A bit of review followed by a string of inter-related insights (none of which are new) strung together in such a logical detailed manner that I’ll bet today’s intuitive train of thought will unearth deeper truth so as to rescue my peace of mind by resolving a long standing sense of inner conflict (though over most of my life, I’d no conscious clue that this particular inner conflict, based in undeserved guilt carried forward from childhood in its unidentified and thus unresolved state, had caused my anxiety to arise on too many occasions to enumerate). So okay, here we go—
After my beloved grandpa and baby sister’s sudden (mysterious) ‘disappearances’, no one in my extended family smiled, leaving me, just shy of three, feeling terrified, utterly bereft, deeply confounded, all alone and as depressed as everyone else—for many months.
As children blame themselves, undeservedly and as these terrifying ‘disappearances’ terrified my three year old undeveloped thought processor, I’d held myself personally accountable, subconsciously, to ‘fix’ everyone’s miseries—and thus was The Fixer born—
With Lauren’s birth, just weeks after my fourth birthday, my extended family’s smiles re-ignited my own, and unconsciously, I’d vowed to keep everyone safe from harm by being the best problem solver in the entire world, thus turning my mind into a world class observer of both sides of human nature.
Over time, my adult thought processor resolved issues (belonging to others) with such insightful success that everyone in my immediate family discussed their problems openly with me (except for my father, who, like me, had ‘solved’ his problems on his own). And each time a loved one’s problem resolved, their smiles were my ‘just’ reward.
So when at the age of sixty, I’d had to bend my brain over backward in hopes of turning my widowed mother’s frown upside down whenever she and I were alone—with the passage of seven years, my strength of spirit, having worn itself out, saw my heart feeling every bit as sadly broken as had felt true following Janet’s sudden death at which time my mommy was inconsolable for many months. And when Dad died suddenly at 87, I’d not yet understood the confounding magnitude of the human brain’s many-layered emotional complexity, which has no concept of time …
Once I’d felt compelling need to gently say: No, Mom, I can’t come over, today, my beloved mother (who’d rarely heard me say ‘no’, beginning at the age of three) let me know, over the next several years (details to follow in the story concerning the sudden death of my father) that she’d felt unloved by me (you see, immediately following my parents’ wedding day, my mom’s mother had moved in with the bride and groom. And as Grandma Ella had lived with our family, I’d watched my mom fulfill her mother’s every need until my grandma’s death when I was 26). And reflection suggests that no one expected me to break that traditional pattern.
Two years after my dad’s death, when I could no longer fulfill my widowed mother’s every need, Mom, feeling lonelier than her persona revealed to anyone but me, told me, outright, that she felt unloved by me.
As for me, our loving friendship of sixty years began to feel like a vice, squeezing the life of my long buried need for existential independence between a rock and a hard place. And no amount of loving patience on both of our parts could bridge that huge divide—until Mom said: Annie, I can feel your love. Thank God. On the day that she died.
So how did my personal perspective concerning our family’s enmeshed dynamics change for the better, last week?
Well, though I’d known myself not responsible for resuscitating Mom’s smile, two years after Dad’s death, that’s not how I’d felt. And so, at my end of this canyon that had opened its jaws, it has been my emotional reaction to frowning faces (most especially my mom’s) that has been in need of change, ever since I was three.
Currently, with the astute guidance of my therapist (who had known my mother), the intuitive portion of my brain began to envision a step by step change in my original perspective as I’d processed this next insight-laden train of thought aloud, knowing that one insight often leads to more:
My mother smiled at me before Janet’s birth.
My mother smiled at me after Janet’s birth.
My mother’s smile disappeared after Janet died.
My mother smiled after Lauren was born.
My mother smiled at me while my dad was alive.
My mother’s smile disappeared after Dad died.
My mother smiled at others but her spirit sagged as soon as she and I were alone.
“Mom, I need your smile, too,”
“Then who will I tell the truth of how I really feel?”
“A grief group or a therapist,”
“I don’t need a therapist or a grief group.”
So I went to both.
I have been a good person (and a loving daughter) throughout my life.
Currently, instead of imagining my mother’s heartbroken frown …
Now, I imagine my mother’s spirit with Janet’s
Now, I imagine my mother’s spirit with my father’s
Now, I imagine my mother’s spirit feeling reason to smile as she is no longer living alone at her advanced age for the first time in her life.
Each time I imagine my father’s arm around my mother who is cuddling Janet safely in her arms—I see all three smiling down at me from on high—igniting my spirit—feeling free of undeserved guilt—to smile up at my loved ones, whose palpable happiness at being reunited, warms my heart as thoroughly as if a ray of sunshine streaming across an azure blue sky has aimed the best mind cleansing attitude straight into my heart, which—having felt as sadly broken as had been true, twice, of my Mom’s—currently feels mindful of the roles played by unrealistic expectations, defensive reactions and undiagnosed PTSD, my sense of self awareness, which has continued to heighten via therapy, felt compelled to understand the nature of the canyon-sized gap that had so sadly widened between my beloved Mother and me until earlier in the week when I’d felt the last vestiges of undeserved guilt (the source of my inner conflict) evaporate, thus lifting the heavy sense of wrongdoing that I’d shouldered, freeing my spirit to float ever so lightly above the chasm, which clarity sees closing every bit as seamlessly as I can feel my brokenness of heart healing wholesomely from the inside out, at last..
And now that I imagine my mother, no longer widowed and mourning her husband, all alone, in her home, I feel myself wrapped within her loving embrace as she smiles down at me as tenderly as had been true before Janet’s sudden death and then again, after Lauren’s birth inclusive of the next sixty years of my life (at which time I’d so rarely said no to whatever had been asked of me that any time I’d felt compelled to meet one of my basic needs rather than fulfilling my widowed mother’s spoken need of my daily presence, I’d feel a sense of guilt emerge from deep within as though my precious mother had been wronged beyond repair). However, once I’d imagined my mother, father and baby sister reunited, my spirit, feeling freed of undeserved guilt, began to feel that, over my lifetime, my mother’s smile and my own had been on the same wave length, much more often than not, and thus did I recreate a realistic revision within my mind’s eye of that which had been my mom’s unrealistic expectation of perfection between mother and daughter
And now, whenever I imagine being alone with my widowed mother, who—having unmasked her persona, freed her saddened spirit to show itself thoroughly soaked, through and through, with sorrow—I, who had consciously continued to be a loving, though emotionally spent daughter, do not fault myself for having ‘failed’ to turn her lonely frown back around.
With this string of detailed insights shining a spirit brightening spotlight upon the heartfelt nature of our love for each other, the natural emergence of deeper truth serves to reignite my spirit’s guilt-free smile as readily as does this reality: Mom and I had enjoyed our close friendship, over most of my life—and hopefully, you, like me, can now, clearly see how today’s objective revision of my original undeserved guilt-ridden personal misperception (which had unconsciously deemed me unworthy of unconditional love ever since the age of three) continues to enhance my peace of mind, each time my intuitive train of thought concerning the heartfelt friendship shared with my beloved mother cleanses my processor of inner conflict by way of purging undeserved guilt wholly and thus thoroughly from my mind.
As David Schnarch, PhD psychologist, author of Passionate Marriage, had once said to my husband and me: You both hold all of the puzzling pieces of your relationship in your hands, but neither of you has yet learned how those pieces (of detailed insight) have need to fit together to clarify the true story of your many layered married life.
And now, whenever my mindful sense of wholeness conjures my mother’s spirit, filling the azure blue sky, the seamless connection between my guilt-free spirit and non-conflicted mindset—sensing my dad’s loving spirit and Janet’s hovering close by—feels the natural warmth of Mom’s heartfelt smile igniting my own.
November 23, 1941
May 31, 1970
The photo directly above was taken at my cousin, Phil’s wedding. As Phil is married 30 years, Mom was 79 and I, 49. (My current age is 78, and I plan regain my health so as to dance the light fantastic at the celebration of my 100th birthday.)
There’s one more photo of Mom dancing with me at another cousin’s wedding (Lara); however for unknown reason that photo refuses to be published in this post—no worries. You see, as soon as I figure out this puzzlement, that photo will appear, clearly, right here. And with that thought in mind, please scroll back, from time to time, as the missing snapshot shows Mom (who had lived to be 100) in her late 90’s which means I was in my late 60’s, suggesting that unexpected changes in our deeply loving, life long relationship had begun to puzzle both of our minds as deeply as our spirits had felt as sad as sad can be … no bad guys to be seen …just a confounded pair of fast friends—mother and daughter—feeling as bewildered as bewildered can be, suggesting that ignorance is not bliss if, upon choosing the road most taken, anguish awaits to break two hearts for this reason: On the highway of life, both had missed the turn-off toward the sunlit neighborhood where the power of knowledge—unearthing insight-laden deeper truths—offers two people, who choose to muster the courage to stay the course—the blessed second chance to better understand oneself and each other while both are alive …
🙋🏻♀️❤️Annie
