the end of grade eight, she and two friends sang at their graduation. Ester survived public school.

High school brought new challenges and greater stress. Ester, who always feels the pressure more than others, could not relax into the teenage social scene and chose to be a loner. She spent long hours in her room, pouring over her homework, never willing to give up. She became a perfectionist about herself and her grades and the tension grew. Her self-esteem plummeted, and she withdrew into herself. But she never gave up.

When Ester graduated from college, I could not have been more proud. As she walked across the stage to receive her diploma, I remembered the words the doctor had spoken on that day so many years before, and thanked God I hadn’t listened.

Yesterday, just minutes before she walked down the aisle to take her wedding vows, Ester and I spent a moment, hands clasped together, eyes locked. There was so much we wanted to say, and no words to express it. Then I pulled her to me and we embraced.

I hope she heard the admiration in my voice as I told her I love her. I hope she felt the absolute pride and respect I have for the woman that she has become.

I don’t know anyone who has worked harder to get to where she is in life.

That is diligence.

Choosing Self Love

The day was sickly hot, and my allergies were bugging me. I just wanted to hunker down in the corner of my room and lose myself in a good book, but when I tried the back door, it was locked. I knocked. No response. I knocked harder and longer.

The door swung open angrily, and my oldest sister yelled for me to get lost, slamming it in my face.

I knocked again, more persistently.

She opened again hissing at me: “Seriously, V.J.! You need to stay away, or Mom will kill herself.”

“But it’s hot and I don’t feel well. Please let me come in.”

“No way! Mom can’t handle anything else.” She slammed the door again. I heard the lock slide into place. I slumped down on the step, thinking over what she had said. Was it really possible for me to be the cause of my mother’s suicide? The rest of the family, save for my Dad, were inside. I was the only one locked out. Was I really that bad of a kid?

That was the day I learned that I could be responsible for another person’s well-being. I wasn’t yet eight years of age.

* * *

“I am not a very good daughter,” I explained to the therapist I had been seeing. I was thirty-seven and having difficulty with my own daughter, so I sought help.

“What makes you say that?”

“Well, I upset my mother and she hasn’t spoken to me for a week.”

“You think you are that powerful?”

“Pardon me?”

“You actually believe that you can influence how someone feels?”

I hadn’t thought of it that way. “You mean, my mother’s reaction is out of my control?”

“Exactly.”

* * *

“My husband tends not to look after himself when I am away.”

“And how does that make you feel?”

Eighteen years later and I am back in therapy again. Situational anxiety and depression is the diagnosis. I feel like I have regressed.

“Guilty.”

“Why is that?”

“Well, if I was home I know he would be cared for.”

“So you are responsible for his choices?”

“No….well…..I guess that is what I am saying. Shit! How do I let this go?!”

“You will not always agree with the choices that your husband makes, but you can at least let him have responsibility for them.”

“That makes sense, so why is it so difficult for me?”

“It’s really about control. Somehow you believe that if you can control the other person’s behaviour, then everything will be all right. It never works, of course, but it’s a product of growing up in an out-of-control family environment. It’s part of being a people pleaser.”

I thought I had dealt with all this years ago, and said so.

“The subconscious tries to heal those parts of self that are still wounded, so it repeats patterns. The secret is in re-parenting yourself. This need for control is a reflection of a childhood need that wasn’t met.”

“Like the part of me that thought she was responsible for my mother’s suffering?”

“Yes. As an adult now, you need to offer that little person a different perspective. What would you tell that little girl now?”

“Well, I would sit down on that porch step with her and explain that whatever her mother was going through was not her fault. I would tell her that her sister was coping with a bad situation, and that it was not related to her behaviour. None of it was her fault.”

“That is a good start. Can you see anything else that the child might be missing in this scenario?”

“Caring for. I was hot and tired and needed shelter. I probably needed some comfort too.”

“So how will you give that to her?”

I think this over. Am I good at looking after myself? Occasionally, but not always. “Why is looking after myself so difficult?”

“You tell me.”

I look back at the little girl locked out of her house, and I suddenly know.

“She doesn’t think she deserves to have her needs met,” I realize. “I still don’t think my needs matter. Others are always more important.”

“So who should you be responsible for?” the therapist asks gently.

“Me. And her. She needs me to take care of us.”

“Can you do that?”

“It’s the only choice that makes sense.”

(Image: hdimagelib.com)

Day 160 “Nature Everywhere”

my heart is a caged bird
whom I guard
as if her very existence
sustains me
oblivious to her beauty
to her suffering
I keep her in a jewelled cage
of golden bars
and convince myself that
her satin pillows suffice
to bring her comfort
and still she wanes
and I do not understand
i have protected her well
and cared for her
like a child,
my child,
my inner child
that no one saw
or loved
she is a simple bird
plain really.
she sings so rarely now
that sometimes i forget to feed her
an oversight, I assure her
no harm done,
i hope.

I am a foolish woman, I realize
Aging
No one values what i feel and think
It is a young’s person world
And this little bird is really insignificant
not the jewel i once thought.
all she has is her song
and i have smothered it out of her
keeping her for false purposes
my head filled with ideals.

I opened the cage today
and an amazing thing happened
my little bird pulsed with new life
and plumped herself up
and sang and sang
before she took flight

and my heart,
with its open gilded cage
breaths in the freedom
and smiles

what a foolish woman i have been.

I think I’ll try and plant a flower instead.

Day 159 “The Tao of Compassion”

Compassion did not come easily for me during my father’s dying years. Instead, I felt an ending to the years of tyranny, and a lessening of the tension between us. The former six foot plus commando had lost his strength and ability to intimidate. I felt sympathy for him, and an incliniation that maybe this was karma at work: a man who had caused so much pain in his life, was now suffering with his own.

Then I had a dream.

It is the thickness of the air that first accosts me: the damp acrid smell of stale tobacco, wet camel wool, and the pungent smell of rubber. I am huddled in the dark corner of the stairwell closet, trying desperately to camouflage myself behind my father’s wellingtons and the coats that hang there. A tiny thread of light, seeping through the bottom of the door, accents the dinginess of my surroundings. “Why God? Why me?” I cry into my sleeve, muffling any sound I might make. I hear the front door open, and my father’s heavy steps in the hall. “Where is he!” It is more of a command than a question. I can feel his tension through the wall that separates us. I know it well. He has been drinking.
“The child has gone to bed, Father. Come in and have your tea.” The pitch of my mother’s voice tells me she is nervous too. Never a good sign.
“I’ll be having a piece of the boy first!”
The closet door opens and my heart stops, but it is only my mother’s arms reaching in to hang up his coat. She doesn’t even glance at me – we both know that is too big a risk. The muffling of their voices tell me that they have moved away and I let my body relax a little, heart still pounding.

I wake up, instantly knowing who the tiny boy is in my dream. When I share it with my father, he says it started when he was four. One of seven children, he became the whipping boy for the family, taking the brunt of all his father’s wrath.”It was the custom,” he explained with an accepting sigh. “And why I ran away from home at fifteen.”

There were so many things I didn’t know about my father, but I was beginning to see him in a new light. I realized that all his life he had been running, not just from the violence of his childhood home, but from his own inner turmoil. He harboured a deep secret, which burdened us all over the years, and his accompanying addictions and impulsive, and sometimes violent behaviour didn’t add to our empathy for him.

Was it possible we were all victims? I wondered.

When he finally succumbed to death, all I could think was: Good for you, Dad. You made it. I hoped peace had now embraced him.

That was several years ago. My mother has since remarried, and when we speak of my father, it is ofter with a sense of relief that that chapter of our lives is closed.

The compassion my father deserved still had not fully surfaced.

It came a few months back, while attending a workshop hosted by Egale, an organization committed to human rights, specifically as related to the LGBTQ* community. I was attending as an educator, hoping to gain some insight into helping students experiencing gender issues.

The morning session was dedicated to understanding the language specific to gender identity and orientation. We learned that biology dictates how an individual presents, and that the concepts of male and female are actually polarities which describe rarities, rather than norms. Most individuals fall within a sliding scale.

Armed with this information, we were asked to think of someone we knew within the LGBTQ community, and step into their shoes for a moment. We were given a coloured star and as the person we were representing, asked to fill out the points of the star with each of the following: closest relative, closest friend, community associations, work, and aspirations. I thought of my aunt, who all her life was a closet lesbian. I could only imagine how hard it must have been for her.

Instead, I chose to step in my father’s shoes.

Silently, we all carried our stars into a circle and sworn to silence to honour each person’s process, we began the exercise.

The facilitator read from a script. She began by suggesting that as our individual we had just decided to come out to our closest family member. If we held a blue star (which I did) our family member was already aware of our preferences and willing to support us. Orange and pink star holders, while meeting with some initial resistance, would eventually gain support. They were instructed to fold the point of their star in. Red star holders would be denied acceptance from the person whose opinion they valued most. Their point was to be torn off and discarded.

The pain of grief tore through my heart. I felt the room reel, but struggled for composure. I was my father’s firt-born child and the light of his life. I was that person dearest to his heart who had rejected him when he came out to me.

The rest of the exercise passed in a blur as I felt each corner of my father’s star drop to the floor, understanding for the first time in my life that he had no hope for acceptance, and no support in his life, and that turning to alcohol and work was his only viable way of coping. No wonder he never fulfilled his aspirations: nothing in his life held him up to do so.

When the heart opens, compassion will appear. Too late for my father and I on this mortal soil, but I hope that from the other side he is looking down on me and catching a bittersweet moment of solace.

I never understood you, Dad, and in my own self-centered, self-righteous manner, I missed a golden opportunity. I have to think we were both destined for so much more.

Today, I am committing to the undoing of the pain that broke us all and pushing through to new understanding. It was biology, and not addiction (as was explained to us in the 1960’s) that caused you to identify as a woman and cross dress. That you were also attracted to females sexually, I now understand to have been part of your norm.

Imagine how much better we would have all been, had compassion, instead of self-defense, guided us. But we were ignorant.

It is my birthday today, Dad, and I wish you were here that I might share this gift with you, but you are not. We might have dressed up and gone for dinner, like we used to do when I was little. Just you and I. And you could wear your favourite dress. And I would be proud of my father who fought so hard to be in a world that could not conceive of him.

I hope this gift of compassion that has come to me late in life, will pay its way forward. In honour of us both.

*Lesbian, Gay, Bi-sexual, Transgendered and Two Spirited, and Questioning.

Day 158 “The Meditative Walk”

Just steps away from the car park there is a big old oak tree whose branches extend over the river. I start here, releasing any stress from the day, and saying a prayer of invocation.

When I am ready I start my walk, first along the path through the woods and then circling back by the river, and eventually stopping at a bench overlooking the flowing water where I can contemplate further.

On this day, I have brought my ten-year-old son.

I explain my ritual and invite him to join in my initial clearing and prayer. As we walk, I advise him to be open to whatever thoughts, emotions, or sensations present themselves, but caution him to keep his mind clear, grounding himself by concentrating on his feet on the earth if he has to.

“Could we see signs along the way, Mom?”

“Like what?”

“Like that hawk sitting in that tree over there?”

“Possibly. It could also just be a hawk sitting in a tree. I don’t usually pay too much attention, unless the sign recurs. But it is definitely okay to appreciate nature; he is a beauty.”

We walk on in silence. The woods offer a plethora of wildlife and I can see that John is alert and on the outlook. So serious for such a young man.

We reach a fork in the path, and I point us towards the river. This is my favourite part of the walk, where the graceful old trees line the riverbank, and magnificent homes stand guard across the way. It is a hot day, with little breeze, and the river is peaceful.

John points at two more hawks resting in the treetops.

“A good sign?” I ask him.

“I think so.”

It has been six months since our family was torn apart by separation, and while John seems to be doing well, I often wonder. He is an old soul; to worried about his mother for his own good. I am happy that he came along with me today, on what he calls my ‘finding inner peace’ walks.

I steer us off the path and across a grassy patch to a bench. “I like to sit here at the end,” I explain, “and just think about the walk, and anything else I might need to experience for healing today.”

I direct him to sit up straight with his feet touching the earth. He has to sit forward. Then I suggest he closes his eyes, and breaths deeply, releasing each breath slowly and fully.

“Feel the earth beneath your feet and around you, and as you breath, let go of your separateness.”

“What does that mean?”

“Try to experience yourself as a part of the surroundings. When you breath, for instance, imagine your awareness expanding beyond your physical self and becoming just part of the flow, so that the river feels like it is moving through you, and that bird’s song is inside you. Do you understand what I mean?”

“I think so.” Then after a few minutes. “Why doesn’t everyone do this, Mom?”

“It would be good. What are you feeling?”

“Like I totally let go of anger. I can’t hold onto it when I’m in this place.”

“Now you know why I come here.”

From the corner of my eye, I can see that others were approaching, so I suggest we move on. As we walk back towards the car, John, who had fallen quiet again, says: “You know how they say seeing is believing?”

“Yes?”

“Well I think it is actually the other way around. If you believe it, you can see it, but you have to believe it first.”

“You may be right.”

I don’t often share my meditative walks with another person, but it occurs to me as I write this that John and I are due for another.

Synchronicity

Daylight had just begun to creep into the night sky when an insistent tapping woke me. Fighting against the fog of sleep, my mind struggled to identify the source of the sound. It was coming from a window, across the room. A small bird was tapping frantically on the windowsill. Silly bird, I thought. You don’t want in here.

Awake now, I decided to start my day. In two weeks I would be going away on a much anticipated retreat. I had things to do. As it was a Sunday, I would have several hours to myself before the kids awoke and the day got underway. Thanks, little bird, I thought.

The next day, I was already waking up by the time my little friend arrived, tapping once again on the same window. He flew into a nearby bush as I made my way to my car a little later, and when I started the engine, he flew onto my side mirror and cocked his head at me. I laughed out loud. “You can’t stay there,” I scolded. “I have to drive to work.” Stubbornly, he rode down the driveway with me and then flew away as I turned onto the street.

We were to become best buddies for the next two weeks, he greeting me every morning, then riding with me on the car. When I’d return in the late afternoon, he’d be back to greet me again. Mom’s friend, the kids called him. “Why is he doing that?” they’d ask. “I have no idea.” I’d respond, but I had a feeling I’d find out soon enough.

* * * * *

Time came to set out for the retreat. Three of us were traveling together and stopping for the night on the way. We chose a cute little town with a promising looking little restaurant where we could get a gourmet meal. I chose the Duck. Never having had duck before, I didn’t know what to expect. The grease from the bird kept me up all night with stomach pains, and prompted a number of jokes about sitting ducks, and Duck! and so on, all night.

We arrived at the retreat center just before dinner the next day. The cabins were rustic, but the setting was idyllic. Our cabin was set back in the woods, not far from a stream with a waterfall. The beauty and serenity of the setting instantly filled me with calm.

The bell for dinner sounded, and my friends and I made our way to the dining hall. A line had formed along the entrance way, which doubled as a book store. “Oh good,” my friend Sandy exclaimed. “I want to shop for books.”

I was not as interested. I’d spent all my money getting here, so I would practice some restraint. I turned my back on the books to avoid temptation, but just as I did, someone tried to pass, and I knocked a shelf. I caught a book mid tumble. It was open, and as I glanced at the page, I was startled to see the picture of my little bird looking back up at me. I gasped.

“Remember the bird I told you about?” I exclaimed to my friends. “This is it.”

“What does it say?”

The caption read: “If this bird has shown up in your life, it is bringing you the message of…….”

Shaken, I put the book back. The message I just read was no coincidence. I couldn’t concentrate all through dinner. I had to know the rest.

The book, Animal Speak, by Ted Andrews, said that the bird that had been following me was a cowbird, and that cowbirds speak to the issue of abandonment in childhood. Andrews said if this bird had shown up in your life, it was time to deal with those issues. I was dumbfounded, and trembling, but at the same time, there was no better place for healing.

* * *

I awoke the next morning before sunrise, and slipped out of the cabin quietly. There was just enough light to see the outline of a path. A movement in the brush alarmed me, until I saw that it was a bird that flew just ahead of me. I followed. The bird flew ahead a bit further. I continued on the same route. The bird settled on a branch of a tree, and I approached it as if being beckoned. The tree stood on the bank of a stream. Without daylight, everything was imbued with an eerie light, almost other worldly. I decided this was as a good a place as any to meditate on my findings from the day before.

Taking a few deep cleansing breaths, I opened my awareness to the beauty of my surroundings. Immediately, I became aware of another presence; a presence I had not felt for many years: the divine feminine. My heart filled with deep longing, and sorrow, as tears rushed down my cheeks. My issue of abandonment.

Why did you abandon me? my heart cried.

I did not abandon you, the voice was gentle, loving. It was you who abandoned me.

It was true. I had become so entrenched in the pursuit of material happiness, I had neglected my spiritual roots.

I never left you. I felt myself surrounded in a warm embrace, and sobbed. I cried for all the years lived in a vacuum, striving to please others, and be good enough, yet lonely, incomplete. I cried for the arrogance that made me think I didn’t need this connection, and for the ingratitude that I had shown.

Mother, I had called her as a child. She was a loving, patient presence that was always there for me: her voice the subtle changes of the wind, her essence a sudden release of fragrance. She spoke to me through signs and omens, but mostly through birds.

Birds. Birds had brought me back to her.

Hope, renewal, rejuvenation, and love filled me. My feet barely touched the ground as I skipped back to the cabin, daylight just starting to greet the day.

“Tell your bird friend we don’t need the wake up call,” one roommate grumbled at me as I opened the door. “She’s been tapping at the window since 6.”

Sure enough, she was there again as we made our way to breakfast, following along and finding a perch just outside our window. Then, as if she had waited, she followed us across the grounds to the gathering place, where we would be studying for the day with Delores Krieger.

Synchronicity is the Universe’s way of telling you, you are on the right track, Delores offered.

At lunch, I looked up the species of bird: catbird.

” The presence of a catbird as a totem indicates you will be encountering a wider range of people than you are normally in contact with …..With the catbird as a totem, look for new people coming into your life that will teach you lessons in your ability to communicate.”

It made sense. The focus of the retreat was how to teach therapeutic touch, and it appeared that I was renewing old forms of communication as extracurricular.

I was feeling the synchronicity.

(Image: abundanthope.net)

Day 156 “Good and Evil”

Jane first contacted me because she thought she was under psychic attack. I agreed to meet her at her apartment.

A slender, attractive blond answered the door.

“Jane?” I noted her hesitancy, but she stepped aside to let me in.

The apartment was small, and despite the clutter, quite tidy. I asked her permission to walk around. Nothing that felt external jumped out at me, however, I did feel a lot of chaotic energy connected to Jane herself. What I was sensing didn’t fit the woman before me. She seemed “normal”.

“What makes you think you are under psychic attack?” I asked her.

Jane told me she felt it, and sometimes she would hear voices. She said it happened at all hours, day and night, and she was losing sleep.

“It doesn’t make practical sense,” I told her. “Who would be attacking you and why? I am more inclined to believe this is an internal phenomena.”

“You mean I’m doing it to myself?” She considered this thought, and then slowly nodded. “I’ve wondered that, but why?”

I suggested she come to see me in my office where we could explore the possibilities.

Nothing on the surface seemed out of place. The first couple of visits, Jane arrived looked refreshed and well dressed. She shared that she had troubles holding down a job, mostly because she still didn’t know what she wanted to do. She had also been seeing a psychiatrist to help deal with personal issues. She didn’t really remember much of her childhood.

I noted that Jane, apart from being highly intelligent, was also incredibly creative.

“Sometimes, I can be,” she concurred.

I maintained that the phenomena she was experiencing was internal, as if there was more than one person inside her.

This notion set of an unexpected chain of events. This well polished woman of nearly thirty suddenly transformed into a little girl before me. Her legs started swinging back and forth and her responses took on a childish, sing-songy tone.

“How old are you?” I asked on a whim.

“Nine,” she replied, and then without hesitation, “Where’d you get that picture? Is it your hand?”

She was referring to a plaster mold of a hand that hung above my desk.

“No. See mine’s too big. I don’t know whose hand is it. I don’t believe we’ve met.”

“I know you,” her eyes continued to scan the things in my room. “You are going to help us.”

“I hope so.” I suddenly knew I was in over my head.

* * *

“What do you like to do for fun?” I asked Jane during our next visit. She was her usual self when she arrived, but the question caused her to stir in her seat.

I waited for her to get comfortable again, but suddenly she didn’t seem to be able to. She stood, and started to pace.

“Did I ask something that was upsetting?”

The woman that turned to me was not Jane. She looked much older, and worn by the years.

“Oh, I know how to have fun, alright!” came the response. “Are you one of those self-righteously moral types?”

“Can’t say that I am?”

“I like a good drink, and a hard man, if I can find one.” She laughed at this. “What is it you hope to do here anyway?”

“Jane thinks she’s being attacked psychically.”

“Jane thinks she’s too good for the rest of us.”

My head was reeling. What was happening here was beyond me. After ‘Jane’ left, I had to confirm with my secretary that what I had just experienced was true.

“Did you see Jane before our appointment? What colour was her hair?”

“Blonde, as usual.”

“And what colour was it when she just left?”

“Come to think of it, it was red. How did that happen?”

“You tell me!”

* * *

I shared with Jane what had been happening during her visits.

“How is this possible?” she asked me.

“From what I can tell, something traumatic must have happened to you to cause your psyche to split into different identities.”

“That’s what my psychiatrist says.”

“And you don’t believe her? Doesn’t it make more sense then psychic attack?”

“I just wish I could know for sure.”

A thought occurred to me.

“Tell me about grocery shopping.”

“What do you mean?”

“How do you know what to buy? Do you ever find yourself getting home with things you either don’t remember buying, or don’t even like?”

“All the time!”

“Well, that must mean everybody participates. Next time you grocery shop, stop and listen. See if you can get a sense of the others.”

The suggestion worked. Jane called me with excitement. “I know what you mean, now! My psychiatrist says this is a great breakthrough.”

But the progress would be short-lived and my lack of expertise would be to blame.

Little Janie arrived next accompanied by a horrible smell that made my stomach turn. I could only describe the energy that followed her as evil, and I reacted accordingly.

We did a ritual to cleanse her from this demon, and banish it.

It worked too well.

It turned out that the demon-like figure that had appeared in my office that day was the one that held the key to Jane’s ability to heal. The evil that it reeked of was the torture and humiliation that had been perpetrated against young Jane. In order to be whole again, she needed to access that knowledge, and I had banished it.

I had not seen that like the ying yang symbol, there is good in bad, and bad in good. I had reacted out of fear.

“Evil is the construct of man,” a religious studies prof once said. “The idea of demons was borrowed from the Greek, daemon, which actually means mischievous. The idea being that demonic beings were intended to shake us from our complacency and help us grow.”

The entity that appeared in my office that day accompanied the young Jane. It came because she trusted me to help it, and I did not.

Judgment is such as harsh thing, and when we put it in the context of good and evil we eliminate other possibilities.

Jane would have to work long and hard to regain the trust of this part of her – so essential to her wholeness.

Distinguishing Past from Present

My father had a habit of tilting his glass in such a way as to indicate that it needed refilling. He would perform this ritual without saying a word, but the accompanying look would speak volumes: I am the Master here, and you are to do my bidding.

I hated it, and I fought against him, but the reality was that he did hold all the power.

When my husband was laid up, I took on the role of caregiver. One morning, he tipped his coffee cup and gave me a look of appeal. I felt myself cringe. He is just like my father! my mind screamed. I felt the weight of years of oppression and depression hovering over me. Have I married my father? Is there no hope for me? Is my joy always to be squashed?

th-1 My therapist recommended Perfect Daughters, by Robert Ackerman. It reveals the struggles, characteristics, and patterns associated with adult daughters of alcoholics. I learned that women of alcoholic fathers will often enter into relationships where they see an opportunity to heal the original father/daughter rift, and that this attempt is seldom successful.

What I have gleaned from experience is that I often tolerate behaviours for a long time, and that instead of seeing fault in the other, I will be quick to blame myself. I know that I do not like confrontation, and that I feel like my complaints are trivial in the light of the bigger picture. I have also learned that I often project unresolved feelings about my father into my current relationships, and I recognized immediately that the gush of emotion over Ric’s innocent gesture was just that.

Many feelings related to childhood have bubbled up as a result of the stress of the past years. I have been feeling the despair of never seeing an end to the hurt. Ric, tired of his predicament became more defiant, pushing his limits, and striving to regain control over his life. My response was accelerated anxiety and as much as I understand that he is an adult and makes his own choices, I find it hard not to react, spiraling into a dysfunctional dance of feeling like a child again, caught in a cycle of chaotic impossibilities, destined to be crushed.

Then I had a dream. I don’t remember what it was, but I awoke with sudden understanding. The panic I had been feeling is a product of my child’s need to finally feel in control. Somehow, she believes that if she could just control my father /Ric’s behavior, then everything will be okay. Her desire to control stems from a need to know that there is consistency in life, and that the process can be trusted. She needs to feel secure and know that she is loved no matter what, not only if she behaves herself, or manages not to upset anyone.

The adult me knows that none of this is possible. People will always behave and make choices outside of our control. It is not a reflection of their love for us, but a product of their own inner workings. Ric’s struggles and his attempts to resolve them are not about me, in reaction to me, or more importantly, because of me. If his actions have consequences that affect me, then it is up to me to look after myself and make sure I have taken appropriate protective measures.

I am reminded of something one of my university profs once said. It went something like this: Where there is power over, love cannot exist. Where there is power for all, love exists. My father behaved as if he was the only one with power in the family. I did not feel loved. My marriage to Ric is a partnership and a sharing of power. I feel his love for me.

Day 149 “Meridians”

By the time I took myself to Emergency, human touch was unbearable. I could get no relief from the swelling that affected me head to toe, and my heart was continually racing. Emotionally, I felt out of control: cranky, teary, and desperate.

The heart palpitations got me admitted directly, but the tests they ran showed the problem was not my heart. An IV drip was started, but the painkiller they were infusing me with did not touch the pain. Two doctors came in and touched me in certain places, setting off cries of agony.

“Your blood tests showed that your liver counts are out,” one young doctor explained. “We don’t know why that is, but it is consistent with someone experiencing your level of pain. We suspect you have fibromyalgia, but you will need further tests. We are referring you on to Urgent Care.”

A battery of tests and doctors followed, checking my kidneys, my heart functioning, and so on. Always the liver counts came back as suspicious. No explanations. Fibromyalgia, each doctor deduced.

“Take pain medication,” the Internist said.

“Your heart can’t tolerate pain medication,” the Cardiologist countered.

“Go see Dr. Li,” a good friend advised.

I called Dr. Li. A tiny, Chinese woman, half my size, Dr. Li had a reassuring presence. She listened intently, and asked specific questions. “I don’t know fibromyalgia,” she said in her broken English. “I will check your meridians.”

I held something in my left hand, while Dr. Li ran a rod connected to a computer over my right hand. The machine squealed and reacted as she clicked buttons, and read the computer’s reactions. At the end, she handed me a printout.

“The body has many lines of energy flow,” she tried to explain. “This tells where there are problems in the flow. Green is good. Red means there are danger spots; yellow is chronic.” I had two green lines; my printout was a sea of red and yellow.

“Each imbalance is scored 1-4. A four means you already have cancer. You do not have a four, but your numbers add up to four. Not good.”

Thus I began my course of treatment – weekly acupuncture, a drastic change in diet, and cleansing with Chinese herbs.

My health improved.

I continued to see specialists, ensuring that I wasn’t missing anything. A year after starting my treatments with Dr. Li, they found the abnormal cells aggressively growing in my right breast. Surgery followed.

I asked Dr. Li about it. She confessed that she had been a medical doctor before coming to Canada, but that she found that by the time traditional medicine finds something, it is usually too late. She prefers to work on preventing disease, where she can actually help the patient.

I escaped the threat of cancer with only a fading scar to remind me, and I credit my work with Dr. Li. Her knowledge, combined with an uncanny instinct for what a body needs, promotes well-being.

It’s all in the meridians, apparently.

Criticism Be Gone!

I was forty before I could finally ask my mother about her constant criticism of me growing up. We were alone together, in the car, driving out of town. I had her undivided attention.

th-4 “Help me to understand, something,” I prefaced the conversation. “When I was young, you always told me no one would ever love me. What was that about?”

“I didn’t say it to be mean,” she explained and I believed her. My mother was not typically a malicious person. “It’s just that you were so different from your sisters, and I was afraid for you. I thought I was helping you by preparing you for the inevitable.”

“But why, Mom? What was it about me that you thought was unloveable?”

“You were just so smart, and independent minded……” she trailed off. “I guess I thought that men don’t like smart women.”

“Do you understand that I heard what you said to mean that I was impossible to love?”

“Oh my God, that is not what I intended at all! Of course you are loveable. You are compassionate and kind, and you deserve to be loved. I thought I was preparing you, that’s all. You were just so different, and I thought I had to protect you. I never meant for you to think you weren’t loveable.”

She paused in reflection.

“When the school came to us and told us they had done some testing and wanted to send you to a special school for the gifted, I was scared. I didn’t know how to handle it. Your father was all for it, but all I could think about was how would you fit in, and who would ever love you. I guess I thought I was helping. You were an enigma to me.”

Mother’s criticism of me was born out of fear and ignorance; my acceptance of her harsh words was a reflection of my need for her approval.

I understood. Within the context of my mother’s upbringing and beliefs, I did not fit the mold. She was merely expressing fear related to her own limitations. Unfortunately, for the first forty years of my life, I lived out my mother’s legacy, choosing partners who were incapable of loving me.

My mother was not the only one to be critical of my intellectual abilities. “Everyone hated you,” a drunken cousin once confessed to me, then added, “but I don’t know why – you’re so nice.” Classmates called me Browner, implying that I only got good grades because I ‘kissed up’ to the teachers. Even close friends have commented that I’m not really that smart.

By listening to the criticism, I began to devalue myself. Driven by a need to be accepted, I started to act dumb. Better to deny self than to be criticized, right?

Wrong!

Embracing criticism and taking it to heart is ultimately a sin against the self. We are each uniquely created, and destined, and it is only through accepting our differences, and nurturing them, that we can truly be fulfilled.

th-3 Rejecting criticism is the first step to living authentically, and the only hope for living purposefully and to full potential.

Armed with this new understanding, I will stop apologizing for who I am. I will let go of the need for praise from others, and recognize that their criticism is more about their process than mine, and let it be. I will celebrate who I am by committing to my own process, and focusing on my goals and gifts.

I will finally start living.