A Writer’s Journey: One Daughter’s Healing Process

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree

of Bachelor of Arts at Vermont College

Faculty Advisor: _______________________________________________ Maida Solomon

Robin L. Bernstein

July 28, 2009

Abstract

My last study is a search, internal and external, for my creative

place in the world. As searches often go, the path turned out to be different

than I originally imagined. While exploring my own writing voice, I found

myself immersed in the interconnection of my childhood and adult

experiences. The journey became one of healing in addition to finding my

own voice.

This is a studio study of my creative writing. My process essay

comes first, laying the foundation for understanding what follows. My

creative writing, in its variety of forms, is separated into three sections:

child, child/adult, and adult.

The first section is comprised of three vignettes—three reflections of

memories from my childhood. The second section is a single piece written

in the voice of the adult unable to separate from the emotions of the child.

The final, and largest, section is the voice of the adult. This section includes

memoir, personal essays, blog entries, and an occasional poem. Together,

they are the substance of my healing process: a writer’s journey.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface....................................................................................................................v

A Writer’s Journey: One Daughter’s Healing Process......................................1

Introduction................................................................................................1

I Must Speak...............................................................................................3

I Must Write................................................................................................6

I Must Read.............................................................................................. 14

I Must Heal............................................................................................... 22

Conclusion................................................................................................ 28

Child..................................................................................................................... 31

Gymnastics .............................................................................................. 32

Homemade Clothes ................................................................................. 36

Did You Wash Your Hair?...................................................................... 39

Child / Adult........................................................................................................ 43

She Arrives .............................................................................................. 44

Adult .................................................................................................................... 45

Biological Side Effects ............................................................................ 46

Standing in the Hallway......................................................................... 49

Out of the Hallway................................................................................... 54

I’ve Lost my Earmuffs ............................................................................ 57

Strange Pains .......................................................................................... 59

Too Tired to Write ................................................................................... 63

Thoughts on my Experiment................................................................. 64

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Avoidance of Good .................................................................................. 69

Persistence .............................................................................................. 72

Heartbreak Salve .................................................................................... 75

Goodbye to March ................................................................................... 78

My Body is Not a Temple ....................................................................... 81

My Body Screams ................................................................................... 82

Morning Walk.......................................................................................... 83

Dead Leaf or Emerging Bud?................................................................. 84

Works Cited......................................................................................................... 86

Annotated Bibliography.................................................................................... 88

Study Bibliography.......................................................................................... 103

Appendix: Eulogy for Eldora Johnson .......................................................... 105

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Preface

I arrived in Montpelier in the fall of 2007 eager to be a writer. I

threw myself into the community, perfectly comfortable with my decision

to join Vermont College and excited to get started. I happily attended study

exploration sessions. I showed up early to faculty lectures. I cried through

every culminating presentation. Then, about two days into residency, I was

blindsided by a paralyzing fear.

I was skipping along, singing, “Look at me! I am a writer!” when I

tripped right over the word “artist” and fell flat on my face. Amy Cook was

giving a presentation on art and photography. The entire, overarching

concept of artist left me curled up in a ball on my thin, foam mattress in my

cinderblock dorm room. Sure, I had come to own my place as a writer, but

don’t you dare call me an artist!

As is my way, I knew this could not be ignored. My fear was

screaming at me, shaking me by the shoulders, “You will pay attention to

me!” I started to share what was happening to me and allowed other

students and faculty to suggest ways I could approach my fear. Sure! I

could study it!

My first study was entitled “The Identity of the Artist.” Patricia

Burke guided me in the nuances of writing annotations as I read books on

creativity, spirituality, meditation, and, of course, artists. I listened to how

other artists described themselves and their work, and the mystery

surrounding the word began to lift. I allowed myself to integrate the term

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into my world. I also spent a good deal of my first study attached to my

digital camera, delighted with the new vision it provided me. At my next

residency I presented a seven-minute movie of some of my photographic

“stories” set to music, proudly proclaiming at the end that I, too, was an

artist!

My second study was a natural progression and continuation of what

I had learned in my first study. I knew I wanted to delve deeper into my

writing, yet I did not want to stop my exploration of photography. To show

how far I had come from my first residency, I requested to work with Amy

Cook. Together, we designed “Photography & Personal Essay.” I

experienced a tumultuous six months of study, during which my partner

began renovating our home (herself), half of my coworkers resigned, a new

acting president was hired, and after assisting my board of directors

during their massive strategic planning project, I learned via a listserv

email message that they had decided to eliminate my position.

Throughout one of the most stressful periods of my life, Amy sent me

constant words of support and encouragement. I just kept reading, one

book after another. I found that when my energy for writing waned, my

energy for photography would take its place, and vice versa. My two

creative outlets fed and supported each other, both giving me the variety of

expression that actually helped me pull through the study. My

presentation at the following residency was a multi-media production of

the yin-yang relationship of my creative endeavors. I read my personal

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essays, accompanied by slideshows of my photography, and allowed each

to inform the other.

When faced with defining my culminating study, I knew it was time

to give myself the space to truly explore my voice as a writer. There were

many classic books I had always wanted to read, and I wanted to see how

they would, in turn, inform my own writing. So, awash in the nurturing

energy of Maida Solomon, I left Montpelier on “A Writer’s Journey.”

This journey started out with the sad passing of my maternal

grandmother a month after I returned from residency. Being with her the

week before she died was a gift I will always cherish, and writing and

delivering her eulogy was my first act of speaking my truth to my family.

Witnessing my own mother’s response to the entire process and having my

aunts and uncles witness me as a separate adult became integral to my

study, as did one uncle’s honest assessment of my mother’s behavior:

“She’s nuttier than a fruitcake!”

Slowly, this journey became more internal than external. Childhood

memories arose unbidden, regardless of what I was reading, and I

struggled to put them into writing. Then a former coworker’s innocent

book recommendation created an entirely new path of study: narcissistic

personality disorder. While I was exploring many classic stories, I was also

learning new terminology to reframe my own past.

Armed with a clearer understanding of my mother’s mental illness,

at least as I defined it, I found the courage to begin sharing my writing with

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others. I researched blogging and designed my own site. I experimented

with online writing and the immediate exchange of ideas. To my delight, I

even had strangers find my site and comment on my writing!

The result became a virtual dance between the reactions of the child

I was and the adult I am trying to be. What follows is a personal account of

the journey I took, followed by my creative pieces. The process essay is the

foundation, informing the reader of what is to follow and how it came to be.

The creative writing is separated mindset: child, child/adult, and adult.

There is no formal ending because this journey has no end. Just as when I

arrived in Montpelier to find myself staring down an unknown fear, I am

unable to turn away from that which offers me growth. Adulthood—and

education—is a lifelong process, and this is just the beginning.

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A Writer’s Journey: One Daughter’s Healing Process

Introduction

I begin at the end and complete my study at the beginning. I quote

from the last book I read during this study, Breaking Out of Prison, written

by the first faculty member I met in this program, Bernice Mennis:

Individuals are born within a family, in a certain time, place,

culture, world. Everything shapes us. The question is not

whether we are pine seeds or acorns, milkweed or burdock;

that, really, is out of our control. The question is how who we

are is shaped by different environments—which environments

foster the individual’s growth and which stunt, which allow for

diversity and which insist on a monoculture of standardized

forms and shapes. (27)

I am a writer. I am also the product of my birth and the

environments that have shaped me. My journey is inseparable from these

facts. The path of this study has been shaped by the variety of books read,

the changing environments encountered, and the questions asked—some

by me, some by my advisor. I consider the result open-ended because the

reading, the questions, and the journey will continue.

Ask me to do something, and I instinctive have a dualistic response. I

will either resist—thinking Why me?—or comply, assuming I must fulfill

the request perfectly or risk losing your approval, if not your love. This is

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the response of my inner child, the part of me that has never grown up: shy

yet rebellious; deeply hurting yet playful; resentful of responsibility yet

begging to be loved. In order to accomplish anything as an adult, I must

negotiate with this child. It has become a dance, weaving and twirling,

dipping and lifting. We take turns leading sometimes, and my life changes

course accordingly. Or, as my partner likes to ask, “Who’s driving the bus

today?”

My creative process follows this same pattern: resistance and

procrastination dancing with deeply felt urges to write, passion for all

genres of writing, and a life force within me that believes it needs to be

heard. For me to succeed in writing, to complete a piece of personal work

that is viewed by others, I must step out of the shadows and stand side-by-

side, adult with child, visible in the light of day. Both of us are excited and

terrified by this notion.

Surprisingly, I am a logically-minded person. I love order. My work

life consists of spreadsheets and files and checklists, everything accounted

for, everything in its place. It provides a sense of safety. It creates an

illusion of solidity from which I can venture out into the untethered realm

of creativity.

My creative writing within this study is born from essentially one

place: my past. To fully understand, it is indispensable to know that I am

an only child. I have no one with whom to compare experiences, validate

memories, or share the heavy burden of growing up with a mentally ill

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mother. There, I said it. During this study, I have come to believe my

mother suffers from narcissistic personality disorder. I have heard no

official diagnosis. I have no credentials of my own to back up such a claim. I

have only forty-one years of life, my own memories, and the information

gleaned from a myriad of books. This is still a tenuous assertion because

the guilt I feel as an adult is circling with the growing awareness of the

child. The internal dance will continue, but I now stand firm in this claim.

My mother is mentally ill, and this is a vital aspect of my study, my

creative process, and my life. Yet, this study is not about my mother. It is

about me. This journey is about the courage to face the truth and the

determination to learn to write about it. This study is about healing, my

healing.

I Must Speak

Soon after my last residency, my grandmother died. Over the

previous year or so, while she lived in Oregon and I lived in Maryland, we

spoke sometimes a couple times a week. Prior to her passing, while she

recuperated in the hospital after a heart attack, I was able to spend a week

with her and her children: my mother and my uncles. I stayed by her side

as much as possible. We laughed as she joked with the nurses. I held her

hand at night as she tried to sleep. On my last night there, we looked into

each other’s eyes and said good-bye. In her presence I always felt special. I

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was her first grandchild. Even when I did not conform to her standards of

living, she had found a way to accept the diversity of me.

During this period of time, I spent any available alone time reading

Audrey Niffenegger’s The Time Traveler’s Wife. It was a nice escape from

the realities of my life. Niffenegger’s creative novel, a love story involving a

man who involuntarily pops back and forth along the timeline of his life,

provided an easy story within which to lose myself. The themes of time

travel, loneliness, and solidity versus emptiness ran parallel to my

experiences of wandering through memories, losing my grandmother, and

being among my family.

The female character in the book makes an interesting observation,

“The compelling thing about making art—or making anything, I suppose—is

the moment when the vaporous, insubstantial idea becomes a solid there, a

thing, a substance in a world of substances” (284). I find my form of art,

the act of putting thought into written word, to be compelling. Since I am

drawn to write about myself—my memories, my ideas, and my feelings—it

is as if I become more substantial by doing so. I become more of a

“substance in a world of substances.”

During the week my grandmother was in the hospital, my mother

and her siblings and I stayed at my uncle’s nearby farm. One day as I was

driving with my mother back to the hospital for a family shift change, I

brought up the subject of preparations for Grandma’s service. Although I

have attended remarkably few funerals in my lifetime, I felt prepared to

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write and deliver my grandmother’s eulogy. I knew my mother had

delivered her father’s eulogy many years earlier, so I was not sure what

she had in mind for her mother. I asked an open-ended question, and to my

surprise, my mother turned to me and asked if I would be willing to do it.

Naturally, I agreed.

So, the writing portion of this study began with a piece I would

deliver to both family and strangers. It would be my voice, my presence,

and my substance standing before an assembly and speaking my truth. I

imagined that it would be difficult, except it wasn’t. The words came

naturally, the images of the piece easily accessible. I did a short research

project on the Internet about what eulogies are and what they commonly

contain, and then I opened a new file and wrote it in a single sitting. Much

of my writing comes out that way because I spend so much time,

sometimes months or years, weighing pieces in my head, playing with the

words and speaking them in my imagination. Most of the edits and

revisions have already occurred before I ever sit before a computer.

As it turned out, my two trips to Oregon and spending extended time

with my mother and close relatives provided something critical to my

study: perspective. Observing my mother and the way she behaved around

her siblings and her dying mother was a challenge because I have often

been embarrassed by my mother’s behavior. Even as a young child, I knew

instinctively that something was “off” somehow with her, but I internalized

it as embarrassment and shame. My grandmother’s passing provided the

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environment that shaped the focal point of my journey: to finally

understand, to accept that something really is wrong with my mother and

to begin to see that all the baggage, guilt, pain, and mourning that goes

along with this journey is not entirely mine.

In conversations with my uncles, I received validation. They, too,

knew that something was not right with my mother, although they each

had their own level of understanding and acceptance of this truth. I

listened to their stories of frustration and anger at their older sister. I

heard their agitation with her. I watched them leave a room in disgust. As

a result, for the first time I felt a connection that I had not known existed

to this part of my family. As an adult, I was finally included in the

conversations that I had missed out on as a child. Perhaps all the years of

feeling like something was wrong with me could be set free with the

knowledge that instead something was actually wrong with her. I returned

home with a different interpretation of my relationship with my mother,

and it became a part of everything I would read and write from that point

forward.

I Must Write

Why am I a writer? I know no other way to be. I love words. I love

the rhythm words make when well composed. I am in awe of authors who

can create sentences that make me want to sing them aloud to everyone

around me. I do not yet feel confident in my ability to create lyrical prose in

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the same fashion as the authors who inspire me—Jeanette Winterson,

Maya Angelou, Virginia Woolf—but I do feel confident that my thoughts, my

experiences, and my life lessons have value to others. I believe I am meant

to write and share my work with a larger audience.

While I am steadfast in my identity as a writer, I usually falter when

someone asks me, “What kind of writing do you do?” I typically want to

answer, “Um, I just write.” Not a very awe-inspiring response. My

hesitation is born from the fact that 99.9% of what I write is in the first

person. Writing has long been a tool I use to move me through difficult

periods of my life. This may also be why it has taken me forty years to even

admit that I am a writer.

My hope for this study was that by reading a wide variety of

literature and allowing them to influence my own writing, I would come to

find a comfortable place of my own. Whether or not I accomplished this is

hard to for me to ascertain. I have no doubt that writers from different

countries and time periods influence, if only briefly, my language style. I

am a bit of mimic. However, regardless of what I read, I seem to stick to

what I know: myself. I write about what I think and feel, how I react to a

book, what a book makes me think about or talk about or shy away from.

Instead of finding a comfortable place of my own, this study confirmed that

I was already in a comfortable place. The books I read over the past nine

months are inseparable from the events that inspired my writing. My life

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informs how I respond to a particular book, and the books I read inform my

view of the events of my life.

About a month after I wrote and delivered my grandmother’s eulogy,

my job in Washington, D.C. was eliminated. For the first time in twenty

years, I was unemployed. I was faced with the question, “If I am not

working, if I don’t have a job, a title, then who am I?” Around this same

time, I was enjoying a happy hour with former coworkers, regaling them

with funny stories of my mother’s wacky behavior in Oregon, when one of

them suggested a book to me. The book I never remembered, but she

explained that one chapter referred to a condition called narcissistic

personality disorder (NPD). She said I might find it interesting based on

the stories I was telling about my mother. It was another turning point, a

serendipitous moment that would finally locate the missing piece of the

endless puzzle that was my mother.

I began to research NPD on the Internet. I ordered books on the

topic. Memories of my childhood began to rise unbidden. I decided to write

them as clearly and innocently as I experienced them as a child. I did not

have a name for this style of writing, short intense pieces with no planned

beginning, middle, or end. My faculty advisor and I called them vignettes. I

didn’t write with an outline or follow a timeline. I simply wrote stories as

they appeared before me, images I had been carrying around my entire life.

Putting them into written format gave them weight and substance, and it

also relieved me of having to carry their weight myself. It was like setting

9

down a burden and then opening it up to look at it, except I could not look

too long. I found it exhausting to write them, and I usually had a few days

of shame attacks after I completed each one. Putting the sad and scary

truth into form left me feeling extremely vulnerable. After a few of these

pieces, I turned away. The purchased books arrived and collected dust. I

continued to keep a list in my phone of key phrases that would trigger

particular memories I might want to write about later. I just wasn’t

entirely ready yet.

Instead, I focused on the action of waiting. I had the luxury of not

having to work for a month or two until I found out if a couple of major job

opportunities would come through. In the meantime, I let myself sit with

the discomfort of not knowing. I found myself full of thoughts and ideas

and began composing personal essays in my mind, at least what I thought

were personal essays. Here again, I do not easily define what it is I do. I

make up speeches in my head, commentaries on things both trivial and

serious, and I write them down. Are these essays or memoirs? What is the

difference if I call them a story versus a vignette? Does it really matter?

I spent a lot of time online, connecting with other students, past and

present, via email and Facebook. In this online world I became curious

about this concept of a blog. I learned that a blog is similar to an online

diary. There are a variety of free services that offer predefined templates

so anyone can create their own Web page in minutes and begin to “post” to

it. A post is like a diary entry. Each post can be defined as open to the

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public or completely private or accessible only by a specific set of people.

Each post can also include photographs or videos about anything that

interests the author. Some people have blogs about a particular topic, so

their entries are more like articles with links to other information. Some

people have blogs about their families. Some people write about anything

and everything. Some people even blog about how to be better bloggers!

Eventually, I turned to my partner and asked what she thought about me

putting some of my writing online. Up to this point, I had never considered

making my writing available to the public. With my partner’s

encouragement Robin’s Corner (http://robinlbernstein.blogspot.com) was

born.

I found two things that made blogging especially interesting. First,

readers could comment on my posts (if I gave them permission to do so).

This made the process interactive. If I chose to ask questions in my blog,

then readers could post a comment in response at the end of my entry. I

learned that authors are generally encouraged to post their own comments

responding to their readers’ comments. Also, readers can add comments

responding to each other. Depending on how many people read a particular

blog and choose to comment, an online community can form around a blog.

Nothing of that sort happened to me, of course, but I did have some loyal

readers, and it was a wonderful feeling to receive immediate feedback.

Secondly, blogs have the option to create a “feed” or “RSS” which is

often defined as “Real Simple Syndication.” This means that readers don’t

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have to remember to go to a Web site every day to see if there are any new

posts. They can “subscribe” to the “feed” and have new entries delivered to

them automatically. There are various ways to do this. Most simply, fans of

a blog can sign up to have each new entry delivered to them via email.

However, if some people like to read a number of different people’s blogs,

this can quickly fill up their email in-box. Alternatively, readers can select

a “feed reader” service which gathers all the new entries to all the blogs

they like to read. This way, they can go to one place, either within their

Web browser or by logging on to a specific online service, and browse

through all the new blog entries from all their favorite sites without having

to go to a bunch of separate sites.

Another aspect of subscribers is the whole new topic of “readership.”

As the author of a blog, I had various ways of knowing how many people

were subscribed to my blog. There is a sense of legitimacy associated with

larger subcriber numbers. (I maintained approximately six or so. I’m not

entirely sure.) At this point in my writing career, I felt this was a

dangerous trap. I am still working on using the word “success” less

frequently and hoping not to be so reliant on other people’s positive

feedback to feel good about my own work, but at the same time putting my

writing in front of anyone’s eyes feels like a helpful risk.

At the top of Robin’s Corner I wrote the following description:

As a young child I was frequently subjected to my mother's

unique brand of punishment. I was sent to stand in the

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corner—on one foot. After an hour or so, she might happen to

walk by my room, notice me, and tell me I could switch legs. I

think sometimes she forgot about me altogether. Today, I am

turning around, facing out from the corner. On one leg or two,

sitting, standing, or dancing, I am allowing myself to be seen,

heard, and perhaps remembered.

Creating this site was an act of immense courage. I had no plans to publish

anything directly about my mother, but just to write this description

carried a risk. If or when my mother found out about it, I would most likely

have to endure her dramatic and vengeful reaction. In order to take this

step in my writing, I had to be willing to fight for it, to stand up for myself,

and most importantly, to believe in it. I had to believe that sharing my

writing was more important than hiding from my mother’s wrath.

In the introduction to Karyl McBride’s Will I Ever Be Good Enough? :

Healing the Daughters of Narcissistic Mothers, she describes the most

basic of human experiences:

Our relationship with Mother is birthed simultaneously with

our entry into the world. We take our first breath of life, and

display the initial dependent, human longing for protection

and love in her presence. We are as one in the womb and on

the birthing table. This woman, our mother . . . all that she is

and is not . . . has given us life. Our connection with her in this

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instant and from this point forward carries with it tremendous

psychological weight for our lifelong well-being. (xvii)

I am conscious of the fact that, in our culture, to speak ill of my

mother, of any mother, is particularly taboo. Motherhood is an exalted and

cherished institution, some say. I have witnessed the instinctive nature of

friends and family members to explain away, excuse, and minimize the

realities of my childhood. More precisely, while others may accept and

acknowledge the horrors of my experiences, they are still compelled to

protect my mother at the same time. They are worried about the power of

my words to devastate her. I understand their concern. Yet, I will speak

again in a different way.

They are worried that the truth of the child has the power to

devastate the parent. I worry about this, too, but not in regard to my

mother and me. I worry that withholding the truth of my inner child has

the power to devastate me as the parent, the adult in the relationship with

myself. I have reached a point in my life where I can no longer avoid,

ignore, repress, reject, or negate the obvious role my past plays in my

present life. Nor do I want to do so because when I pay attention to myself I

am rewarded, supported, and validated.

Writing and publishing on my blog gave me this support and

validation almost immediately. I shared what I noticed about my reactions

to life, the feelings in my body, my thoughts on faith, and, to my wide-eyed

surprise, people commented. I connected my blog posts to my Facebook

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page, so my online friends would be aware of what I was doing, and some

visited my site. I posted the address of my site on another writer’s blog,

and strangers—even a published author—commented on my writing.

Suddenly, I had a very small, but very real audience.

This bolstered my confidence and inspired me to challenge myself. I

gave myself the assignment to write on my blog every day for one week.

More than the writing itself, I found the interaction with the readers to be

my reward. Some gave me support; others kept me honest when I jumped

to conclusions that might not be correct. It was a difficult task to maintain,

and I wrote about that, too. At the end, I shared how I felt about the entire

process and forced myself to look at it in a positive light, rejecting my long-

held habits of embracing only my perceived failures. Overall, it was a

wonderful experiment in finding my voice and learning that people other

than my closest loved ones are interested in what I write. Eventually, I

stopped writing new posts as I put more focus on the reading I was doing,

but I believe the blog will continue to be an important tool in my evolution

as a writer.

I Must Read

One of my goals in this study was to read some works of classic

literature, pieces I believed most people had read at some point during

their education but I had somehow missed. I wanted the chance to allow

these classics to inform my own writing style.

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One in particular was Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham.

I reveled in Maugham’s strong descriptive style and the main character

Philip’s wildly fantastic and dramatic internal world. Having lived most of

my life feeling a victim to my own emotional upheavals, I easily rode the

highs and lows of Philip’s coming of age. At one point in the story, Philip

stuns himself by his sudden realization that he doesn’t believe in God:

Faith had been forced upon him from the outside. It was a

matter of environment and example. A new environment and

a new example gave him the opportunity to find himself. He

put off the faith of his childhood quite simply, like a cloak that

he no longer needed. (123)

I related to Philip with my newly found belief that perhaps the

shame of my childhood belonged to my mother and not me. My deeply

engrained negative image of myself, as I had learned it from my mother,

might possibly be shed “like a cloak.” Philip’s liberation continued,

“Suddenly he realized that he had lost also that burden of responsibility

which made every action of his life a matter of urgent consequence. He

could breathe more freely in a lighter air. He was responsible only to

himself for the things he did. Freedom!” (124).

I continue to dance with this concept of freedom. How do the effects

of my mother’s narcissism imprison me? How can I live free from my

mother’s illness? How does my writing unburden me? Or does it?

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After reading Maugham, Virginia Woolf’s To the Lighthouse, and

John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, I longed for a different genre. I turned

to memoir, a style of writing closer to my heart. My next selection was

somewhat random, but as I’ve learned throughout this study, nothing is

truly random. I began reading Deborah Layton’s Seductive Poison: A

Jonestown Survivor’s Story of Life and Death in the People’s Temple, and

on page four I read, “Being a good obedient daughter seemed incompatible

with having questions and doubts.” I knew immediately that Layton’s book

would hit closer to home than I could ever have imagined.

Reading her story of the deteriorating madness of Jim Jones was

both captivating and horrifying. When Layton finally confronted Jones via

radio that she intended to leave Jonestown, she was subjected to the brutal

force of Jones’s psychosis:

Are you so ignorant to believe anyone will want you? I am the

one who saved you. I took you into my heart, my mind, and my

confidence. You are my soldier, my creation. Do you think you

would have been in a position to even have these thoughts if I

had not taught you? It’s been under my tutelage that you have

blossomed, through my eyes that you discovered this world. . .

. You’ll rue this day forevermore. I will never allow you to

forget . . . What . . . What is your little mind saying? That I

cannot? Have you forgotten my powers? They will haunt you

forever. (262)

17

My visceral reaction to this book brought up childhood flashbacks of

my mother’s rages, cruel and demeaning. I knew I had to begin writing my

memories again and return to the books I had purchased on narcissistic

personality disorder. It was time to face the heart of my journey.

I started with Eleanor Payson’s The Wizard of Oz and Other

Narcissists. From the very beginning, I realized I had found my answers.

The author was describing my relationship with my mother. Every other

explanation I had come up with over the years to understand the core of

my pain paled in comparison to the precision with which NPD described

my life:

For countless generations, the average person has been

encountering and coping with individuals who suffer from

character disorders—one of the most significant, yet least

understood, of these character disorders is the narcissistic

personality disorder (NPD). . . . The relentless need for the

narcissistic individual to command the majority of another

person’s resources will eventually deplete the energies of the

healthiest individual. . . . The inevitable impact on the

individual in a relationship with an NPD person is a dangerous

erosion of self-esteem. (1)

Payson gave me the foundation for a deeper healing. I was no longer

floundering for the illusive explanation for my mother’s behavior. It was

18

right there in black and white. I finally stopped dog-earing the pages and

underlining every sentence. It all made so much sense.

Having educated myself on the effects of narcissistic personality

disorder, I returned to reading memoirs and novels related to a child’s

experience. I started with Daniel Tomasulo’s Confessions of a Former

Child: A Therapist’s Memoir. Tomasulo deftly merges serious parts of his

childhood with hilarious life stories, but more importantly to me, he

courageously writes about how group therapy triggered his understanding

of narcissism in his family. In the following dialogue he finally speaks up in

a session about his problems with another group member named Lulu:

“So, it is more than just her breathing. It’s as if she attacks me,

robs me of being who I am when she jangles her bracelets and

breathes funny. When she draws attention to herself, it’s as if I

don’t exist. Everything is about her, she doesn’t really know or

care about me or anyone else in the group; it’s only about her.”

“So, around Lulu . . .” Jackie prompted.

“I feel invisible, yet I am unbelievably angry. It’s as if I am split

between having to shut down, keep quiet, and get depressed,

or get crazy and act out all over the place.” (139-140)

In the session, Tomasulo makes the connection between his reaction

to Lulu and his childhood experiences of both his mother and

grandmother. I could have written the very same words about my mother.

The dichotomy of “her versus me” is a very real sensation, one I still

19

experience today. Do I stay silent and wither with depression or do I

confront and look like a crazy person?

Slowly, as I continued to read, I started to notice an underlying

theme. As I read stories about abused children, I also heard the children’s

inner faith, their instinctive determination to survive.

Augusten Burroughs is one of my favorite authors. I love him for his

outrageous humor and for his willingness to tell the truth regardless of

how shocking it may be. However, his latest book, A Wolf at the Table: A

Memoir of my Father, is purely Burroughs the serious writer, devoid of the

humor in his other collections. Being a person who handled my childhood

abuse by becoming invisible and turning against myself, I am always awed

by those people who had something in them as a child that fought for

survival.

After Burroughs’s father found him kneeling beside his bed, secretly

praying for God to take his father away, Burroughs left the confrontation

with a new outlook:

I didn’t know if it was because of what he said or just that I

was getting older, but I soon stopped feeling God standing

right beside me everywhere I went. . . . I stopped asking God to

protect me.

I came to think that maybe God was what you believed in

because you needed to feel you weren’t alone. Maybe God was

20

simply that part of yourself that was always there and always

strong, even when you were not. (163)

A similar passage stood out in Sue Monk Kidd’s The Secret Life of

Bees. August says to Lily, “You have to find a mother inside yourself. We all

do. Even if we already have a mother, we still have to find this part of

ourselves inside” (288).

Do I have this part of myself? Yes. This is the dance. When faced

with the most difficult of confrontations, having to stand up for myself, the

child inside me runs. How do I access the part of me that is always there

and always strong? I start with baby steps, with practice, by stepping

forward into my deepest fears. To look at my life partner and tell her how I

feel; to show her the real me, open wide and vulnerable; to show my truest

emotions even when she may or may not understand them, even when she

may not even want to hear them, I must find this part of myself and let it

be stronger than the frightened child. This is my ongoing dance, my daily

struggle to be true to myself.

Next, I began to notice the different voices of the authors I was

reading. Even in the realm of nonfiction, sometimes describing the most

awful of circumstances, authors can express themselves in heart-

wrenching beauty.

Lucy Grealy, in Autobiography of a Face, recounts enduring weekly

chemotherapy injections for two and a half years as a young girl. Here she

21

writes about using the public bathroom while waiting to see her doctor,

facing one of the two stall doors she has selected:

Some weeks I stared at it dumbly, thinking only of what was

happening back in the waiting room with my mother, how

many more rows of knitting she’d finished. Some weeks I

thought of the impending injection, or I simply continued with

my fantasy life: the pony express rider seeks relief in the

town’s saloon, the alien ponders the wonders of waste

disposal. Some weeks, especially when it was hot, I thought of

nothing and only listened to my urine hiss into the water

below my legs as I leaned forward, pressing the coolness of the

inscribed metal against my forehead, and wept. (17)

Grealy’s ability to write from the voice of the vulnerable child broke my

heart again and again, and I knew instinctively that it was important.

Grealy combined the personal story of memoir with the beauty of written

language to create images that sink to the core of the reader. This was a

voice I admired and aspired to.

I listened to the powerful, poetic prose of Maya Angelou in Letter to

my Daughter as she remembers when she first allowed herself to believe in

the idea that God loved her:

That knowledge humbles me today, melts my bones, closes my

ears, and makes my teeth rock loosely in my gums. And it also

liberates me. I am a big bird winging over high mountains,

22

down into serene valleys. I am ripples of waves on silver seas.

I’m a spring leaf trembling in anticipation of full growth. (162)

Angelou’s passion for words always inspires me. Each time I read this

piece, I was transformed into the images—melting, rocking, soaring, and

swimming. One short passage can provide so much!

Having read the beauty and heartbreak of other nonfiction writers,

having seen the threads of survival among so many sad stories, it was time

for my wake up call. Reading and pontificating won’t get a paper written.

Noticing yourself in other stories and sharing your angst with your

therapist doesn’t make you a better writer unless you use the knowledge

by actually writing.

I Must Heal

Writing about my daily experiences and my responses to them is a

healing tool for me. In turn, as I heal I have more to write, and I believe

that to share this writing is passing along this healing to others. For the

first time in my life I am creating a positive spiral as opposed to the

negative mental spiral I have spent most of my life fighting against.

I experienced my first complete breakdown during my third year of

college. It was the culmination of twenty-one years of living under the

secret tyranny of a mentally ill mother, combined with the experience of

my first romantic relationship. The result was a spotlight into the

emptiness of my being. I had absolutely no self-esteem, no sense of self

23

beyond what my mother had created. I consider that hospitalization the

turning point from the end of my abusive childhood toward the beginning

of my recovery as an adult.

This year marks the twentieth anniversary of that point. I have lived

nearly as many years in recovery as I did in the midst of the confusion and

abuse of my childhood. This year also marks another milestone. I am

completing the Bachelor’s degree that was put on hold when I was

hospitalized.

Of all the books I’ve read during this study, McBride’s Will I Ever Be

Good Enough? stood out like no other. It gave me the validation I craved,

the information I desired, and the tough talk I needed. I no longer have any

doubt that I am the daughter of a narcissistic mother. I did not grow up

with a sense of being loved for simply who I am. I was an extension of my

mother, to be defined and shaped by her needs, not mine.

Having never had my own needs met in childhood, I have spent a

lifetime consciously and subconsciously trying to have them met by

everyone in my adult life—indeed, feeling entitled to have these needs met

by others. So, I felt my world shift when I read the following:

When you have successfully completed the acceptance part of

recovery, you realize that no one can really meet your

childhood needs. . . . The part of life when you were entitled to

that kind of maternal nurturing is gone. You are willing to

grieve the loss but fully understand that you can’t go back and

24

get it and you can’t make it happen now with someone else.

Remember, as an adult, you are not entitled to this. You are

responsible for yourself, now willing to accept this

accountability for your own needs and to find a way to meet

them. (143)

My chest tightens every time I read this passage. I want to scream,

“WHAT?!? What are you talking about? Of course, I am entitled! My

partner is my partner for exactly that reason, to love me and nurture me

and protect me! That’s the way it works, right? What happens to me if I

truly can’t go back, and I can’t make it happen now with someone else? Are

you saying I’ll feel empty and miserable my entire life?!” See, the last

sentence of that passage, the one that begins “You are responsible for

yourself. . .” is addressed to the adult me, but my inner child reacts so

strongly and immediately to the earlier sentences that I have a hard time

taking in the end.

Here. I’ll practice. I am responsible for myself. I am now willing to

accept accountability for my own needs and to find a way to meet them. I

am responsible for myself. I am accountable for my own needs. Responsible

for myself. Accountable for my own needs. Responsible. Accountable.

I don’t know how this makes others feel to hear this, but for me, this

is mind-blowing stuff! Not that I haven’t been told this before. I just wasn’t

willing to hear it. I can continue to process the sadness and disappointment

over not having a mother who can relate to me or see me or understand

25

me, but beyond that I have to now become the mother I need for myself! I

have to be able to account for my own emotions. I have to be able to

respond to my own needs. Suddenly, I see all my interactions in a new

light.

Then I find myself sitting on the foot of my bed after a long and tiring

week, watching an episode of “Countdown with Keith Olbermann” on

MSNBC and listening to his Special Comment. He is looking right into the

camera, directing his speech to President Obama, but looking into my eyes.

I am spellbound. He praises our President for releasing the Bush

Administration torture memos, but in response to the President saying

there will be nothing gained by laying blame for the past, he says, “Mr.

President, you are wrong.” I actually stop breathing.

I am wide-eyed and slack-jawed as Olbermann continues to explain

in historical context why those who tortured, those who gave permission

to torture, those who created the environment in which laws against

torture could be surpassed, must be prosecuted. He finishes his special

comment by saying:

Mr. President, you have now been handed the beginning of

that future. Use it to protect our children and our distant

descendants from anything like this ever happening again—by

showing them that those who did this were neither unfairly

scapegoated nor absolved. It is good to say ‘we won't do it

again.’ It is not, however...enough.

26

I sit there, stunned.

He is asking the leader of our country to respond appropriately, to

hold others accountable for their actions. Responsible. Accountable. I

cannot separate myself from this; I am part of this whole. We are

interconnected. If I learn how to be responsible for myself and accountable

for my own needs, will I be contributing to the health of my nation? Is that

what Olbermann is trying to do?

I do not pretend to understand politics or the inner workings of my

government. I do, however, believe in the holistic nature of the universe.

This is no accident. I can feel it in my heart. Olbermann might have been

responding to our nation’s leader, but he was also speaking to me. He

reaffirmed the path I am on. He provided for me the image of a calm,

thoughtful, and assertive response to an intolerable situation (for him,

anyway), and I am grateful.

This is a year of anniversaries and turning points. I have more of a

sense of self than at any other time in my life. I believe that as I am guided

and supported, my life, in turn, is connected to the whole. I must believe

that as I heal, so do we all.

I once had a therapist say I am tenacious about my own recovery.

While I have fought chronic depression my entire adult life, I have always

found a way to avoid losing the battle. Today it is a matter of constantly

observing myself and using my automatic defenses, my instinctive

27

responses, as material for writing. Writing is now integral to my own

healing. This interconnectedness is undeniable.

Much of my time is spent observing, both my surroundings and my

responses to them. This initiates a multitude of essays in my mind. My

mind is always writing. I see a tree with new spring leaves budding and

notice a dead leaf unyielding to the cycle of nature. I see myself in this dead

leaf, and a new essay is born.

I believe the healing nature of the statement “neither unfairly

scapegoated nor absolved.” It has become a mature and supportive push

behind my writing. I do not claim that my mother is the cause of all my

pain or problems in my life, nor do I absolve her from the immense

influence she has had on my psyche. Therefore, as I put my memories into

written format, I am giving substance to my healing process as well as my

creative one. I am shedding light on dark memories, I am revealing the

depths of one child’s confusion and pain, and I am offering the opportunity

for growth for myself and for those who feel a connection to my story.

I reject the notion that I have the power to annihilate. I abandon the

belief that I am responsible for my mother’s—or anyone’s—feelings. If

hearing my truth causes her pain, then it is hers to deal with. She is

accountable for her own actions, just as I am accountable for my own. I

refuse to continue to minimize my experiences, my talents, my ability to

succeed, in order to give credence to the idea that what I gain, she loses.

Instead, I am trying to live my life within a system of interconnectedness. I

28

am attempting to stand up for myself, to speak my truth, to say who I am

regardless of whether I find acceptance, rejection, or worse: no reaction at

all.

Conclusion

In closing, I return to Bernice Mennis’s Breaking Out of Prison. She

says, “We are all deep wells covered over with heavy stones” (27). I agree.

This final study has been an exhausting one of working to move my heavy

stone and plumb the depths of my well of talents. My mantra has become

the word “and.” My life will no longer be “her versus me” or this choice

over that choice. I am learning to soften my edges and not view my world

in either/or relationships. I can say I write essays and memoirs. I write

privately and publicly.

Some faculty members in this program have told me that they often

have a difficult time coaxing their students to write about themselves

within the context of their academic study. I seem to have a hard time not

doing it! Taking a step back and writing about what I have learned is one of

the hardest things for me to do. When I first tried to conclude this essay, I

wrote the following poem, inspired by Rumi’s poem, The Guest House:

29

The Journey

May I remember to be grateful

for all the guides in my life.

May I find a way

to welcome them all.

If I feel like dying, then I am still alive.

And what more is there?

How much time

does any one of us have?

I must remember

any time

I spend

shrinking in fear,

limiting the fullness of my being,

is one moment

lost.

I am here for a purpose,

to be fully who I am,

to dance through the darkest of nights,

to stand tall in the light of day,

to enjoy

the journey.

30

From the context of my goals for this study, I have learned much. I

am neither intimidated nor self-conscious about classic works of literature.

I have found the confidence to submit my own writing for public viewing.

And, perhaps most valuable, I no longer need to categorize myself. I am a

writer, and the form my writing takes may wander, as does the path of my

life’s journey. I am eager to see where each will take me.

31

Child

32

Gymnastics

If you asked my mother today, she would probably tell you that,

when I was young, she thought I was going to be the next Nadia Comaneci.

She’s been telling people this story my entire life. If you tell her that Nadia

started at age six, she will reply that I started classes at five. She saw my

talent and started me as young as possible.

I remember some of the classes. I remember being so much smaller

than all the other students. I didn’t even fit between the uneven parallel

bars and had to sit out during that portion of class. During vault practice, I

ran with all my might toward the springboard, but I didn’t weigh enough to

make it spring. It was hopeless trying to get over the vault, but the coaches

encouraged me to keep trying. So, I kept running, jumping, and smashing

into it like a brick wall. It was humiliating. I think about it now and I

envision Goldie Hawn, in the movie “Private Benjamin,” repeatedly trying

to climb the wall in basic training, crying in the rain and being yelled at by

her commanding officer.

When we trained on the balance beam, I was assigned to the practice

beam, the one just a couple inches off the floor. Balance beam was my

favorite. It was the only apparatus that matched how I felt. Even in floor

exercises I felt like the mat was so huge and overwhelming, and I hated the

feeling of everyone watching me. During balance beam, we all practiced at

the same time, and I got to step-dip-step-dip my way across the lowest

33

beam and turn at the end with a flourish. I used to practice at home in our

garage between two strips of masking tape on the cement floor.

Unfortunately, I think my mom said something to my coaches one

day, and when it came time to assign students to the various beams, I was

told to work on the mid-height beam, the one several feet off the floor. I was

terrified. We were asked to hop along on one foot, and I was scared I was

going to miss the beam and fall. In fact, I did. I scraped the side of my shin

on the wooden beam on my way down and was taken to the clinic for ice. I

don’t remember what happened when my mom picked me up that day.

I do remember what happened when I came home after a different

practice. I think it was earlier in my career, because I remember being

among other girls my age. We were practicing handstands all at the same

time, and our teacher would count out loud to see who could stay up the

longest. One day I found that perfect spot. It’s a physical memory for me

still, a sense of perfect equilibrium. Somehow, on that one day, I found it,

and I knew I could have stayed up there as long as I wanted. The goal in

class was to make it to a count of ten. If you made it to that nearly elusive

goal, you got a special construction-paper award from the teacher. This

was my first (and only) one! I remember running through the front door so

excited to show my mother. I stood with anticipation as she read the little

colored-circle award with its magic marker explanation of what I had

accomplished. I waited eagerly for her praise, but instead she lifted her

34

eyes to me with a stone cold face, pointed to the floor beside me, and said,

“Do one for me.”

I shrunk inside. I knew it was a fluke and I would not be able to

repeat it. I also knew I had no choice but to take off my coat and try: futility

in its most basic form, the earlier accomplishment lost. I did not

understand then, but my achievements would never be good enough unless

my mom could take credit for them. She made me practice for hours every

day at home while she yelled corrections at me. “Straight as a board,

Robin! Your legs should be straight as a board!” I would work to

exhaustion because she wouldn’t let me stop until I performed a particular

exercise perfectly, and then again and again and again.

The good news is that by the time we moved back to the Washington,

D.C. area, I was no longer in gymnastics. I don’t know how I manipulated

my way out of it unscathed, but my gymnastics memories are inextricably

connected to the time we lived in Seattle. Since I remember things not by

my age but by school years, that time was from pre-school though second

grade.

Now, here’s the interesting part. I did some Internet research: in the

summer of 1976, when Nadia stunned the Olympic gymnastics world by

scoring a perfect ten in seven separate routines, I was eight years old. That

was the summer between second and third grade. No matter how I look at

this, my mother could not have known who Nadia Comaneci even was until

after I had quit taking gymnastics. This life-long story that I have been

35

repeating is all part of her fantasy life, her rewritten history based on her

unquenchable desire to be important. Sharing this now is part of rewriting

my history, my rebirth, using the facts as I remember and learning from

them.

36

Homemade Clothes

Until the time I was around eight years old, my mother used to make

my clothes or alter purchased clothes creatively so that I could wear them

longer than usual. We weren’t poor as far as I knew. We lived in a huge

modern house that backed to a canal that led out to Lake Washington. We

had a boat! We weren’t exactly living on Spaghetti O’s.

Anyway, I wore a lot of thick polyester pants with elastic waistbands

and jeans covered in multi-colored patches with three-inch orange fringe at

the bottom to make up for how short they were on me. (This was the early

70s. Orange fringe wasn’t that unusual.) When I was really young, my mom

used to select and arrange my outfit each day. I don’t ever remember

questioning this or even thinking about protesting a particular selection. I

simply did what I was instructed to do.

However, early one morning as I stepped from my bedroom into the

kitchen, my mother looked at me horrified. She pointed to my lime green

polyester pants and said with all the emotion normally reserved for a

natural disaster, “You have those on backwards!” I stood frozen in fear,

looked wide-eyed down at my pants and back up to her thinking, “I do?”

She demanded that I return to my room and put them back on correctly

with the instructions that “The seams go in the front!”

Mind you, I was probably only five or six at this time. I padded back

into my room, took off my pants, and examined them. They had the

37

aforementioned elastic waistband, no button or zipper or tag to determine

front from back. They were perfectly pressed so that if I lay them on my

bed they fell easily onto one side, legs aligned one atop the other. I held

them up, turned them around a couple times, and guessed which was the

front. Dressed again, I gingerly stepped back into the kitchen hoping for

breakfast, but that was not going to happen yet.

“What is wrong with you?” my mother began. “Why won’t you listen

to me? I told you ‘Seams in the front!’” I obviously had guessed wrong, but

now I was really scared. Her raw, bony hands were shaking by her sides. I

wanted to do this right, but I was too timid to ask her what she meant. I

retreated back to my room before she could continue, determined to figure

this out.

I took off my pants again and scrutinized them. Lying neatly on their

side, each pant leg had one edge that was folded fabric pressed into a tight

crease. The other edge was slightly fuzzy where she had cut the fabric and

sewn the pants together on the outside. The problem was I didn’t know the

difference between a crease and a seam. I thought the fuzzy side looked

worse, so I put the pants back on with that side to the back.

This time I tiptoed into the kitchen with my hands clenching each

other behind my back. She was clearly in a rage now. She stormed toward

me and slapped me full force across the face. My hands came undone so I

could catch myself against the side of the kitchen cabinets, but I said

nothing. Even at that age I knew not to say anything during those

38

moments. She stood over me screaming, “You ungrateful bitch! Say it with

me! ‘Seams in the front! . . . Seams in the front! . . . Seams in the front!’” I

repeated back obediently, tears in my eyes, waiting for permission to leave.

“Now get back in there and don’t come back out until you have them on

properly!”

I don’t have any memory of my next visit to my room, but angels

must have been helping me because I did finally return with the fuzzy

edges in the front. I still didn’t know what a seam was, but I was finally

allowed to eat my breakfast in the stone cold silence of our kitchen.

Another disaster averted.

39

Did You Wash Your Hair?

Being an only child, I always had my own bedroom and my own

bathroom. One might think that gave me the luxury of a lot of privacy, but

one would be wrong. My mother was the master of turning the doorknob

first, then knocking on the door as she swung the door open. This was a

natural action for her, harboring no concept of invasion or intrusion. In her

mind, there was nowhere she was not allowed to be.

During the time I was about eight to ten years old, we lived in a

townhouse in Springfield, Virginia. My bathroom was at the top of the

stairs between the door to my room and the door to the master bedroom.

Once, as I was stepping from the shower, my mother threw open the door

and scowled at me. I stood there dripping on the bathmat gathering my

towel together around me. “What?” I asked shyly. Her words roared in the

small room, “Did you wash your hair?”

I was stunned into silence by the absurdity of her question. Of course

I had washed my hair. She took a large aggressive step forward, her voice

filling with menace, “I said, ‘Did you wash your hair?’”

“Yes,” I replied as I, ever so slightly, leaned back away from her.

“Don’t lie to me!” she bellowed.

I was terrified. How could I prove to her that I had washed my hair?

It hung in dark, wet clumps around my shoulders. I vainly pointed to the

matching bottles of Fabergé Organics shampoo and conditioner. How could

40

she know that I measured each one carefully with every use so I wouldn’t

run out of one before the other? “Look,” I said hopefully. “The tops are even

still open.”

“Anyone could open the bottles. That doesn’t mean you actually

washed your hair. Look at you!” She clamped her iron hands onto each

side of my head and wrenched my face toward the mirror. “Your hair is

still in a part!”

I had no answer. There was no answer. My hair was always in a part.

I had heavy, dark hair that always fell into a natural part, hair I must have

received from my father’s Jewish family. My mother, on the other hand,

was of fair-haired German and Scandinavian descent. She would spend

hours each day trying to make her dull, fine hair look full and alluring.

Our eyes met in the mirror, the truth passing silently between us,

but I was a child and did not understand what that truth meant to her.

“You’re a liar!” she screamed. “You’re a filthy, dirty liar. What do I have to

do? Do I have to wash you like a baby? That’s exactly what I’ll do!” She

released my face, sunk one hand deep into my hair, then dragged me out of

my bathroom, through her bedroom, into her bathroom, and tossed me into

her tub.

She turned on the tap full-force, and I sat there watching the cold

water rise around my legs as she continued her litany. “I can’t believe I

have to do this. Look how big you are, and I still have to wash you like a

baby. I’ll show you what washed hair looks like. Washed hair doesn’t have a

41

part, you lying little baby!” The shampoo suds ran down my face as she

punctuated her words by digging her fingers into my scalp. She scoured my

head with her fingernails, and I sat there as motionless as I could, my

skinny, preteen body being pushed and pulled by her angry hands.

When she felt she had finished, she dragged me, naked and dripping,

in front of her vanity mirror. I cowered as she stood behind me, yelling into

my ears, “Does your hair have a part now?”

I could feel my hair in the same wet clumps around my shoulders. I

slowly raised my head. Her face was just above mine in the mirror. “Well?”

she screamed as our eyes met again in the mirror. I looked at my hair and

saw my usual part. My heart leapt! She would have to admit that I was

right. Right? But my mother continued to glare at me.

I leaned toward the mirror, my hair framing my face, and I

examined the part. Suddenly I saw it, one small clump toward the back of

my head looked like it had fallen to the wrong side. I reached for it under

the scrutiny of my mother’s eyes. I’ll just correct this small piece, I

thought, and she’ll have to apologize. But it wasn’t just hair that had fallen

the wrong way. It was traitor hair. This small section withheld loyalty from

both sides of my head, a tiny blockade in the pathway of my part. As I stood

there holding this long, thin section of hair over my head, I realized there

would be no apology. I let it drop along with my arms and my head and

answered with resignation, “No.”

42

Here was one of my first lessons in the varieties of truth and reality.

I had washed my hair and I had told the truth, but my mother found a way

to alter my version to match hers. By agreeing with her that my hair did

not have a part, I was resigning myself to being a liar in her world. Her

truth was the only one I could survive in, so I began to distrust my own.

Maybe I hadn’t washed my hair?

While I considered that clump of hair as abandoning me in the

moment, I can see now that it was a small, saving grace. It allowed me to

hold on to a small strand of my own reality and tell her with honesty that

my hair was not parted, even as the two of us were staring at the pale

white line down the middle of my head.

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Child / Adult

44

She Arrives

She arrives, five-foot-two, swimming in a man’s-sized button-down

shirt over a skin-tight sweater, with a cigarette burned almost down to the

filter in her right hand. I lean back as she approaches the group, twirling,

arms wide to greet everyone, hugs for those known and unknown, unaware

of the burning embers between her fingers. She has no concept of how

others are feeling. She smiles, hugs, laughs. She tries to be silly, tries to be

witty. She seats herself in the center of the group as we all attempt to

return to what we were saying earlier. I watch her through sidelong

glances, careful not to catch her eye and engage her attention. She grins

awkwardly as others laugh together. Her hair is unnaturally blond and

hangs stiffly, coarse from too much processing; her breasts are

unnaturally large on her small frame; her teeth are, simply, not real.

Mothers are mirrors to their young daughters, and I have lived a lifetime

being terrified of this reflected image.

Let this not be me!

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Adult

46

Biological Side Effects

Let it be known that I firmly believe there is a direct correlation

between the increase in hormones coursing through my body once a month

and the increased number of times I bounce off walls, trip up the stairs, or

stumble over seen or unseen objects. Forget the stereotypical menstrual

side effects of irritability, mood swings, or bloating. Quite simply, I am a

danger to myself (and others).

This phenomenon can typically be tracked by a trail of purple

bruises down my arms, around my hips and along my knees. I misjudge the

distance and size of desks, tables, bedframes, couches, countertops, and

walls in general. Perhaps the hormones change my eyesight or somehow

make hallways and doorframes narrower than usual. I'm not sure of the

precise cause. All I know is I have lived in the same house for five years,

and for about one week each month I can be seen on any otherwise

ordinary morning careening off my bedroom threshold and barely catching

myself with the side of my face pressed against the hallway wall.

So, I beg you, please do not toss me your keys, a remote control, or a

stuffed dog toy, for it will surely bounce off my fingertips at least once as I

fumble to catch it, resulting in me losing my balance and crashing into the

nearest corner or entirely to the floor. Do not invite me to try yoga or a

new exercise stretch, because I will not just fall but I will take down anyone

else around me. Yes, we own a Wii Nintendo gaming system, and this

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month I have the bruises on my shins to prove my grace in video bowling.

Did you know it was possible to bruise your shins on a hardwood floor?

And, really, don’t bother hiding the scissors from me. I am more worried

about envelopes, baby gates, and the ever-dreaded doorstops. I simply

cannot be held responsible for the inevitable results of their being in my

vicinity. Of course, the upside is that if you are a sucker for slapstick, I am

quite entertaining.

But while I’m on the topic of biological side effects, I would also like

to discuss my theory about depression and hair. If you are one of those

people with a propensity toward depressive episodes, here is my advice to

you: shave! Shave as much as you can. Take it all off! I understand that

many people complain of hair loss due to depression, but I’m talking about

something else. I don’t know if anyone has done any official studies on this,

but I am convinced that my depression is stored in my strands of hair. The

more hair I have, the more depressed I am likely to be.

I used to wear my hair long, and the longer (and bigger) it got, the

worse I felt about myself. Now, I can hear what you might be saying,

“Maybe you don’t look good with long hair?” Okay, that’s a valid point, but I

think there is more to it than that. Why do we immediately relate to a

friend having a “bad hair day?” Why do we usually feel better after a

haircut? And why do I feel lighter after shaving my legs?

If I could afford it, I would have one of those hair removal places take

everything off. Leave me my eyelashes, eyebrows, and anything attached

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to my scalp. You can have my chin hairs, my mustache, and the stray hairs

on my collarbones. Basically, take everything from my nose down. And

don’t forget the few on the tops of my feet and my big toes, too. Is this too

much information? I’m sorry, but we’re talking about my mental health

here!

Does anyone agree with me? Seriously, I have respect for all you

“natural” women out there, but if I don’t shave for a week, it’s not my

appearance I’m worried about. It’s like every strand of hair is weighing me

down, collecting all my negative thoughts, convincing me of my pure

ugliness, worthlessness, and how I’m better off staying in bed. But! When I

see all the tiny, dark bastards slide down the drain with the sudsy water,

my vision clears, the sun shines brighter, my clothes fit better. Well, maybe

not the clothes part, but it feels that way! It’s my own battle against the

Dark Side, and they are always sending reinforcements.

So, I say, take up your Daisy, your Venus, your Schick Quattro, and

get to work, ladies! This isn’t vanity we’re talking about. It’s a war against

the soul-stealing stubble. They’re evil, I tell you! They warp your mind.

Remember, I am with you. I will wield my razor as my own light saber

against the evil forces, . . . um, just as soon as I finish my period.

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Standing in the Hallway

Have you ever heard that saying, “God never closes one door without

opening another?” Or I’ve heard it said, “When one door closes, another

always opens.” I don’t know exactly how it goes, but a friend of mine and I

turned it into our own image. We picture ourselves having walked out of a

door, the door “God” has just closed behind us, and we find ourselves

standing in a long hallway full of closed, locked doors. We turn our heads

upward and gesture at the ceiling, yelling “Now what?!?” Our favorite

saying to each other when one of us is going through another of life’s

damned transitions is, “Standing in the hallway sucks!” Somehow that

makes us feel better. We know our friend understands our experience,

waiting for that next opportunity to open up. It does suck.

It tests our faith (if we had any to begin with). It makes us question

our self-worth. It causes an otherwise rational person to jump at the first

thing that appears, even when that thing is clearly a test of our resolve

because it’s so obviously wrong for us, but we have to because we just can’t

take another single solitary moment in that hallway!

And it truly is a solitary experience. Even if everyone we know is

going through the same thing, we all have our own hallways. Standing in

the hallway is a solely internal process. Mine includes a constant knot in

my stomach, tightening of my chest, and internal fistfight. One part of me

is whining, “How did I get here? What’s wrong with me? Why is this

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happening again?” Another side of me is smacking the first part upside the

head, “Quit your sniveling! This is for the best. You hated where you were.

You asked for this, remember? Something better always turns up, right?”

Then, the first part digs deeper and explains how miserable I am, and how

no one will ever want me, and can we just go to sleep now? Can you see

how this escalates? Being alone in my head is a scary experience, believe

me.

This time I am in the hallway of my professional life. I’m wearing a

suit, ready for an interview. This is my first hallway experience in this

arena of my life. I have not been unemployed since I left college. The weird

part is that I don’t wear the suit the entire time. No, I don’t stand there

naked! I keep changing my clothes, because I keep asking myself what I

really want to do next. Hence, the “don’t jump through the first door that

opens” warning applies here. Unfortunately, I seem to be spending too

much time in my pajamas lately.

My challenge is simply to keep smiling. Smile and say “Hello!” to

everyone. Be visible. Speak. Maybe someone will come walking down my

hallway, someone I wouldn’t ordinarily consider speaking to, and they will

invite me to join them as they walk through a door I hadn’t seen before. I

know I just messed up my solitary hallway image, and now, for those of you

who just imagined some grimy hotel that rents rooms by the hour—you

know who you are—I am not trying to pimp myself out either. (Even if my

image isn’t consistent, I would like to keep my analogy clean, thank you

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very much.) I’m trying to stay open to new opportunities. Standing in the

hallway is nothing but opportunities.

I have now been through the extensive interviewing process for two

separate positions, months of waiting and multiple interviewing visits.

Both organizations called my references. The first one, after I interviewed

with six separate people over three months, announced their new hire in

their newsletter, but never followed up with me in any way. The second

one, who invited me to interview for a newly formed position before they

even announced the job publicly, mailed me a poorly written,

grammatically challenged form letter saying that they had selected

another candidate. No phone call. So, I am imagining the doors in front of

me being opened, just halfway, and people greeting me with smiles and

compliments, and as I step forward—slam! I wait stunned, and then look

down to see an envelope being slid under the door at me. Okay, still in the

hallway.

So, the truth is I don’t even like wearing suits. I don’t have to be in

sweats or pajamas all the time, but I prefer to be comfortable when I work.

I like having the flexibility to set my own hours. I am happy when I am

helping others do their jobs better. So, I may not be looking for a job

anymore. I think it’s time to leave this hallway. There is a big, bright

window at the end, with the sun shining brightly on the other side, and I’m

climbing through it. I’ll probably get my foot caught in the windowsill and

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fall into a bush on the other side, but I have decided to stop asking for a job

and start creating one.

I have worked in small business offices since I was fourteen years

old. I am a master of organization and efficiency. I enjoy doing the parts of

business that most people try desperately to ignore. I can design an

intelligent timesheet spreadsheet that automatically shades out weekends

as you change the monthly date. Isn’t it the small things in life that make

us the happiest?

I excel at making tedious tasks easier. I have something to give

people! Now there has to be a market of businesses that would be willing to

invest a relatively small portion of their consulting budgets to bring me in

and make their offices more efficient. My fees will pay themselves back

when the organizations need less time from other consultants and their

own staff can spend more time on programs instead of administrative

action items. It’s win-win all the way. I am the clutter-clearer for office

closets! How's that for a tagline?

And then I wonder if I’ve been standing in the hallway too long and

maybe they’ve painted recently and the fumes are getting to me. Is this all

a fantasy to distract me from the discomfort of rejection? Rejection from

being let go, and rejection from not being selected. Well, stop sniveling! If

you want to be a consultant, you better get used to rejection! Right?

Truthfully, I do believe that we are always taken care of, whatever

the situation. Waiting is painful and sometimes ugly, but new growth

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begins in the dark and dirty earth. We are experiencing the change from

winter to spring. The ground is still hard and cold, but underneath it, seeds

are germinating. Oh, how we want the winter to end! We have had enough

of the frigid winds and ice scrapers. We want to trade our awkward, clunky

boots for flip-flops. Yet, I believe in the solidity and fluidity of nature. I am

part of nature. My season will change, eventually. If I am patient and

vigilant, soon there will be no more hallway, no walls. The door that just

closed behind me has placed me before an open field of endless possibilities,

fresh, green, and growing in the sweet, spring sunshine. To hell with the

hallway!

54

Out of the Hallway

Mixing metaphors is an annoying habit of mine. However, since I

said in my last post that I was going to stop asking for a job and start

creating one, I have decided that I need to start challenging myself. First

challenge: write a post every day for one week. Considering the fact that

the next seven days will include travel to Las Vegas and a family wedding,

this should be fun.

Today, I received my first rejection email. I submitted "Biological

Side Effects" to a women's magazine, but they didn't take it. Humph. The

message simply said "Thanks so much, but we don’t have a spot for this in

an upcoming issue." Rejection? Yes. Annihilation? No.

Here is my chance to practice my new behavior! I could take this

message and run the old direction. They hated it. My writing sucks. I suck.

Why was I so stupid to even submit it in the first place? I do everything

wrong. Give me a shovel, so I can dig a hole to die in. Right. Now, that's

what I could have done.

But this is the new me. This is the woman who is tired of waiting

around. Tired of standing in the corner, the hallway, the lobby. I am the

woman who knows her worth. My essay was funny! She didn't say she

didn't like it, she just said they don't have a spot for it. They want their

essays to fit one of their monthly themes. In my fantasy world, they would

have read my essay and, while wiping away their tears of laughter, said

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"We have got to find a place for this one!" Enter reality. It doesn't work that

way.

Okay. It was a lark. It was exciting to do. It was my first submission

ever! I have other work to be doing, you know. Let's not take this too

seriously. There is a place in this world for my essays. This place and I just

haven't found each other yet. I know I have an audience (beyond family

and friends) who are seeking me. When I am ready with my work, they will

find me. Right now, we are all walking around blindfolded, waving our

arms in wide circles around ourselves. Is this right? Should I go this way?

Are you my mommy?

So, I bought myself a rough, black coffee mug that has the following

quote on it. "Whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is

unfolding as it should. . ." (Max Ehrmann) Go ahead. Read it again. It's

worth it. My favorite part of that quote: no doubt. No doubt! Do I know how

I will financially support myself this year? No. Do I know what my final

project will look like before I graduate this summer? No. Is everything

clear to me? Clear as mud! Is everything unfolding as it should? No doubt!

I believe this deep in my core. Not to say that I am not crabby,

bitchy, grumpy, and sad. Not to say that I don't pick, push, poke, and

generally test the patience of my partner daily. This process makes my

skin crawl, but I believe in it. Hopefully, I will learn to sit with it more

gracefully as I go along.

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Yes, I am still metaphorically in some kind of hallway. Doors have

certainly been closed behind me, in front of me, and all around me, but the

lesson is to practice new ways of responding. I am still envisioning a

verdant green, flowering pasture, instead. I will not let this take me down. I

will own my value, speak my truth, and try really hard not to let people

negotiate my consulting fees down to unreasonable levels.

Day one down. Six more to go. . . .

57

I’ve Lost my Earmuffs

Last Friday the temperature was rumored to have reached the 60s.

This past weekend we received at least a half a foot of snow. Isn't Spring

fun? I had a consulting job downtown today, which meant leaving the

warm security of my home and walking to the Metro station and then from

the train station to the office. It was thirty-two degrees and "breezy," and I

had no earmuffs!

The result of this tragedy is that I had to wrap my fleece scarf up

around my ears and pull my hood up over my head. With my full-length

black wool coat, this makes me look like a caped Hobbit, especially with my

fuzzy trimmed snow boots that are a size too big for me.

How does the saying go? "In like a lion, out like a lamb?" In grade

school I always thought it should be the other way around, "In like a lamb,

out like a lion." I thought the lamb represented the fluffy, white snow, and

the lion represented the warm, yellow rays of sunshine. Considering the

current environmental concerns and my tenuous, transitional stage of life,

I feel like this weather is both lion and lamb—and so am I.

While I have a tendency to view things in extremes, I am feeling an

affinity with this quandary. Is there anything wrong with being both the

lion and the lamb? I've found I can write deeply personal and powerful

vignettes about my childhood experiences with my mother, and I can also

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write moving and amusing personal essays about my current life

experiences. Can I accept both the lion and the lamb?

Maybe it is time to stop judging the differences, the changes, the

broad ranges of emotion. Perhaps they are all valuable, they all serve a

purpose. Again, this is practicing new behavior. I could be hating the cold

and lamenting my lost earmuffs. I could be wallowing in being a victim or

abandoning myself to negative self-talk and the resulting downward spiral

(no guarantee that won't still happen either). Yet, today, at this moment

anyway, I choose to see the possibilities.

March is a month of great changes: physical, environment,

energetic. My personal history is replete with major life events in March. I

used to dread this time of year, but I am seeing it differently now. This is a

period of growth and transformation, sometimes messy, sometimes

painful, sometimes with freezing cold ears. The upside is that March

eventually becomes April, and April eventually becomes May. Spring

flowers are on their way.

The happy ending to this story is that my lovely partner picked me

up at the Metro station after work so I wouldn't have to walk home. All I

ask is that you remind me of the upcoming flowers the next time I'm

shuffling the city streets in a frigid wind without my earmuffs.

59

Strange Pains

Do you believe that our life experiences are held in our bodies? I

believe there really aren’t a mind and a body, but one whole mind-body.

Don't worry. I won't get too woo-woo here. It's too late in the day for that

right now. I just want to mention an odd experience I had today.

First, you need a little background. As an infant I developed (among

other things) pyloric stenosis, which basically means the valve that lets

food pass out of my stomach grew shut. In other words, I vomited a lot.

Whatever I was fed came right back up. I can only imagine how scary this

must have been for my first-time mother. To correct the situation, I

underwent surgery. They apparently have cool, new ways to do this now

that minimize the scarring, but this was back in 1968. The result is a

horizontal scar about two inches long just under my rib cage on my right

side.

I have many other stories that involve my childhood, mostly sad and

painful stories, and I believe they are all related to this first one. The fact is

that this tiny scar is adhered to my rib cage. As I've gained weight over the

years, this little slice stays stuck. If I press it with my fingers or try to

massage the area, I actually feel mild pain, like a pulling of skin but on the

inside. Who knows how much scar tissue is actually in there and what else

is caught up in it?

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So, the reason I bring this up is that I had an odd sensation today. I

was leaving my part-time consulting job and reading an email on my

phone. I was delighted to hear that another prospect was asking to hire me,

and as I was walking, I started to feel a strange pain in my midsection. I

continued a brief email exchange and set a time to consult over the phone,

and I started feeling a pulling, burning sensation, just like my infant scar,

but on my left side. It was as if the scar tissue was trying to tear away.

My first thought was—and here's the progress—that I am separating

from the poor, victim child. I didn't immediately think I was having strange

female heart attack symptoms or that I had some heretofore unheard of

tumor. I actually associated the success of a new client with the painful

feeling of separation. The physical sensation was my body responding to an

emotional growth process.

I have long believed that this scar tissue harbors much more than

the remnants of my originally diagnosed disorder. I imagine a spider web

of scar tissue spread throughout my midsection, and the white spindles

contain the trapped emotional responses to my early childhood traumas.

Now that I am reaching a serious turning point in my life, I believe these

tendrils can no longer hold.

I am tearing away from the me I've been holding on to for so many,

many years. It is certainly not comfortable. It's actually physically painful.

It's a tearing of flesh. It's worse than ripping away a scab before your

wound is fully healed. No, wait. It's actually just like ripping away a scab

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too early, and you find that barely formed pink tissue underneath, the not

yet fully-formed skin, but the vulnerable soft underlying flesh. Hey! It's

like baby's skin!

I think this transformation period of my life is about releasing my

damaged infant self. Pulling, tearing, cutting her loose. I don't need to carry

her around anymore, the crying, the whining, and the vomiting

(metaphorically, of course). I believe the mind and body are irrevocably

connected. As we grow emotionally, our bodies must change as well.

I have no idea what the final form will look like. I don't have any idea

who the future me will be. Perhaps listening to my body more will assist

me. What I do know is that in the middle of this whitewater river ride, I feel

like things are going to be all right. It's time to accept nourishment in my

life. Truly accept it and digest it. It's time.

Online Comments:

ohwow said...

I discovered your blog from Write to Done. I love the way you describe the pain as

"It's actually just like ripping away a scab too early, and you find that barely formed pink

tissue underneath -- not yet fully formed protective skin, but the vulnerable soft

underlying flesh. Hey! It's like baby's skin!" and your discovering that the physical

change is linked to emotional pain from such a young age. Pain is really hard to describe

but I had a really clear idea of what you were writing about. You might really like a book

called "Awakening Intuition" by Mona Lisa Schulz. She writes a lot about the connection

of physical pain and emotional pain.

March 6, 2009 10:54 AM

Groffy said...

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How right you are! We certainly carry our life stories with us in both our body and

mind. It's important not to get bogged down in our past, but just as vital we understand

and embrace our formative stories.

Thanks so much for sharing one of your body-mind experiences. Keep listening to

your body and learning!

I have had similar infant surgery and experiences. Every time I hear certain words

spoken by others, an electric pulse runs down my scar and I feel myself going into "fight

or flight" mode: that's after 63 years! Don't imagine I can change that, but I'm still

enjoying my growing hold on my body's intricacies.

March 6, 2009 7:42 PM

RobinB said...

Thank you so much for your comments, suggestions, and sharing. I love the exchange.

March 7, 2009 1:28 AM

Heather said...

Robin, I just teared up at 6:30 am on Sunday morning reading this day. I too am trying

so hard to let go of the inner children in side of me. Notice the plural. I am learning to

acknowledge each one, have talks with them to understand and let them go quietly.

Believe me there is a lot of talking going on in my head:) Have fun in vegas. XO

March 8, 2009 9:58 AM

RobinB said...

Heather Dear -- I understand. It's a deep grieving process that takes a lot of practice

and a lot of time, but remember that to walk this path is to truly love yourself, inner

child(ren) and all. The further along this path we go, the stronger we are and the less

vulnerable we are to being hurt by others. It's worth every penny of therapy and every

ounce of effort. You're worth it!

March 8, 2009 3:50 PM

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Too Tired to Write

The alarm went off at 3:45 am Eastern DST, and by four o'clock my

partner and I were shuffling toward the bathroom, eyes half closed, hair

askew. We had a 6:50 am flight out of BWI airport, nonstop to Las Vegas.

Now, it is 10:33 pm Pacific DST (or 1:33 am body time). We have

been up this entire time, eaten lunch at a rooftop restaurant in the lovely

sunshine, gathered with family in a casino bar, ate a fine dinner, and

finally soaked in the whirlpool tub in our hotel room.

I am sore all over, tired to the bone, and having trouble making

complete, coherent sentences. Mind and body are exhausted.

Yet, the experiment continues! I made a commitment to myself, and

I am permitting myself this short entry as proof that I am serious about

writing. You may think this sounds simple enough, but I am usually the

first one to give up on myself. If it involves just me, then it usually isn't

worth the effort. Who cares? What's the point? Forget it.

That is exactly why I created this experiment. I am challenging

myself, the victim, the sniveling quitter. I can do this. I care about myself. I

care about my craft. I care about my future.

And this counts!

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Thoughts on my Experiment

I must always remember the goal is progress, not perfection.

Last Monday I decided to challenge myself to write a new blog entry

every day for one week. While my deeply ingrained, perfectionist ways

would have me focus on how I didn't actually write every day for seven

days in a row and how I "cheated" in places, I am going to choose to look at

this experiment on the whole. I am going to attempt to look at the

accomplishments I achieved, the progress I made, and the lessons I

learned.

First, from a Monday to the next Tuesday I have written (including

this post) seven blog entries. I did this while traveling for a long weekend

to a family wedding in Las Vegas! Seven out of nine days deserves a gold

star, if I do say so myself.

There. Now. . . . I am not so practiced at pointing out the positive.

This is not a natural act in my life. So, how about: I would like to point out

that I received two comments from people I don't know! I am still stunned

by this. I subscribe to a blog called Write to Done, and on March 3rd the

entry invited readers to post a comment about what they are writing and

how to give meaningful feedback to each other. On March 4th, I posted a

comment and included a link to Robin's Corner. Perhaps this act alone is

worthy of my attention. It was scary to put myself out there to strangers,

and I did it anyway!

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I found myself on some evenings not wanting to write. I was tired, up

way too late, and seriously jet lagged for part of it. During these times, my

loyal and supportive (and a royal PIMA) partner reminded me of my

commitment and that it was important to me. I learned that I am adaptive,

meaning I can easily alter my usual excuses to meet new situations. I didn't

go the typical route of saying that it wasn't worth it, or I didn't really care,

or nobody would notice since no one was actually reading my blog anyway.

Oh, no! I got creative in my resistance. I decided that to stay up a while

longer typing my blog entry would be disruptive for my partner when she

really needed to sleep. Ingenious! That way I could say I was failing, but it

was only out of respect for my partner. I'm telling you, I am really quite

talented at avoiding things that might lead to my personal success.

Luckily, my partner is just as smart and talented as I am. She will not let

me get away with these things. I stayed up and wrote my blogs.

I found that people can disagree with me and I don't die. Seriously,

this was a big one. Sometimes, when I am writing I go into a narrow zone of

thought and forget to look at how my opinions at that moment are limited.

I received the gift of rebuttal. Someone took the time to share their

experience with me, and it opened my eyes. The funny part is that I

completely agreed with them! In this respectful exchange I was able to see

that I was hiding what I really wanted to say underneath an easier topic. I

have more work to do on that. I need to explore what was underneath and

what was really on my mind.

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I learned that perfection is a fantasy. What "counts" is all in my own

head. Not only did I continue to write while vacationing in Las Vegas,

hanging out with family I rarely see (and I will stop here to note that this

fact alone is worth another kudo!), but when I was beyond too tired to

write, I wrote something anyway. A small entry is no worse than a long

one. Giving an effort, making progress, is absolutely worthy of praise. How

else do we get better at anything?

Without the small efforts during difficult times, we would never be

able to accomplish the overwhelming task of self-improvement. Sometimes

the simple act of brushing my teeth is a monumental act of self-love. That

may seem dramatic or outrageous, but it is the truth. I actually divvy up

what I am willing to do for myself. Things like putting lotion on my dried

out, itchy skin is something I rarely do. I often skip this step in my

morning routine because I think it is a waste of my time. I'll be fine. If I

were to examine it more closely, I would probably find I believe I wasn't

worth the lotion. Or if I absolutely have to use some lotion before I scream,

I will apply only a miniscule drop to the part of my body that is in greatest

need. No point in going overboard. Whatever is leftover on my hands can

be wiped off on my forearms for an added bonus, and I actually imagine my

arms sighing in ecstasy for the rare gift. Crazy, I know. That is exactly why

giving credit for the smallest act is so important. Each time I can show

myself some appreciation or pat myself on the back for the tiniest effort in

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new behavior, I am building up my reservoir of self-love. And, believe me, I

need the extra supply.

So, I think I have answered the question I've been pondering. Should

I continue? Well, is anyone reading this? Robin, does it matter? Kind of,

but not entirely. Did I do this to gather a long list of loyal fans? Only in my

fantasy world. You know that a famous publisher is going to stumble across

this and know immediately that I am the next world-renowned author,

right? Riiiiight! This was about pushing myself beyond my comfort zone.

This was about letting myself be seen and heard, sharing the thoughts in

my head, and allowing myself to successfully write on a regular basis,

whatever "regular" turns out to be. Of course this is worth continuing!

Result: Experiment deemed successful; further exploration

recommended.

Online Comments:

Heather said...

YOU M-U-S-T KEEP Writing:) Each day your entries are like my self affirmation

cards....just the insight and little boost that brightens my day. Love and big hug coming

your way....

March 11, 2009 10:30 AM

DayleShockley said...

I say continue on. Writing is a form of self-therapy for me--at least the writing that I do

in my personal journals. It's like a conversation with myself. I would write, even if

nobody read my work. In my opinion, the one who benefits most from writing about life's

experiences is the writer.

March 11, 2009 4:23 PM

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RobinB said...

I believe that writing is self-therapy, too. It always has been for me, especially with

personal journals. What a wonderful experience to realize that some of what I share is

meaningful to others as well! I am enjoying the me that is evolving from this new form of

writing and the dialogue it produces.

Thank you for your comments!

March 11, 2009 9:25 PM

K said...

I'm reading! I'm reading! (raises hand over the internet)

I just read through my RSS feed, so you don't always know....

You are a great writer, Robin!

March 12, 2009 9:56 PM

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Avoidance of Good

I am afraid today. My chest is a little tight. I'm finding new and

interesting things on the Web to distract me. I am avoiding.

Avoidance is my own version of backlash to recently experienced

good. I use "good" as a catch-all phrase. I like it. Good. Good girl. It embodies

anything I experience as positive or uplifting or successful, all of which are

usually followed by a period of avoidance.

Thank you to those of you who have commented or sent me

messages that you are reading and want me to continue. I was so excited to

hear from you. I spent a few days thinking positively about my life, my

future, my prospects. I went to therapy and talked about all the good

things happening and my hopeful attitude toward my consulting business.

And then she said, "What are you feeling?"

Feeling? Huh? What do you mean? I just told you all these wonderful

things. "Yes, and you also told me you are waking up at night with [acid

reflux] pain and you're having belly and digestion problems. What feelings

are attached to that?" . . . Blank stare. . . . I'm not feeling anything. I'm

avoiding.

Accepting good things into my life is a constant internal battle. My

partner can tell you. She's the best thing that's ever happened to me, and I

push her and poke her and test her still after almost five years together. I

still resist the fact that she cares about me and is always concerned about

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my welfare. Even as I write this, my body-mind is saying "Yeah, right. Don't

put much stock in that." Of course, this infuriates her.

These deeply seated responses are hard to overcome, even when our

intellectual mind knows it to be ridiculous. Writing is good for me. Good for

me. Plus, other people are reading it. Uh, oh. That means... it could go

away! If I avoid it, turn away from it, ignore it, find any other distraction

no matter how insignificant, I don't have to face the possibility of failing. Of

losing. Of being left. Of not being good enough!

Ooooo. Now my belly hurts. That one hits right in the gut. It has a

voice that comes from an adult towering over my five-year-old self, raging

at me to be perfect, screaming at me for my mistakes. It makes me want to

curl into a little ball and fall asleep. Sleep used to be my safe place. At forty-

one, it is only safe after some prescription enhancements, and even then

my body speaks louder than my brain.

So, here I am. Standing in the middle of the pain. Pain, I understand.

Feeling good and facing potential success. . . not so much. And yet, I am

tenacious, right? I will find a way to take baby steps through this. I must. It

is my nature to keep moving forward, even when that includes a period of

time curled in a ball. All who love me learn to trust that I will open up

again, pull myself back into a standing position, and find a way to face the

current demon.

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And the current demon is almost always me. It may have begun as

someone else, but they are parts of me now. I can't get away by avoiding. It

only lengthens the time before having to face it again.

So, here I am.

Online Comment:

FredV said...

Thank you Robin, for getting back to writing. Have you read Wendy P Williams' latest

blog? As it seems to me, similar pain issues, similar gratitude to her partner, similar

release by writing... And by writing you touch others and help them explore, and find

greater peace.

March 15, 2009 7:28 AM

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Persistence

Did you watch President Obama's press conference Tuesday night? I

did. I watched the whole thing. I don't think I've ever watched an entire

presidential news conference before. I admit I was bored by the middle of

it, but I am glad I waited until the end before turning off the television.

For the first time in my life, I feel like I want to hear what my

President has to say. I feel like he is truly paying attention and knows (or

at least is highly prepared for) what he is talking about. He may be part of

a "well-oiled machine" or an extremely good actor—I am not one to know—

but I feel like he is trying to be up front and honest and speak to the

general public, not just to Washington insiders or the media.

Okay, that is about as far as I go when it comes to political

commentary. I am the one who lives under a rock, remember? I do not

usually watch the news, I never read a newspaper, and I don't listen to the

radio (except XM Radio for music or comedy only). However, I have

recently become a huge Rachel Maddow fan, so I might be changing, ever

so slowly, in this arena.

Anyway, the reason I even began to ramble about this is to quote

part of the very end of Obama's press conference. Here is what I wish to

share from the transcript:

And what that tells me is that if you stick to it, if you are

persistent, then—then these problems can be dealt with.

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That whole philosophy of persistence, by the way, is one that

I’m going to be emphasizing again and again in the months

and years to come, as long as I am in this office. I’m a big

believer in persistence. . . .if we keep on working at it, if we

acknowledge that we make mistakes sometimes and that we

don’t always have the right answer. . .

(He never actually finished that sentence.)

This is what I was proud to hear. Forget the details of our budget,

changes to health care, education, etc., this is what matters to the way I

live my life. Persistence, tenacity, perseverance. . . ooh, here's a good one:

pertinacity! (I love thesauruses.)

We only heal when we are willing to persevere against our deeply

instilled defense mechanisms. This means we will make mistakes

sometimes, and we won't always have the right answer. Yet, we must try

new behavior and observe our reactions as gently as possible. That part

was important: as gently as possible. If I try new behavior and do not

succeed, I must be vigilant to avoid the negative backlash that tells me I

should never have tried at all. For it is only through persistent attempts

that I will eventually learn better, more healthy behavior. As the saying

goes, "Baby steps!"

So, I am proud that my President believes in persistence. I think it's

a healthy attitude toward our country's problems. Whether we are healing

personally or globally (and I also believe these are integrally related), it

74

must be through the willingness to make some mistakes and learn from

them. I hope the general public will agree. I hope the majority of Americans

will allow this to happen. I hope we all gently heal both personally and

globally, even if it takes significant time to achieve this.

75

Heartbreak Salve

Heartbreak is real. It's a fissure in our soul. When we open our heart

fully to someone and are rejected or abandoned, the pain goes deeper than

the current relationship. It sinks to our core.

And this real pain, this sudden fear for our very survival, is

important to acknowledge. It may only ease with the passage of time, but

some reminders may help us through the immediate injury.

First, only those who are able to fully open their hearts are also able

to feel heartbreak. This is a gift. Not everyone is willing to be vulnerable, to

risk that kind of pain. Those who do should be celebrated! Only when

enough of the population is willing to open their hearts and take big risks,

will our species—our planet—heal.

Second, we were born with open hearts. For most of us, something

happened, either a single traumatic event or an extended experience of

childhood abuse or neglect or simply the natural existence of imperfect

parents, and we learned to close and protect our hearts. This is why

heartbreak feels so intense. It returns us to the first time we felt rejected

or abandoned. To feel this as a young child is to feel the fear of death. If the

one who is supposed to care for me has abandoned me, how will I survive?

To feel this as an adult allows us the opportunity to heal the original

wound. We may be suffering, but we can be reminded that, at the same

time, at can be experiencing profound healing.

76

Actually, the very fact that we allowed ourselves to be hurt in the

first place proves we are healing. We don't help ourselves by saying, "I

should have seen this coming. How did I mess this up? Will I ever be loved?

What's wrong with me?" To be open to love, to fully commit to a

relationship, knowing there are no guarantees for success, is an act of self-

love. We cannot do this honestly until we actually believe we deserve it!

Isn't that alone a step forward for many of us? And how can it ever be a

mistake to love ourselves? We help ourselves by continuing to love

ourselves, even when we are hurting.

Lastly, if we have the capacity to feel intense pain, then we have the

capacity for extreme joy! This is what makes us the remarkable human

beings that we are. Further, I believe we are spiritual beings having a

human experience, choosing to have a human experience. Every aspect of

our lives—dark and bright, painful and joyous—is our gift to ourselves. The

gift of feeling our lives! We aren't numb! If we are moving along this

journey of our lives, seeking to be more fulfilled, searching to heal our

deepest wounds which, in turn, allows us to contribute to the healing of us

all, and someone we love isn't willing or isn't ready or isn't capable of

joining us, then the best we can do is wish them the best and keep moving.

When we genuinely try to learn from our lives and seek out guidance

and assistance, we are always rewarded. Always. We may not be able to see

it or feel it when we are in the middle of heartbreak, but we are surrounded

by support. We are loved, and we have witnessed our willingness for self-

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love. We have already grown, and there are only better experiences

awaiting us on this journey.

Head held high, tissues in hand, we step forward.

78

Goodbye to March

In the story of my life you will find that March has been a

tumultuous time of year for me. I won't even focus on the five-week

hospitalization for Acute Depression in early adulthood (and not my only

hospitalization, either). I think it might be more helpful to point out my

more mundane responses to the shift from winter to spring.

While there are ample resources available to understand the

somewhat common depressive responses to the dark days of winter, I find

the resurgence of spring bears my darker responses.

Others may feel uplifted by the warming temperatures, the

twittering birds, the bright blossoms. I, on the other hand, hate guessing at

what to wear each day, want to scream at the noisy birds, and sneeze at

the new tree buds. While making noises like Felix Unger trying to scratch

the back of my throat with my tongue, I see young couples basking in a new

romance. As they walk along holding hands and gazing into each other's

eyes, my sniffling, snorting self wants to body slam them into the fresh

spring mud.

When the seeds bursting with new life are fighting toward the

surface of frozen earth, I feel their struggle. When the barren tree limbs

begin to show their pregnant bumps, I feel the internal pain of

contractions. My life is the poem by Anais Nin:

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Risk

And then the day came,

when the risk

to remain tight

in a bud

was more painful

than the risk

it took

to Blossom.

However, I must celebrate this year, 2009. I made it through March

unscathed! No major depression in the face of employment uncertainty. No

fantasies of death as I compare my lack of progress to my fellow students'

as we approach graduation in July. I have, stunningly, been the calmer one

in the household. This is only a matter of degrees, mind you, but it is

progress!

In fact, I begin this April with two, perhaps three, clients. I may soon

have the truly honorable position of choosing which jobs to keep and which

to let go. Add this to my new resurgence of writing, my blogging

experiment, and I must admit this is no ordinary spring.

So, I not only say good-bye to March as the cherry blossoms blow in

the gusting winds of April, I say good-bye to my history of March. I am no

longer a victim of my emotions, being ruled by the ebb and flow of my

responses to my surroundings. I am a stronger stalk now. I can feel the

80

wind and withstand the storms. I am finally reaping some of the rewards of

many years of learning tools and trying new behavior and making

mistakes along the way. I am able to see things with the multitude of

options they afford, instead of the single reflection I was restricted to in the

past.

While the change of seasons is a constant, patterns can change. It is

always a gamble as to when our Nation's Capital will be in full bloom and

how closely Nature agrees to follow the preplanned schedule for festivities.

Some years the blossoms are long gone; some years the buds are not ready

to bloom; and some years the thousands of tourists and locals, alike, share

the radiance of a remarkable gift together. Who can stand along the Tidal

Basin during the peak of cherry blossom season and not be moved?

Yes, in all honesty, I want to push many of the tourists into the

water, but I still respect the beauty of the trees! Today's gusty winds cause

our large tree out front to scrape against our roof. It is a lovely metaphor.

I'm still growing, still scraping, and now able to see more than before. I'll

welcome March next year, knowing I am not trapped in a mental pattern of

negativity. Each year will be unique, and today I am choosing to look

forward.

81

My Body is Not a Temple

My body is not a temple. When I think of it—if I think of it—I see it as

more of an abandoned toxic wasteland. Or a boarded-up haunted house

that causes people to cross the street so as not to get too close when they

pass by. I often wish I were only a mind without a body, and my body treats

me with the same disdain.

I hate having to take care of myself. Eating is such a waste of time.

Remember the first RoboCop movie where he only had to suck down a little

tube of goo for all his necessary sustenance? I wish I could be like that. I

just can't stand making decisions about what to eat, and I prefer not to

have to spend more than five minutes (maximum!) preparing or planning

a meal. And for all this attitude, you would think I was still a petite, little

thing, huh? Nope! It's true what everyone told me: middle age and

metabolism got to me eventually. Now, the larger I become, the less I care.

What a rotten cycle to be in.

But I don't stop at eating. I resent having to brush my teeth, bathe,

and select clothing. Oh, how I hate that one! Couldn't we all just live like

those on Star Trek and wear the same uniforms every day? Just a one-

piece jumpsuit that makes everyone look silly. Of course, my belly would

stick out further than any other part of my body and I would look like a

Tellytubby. Great idea, Robin!

I just really don't like to have to think about my body at all.

82

My Body Screams

My head is fog.

My body screams.

The sound dissipates into the moisture of the haze.

Who am I yelling at?

My gut churns.

My throat constricts.

I fight off the mist rising in my eyes.

Who am I angry with?

My skin crawls.

My muscles are all nerves.

I say good morning with a smile.

How do I get through this day?

83

Morning Walk

I walk stiffly

through the cool April air.

Eyes wide,

soaking in the morning sunshine.

A robin steps into my path

and flits to the pavement beside me.

We make eye contact

as we travel a few paces together along my journey.

Spring can be healing, too.

84

Dead Leaf or Emerging Bud?

Another robin demanded my attention this morning. I take it as a

direct message. "See me!" Okay, it's up to me to pay attention. This is

merely the cost of my energy, and the investment can yield beautiful

results. This is something everyone has the ability to afford.

So, I look up while walking, instead of down. Ah! Many of my

neighborhood trees have already bloomed. The blossoms hang dead, but

now reveal the brown seeds within. A strong, spring breeze and they will

begin a potential new life. Next, I know, I will start to see the birth of fresh,

green leaves.

But here on this tree, I see a dead leaf, a stubborn leftover that has

survived the winter. I imagine its false pride for beating autumn. Does it

really believe it will now receive the sustenance it requires to become alive

again? It is probably clinging to a dead branch.

How many times have I clung to a fantasy of potential nurturing only

to find myself attached to a dead tree? It might look normal on the outside,

admired by others, standing tall among its peers, but it's a hollow tree.

There is only darkness and disease on the inside, yet I believe in the

transformational power of my dreams. "If I heal this tree, I will stay a

beautiful leaf." All the while, my colors are fading.

I try to catch myself from repeating that pattern. I believe that

Nature provides healthier cycles.

85

If I have the faith to let go during a fall storm, I can use the

hibernating winter months to go within and regenerate. I can learn from

both my previous behavior and the experience of the fall. There will always

be another spring. Nature hasn't let me down yet.

Slowly, sometimes painstakingly, with fits and starts, I will emerge.

This time as a single flower or a blade of grass or an emerging leaf on a

healthy tree, both of us providing for each other, living in the harmony of

interdependency.

Thank you, little spring robin, for reminding me to pay attention.

Lessons are living all around me. I want to leave the dead tree fantasy

behind me.

86

WORKS CITED

Angelou, Maya. Letter to my Daughter. New York: Random House, 2008.

Burroughs, Augusten. A Wolf at the Table: A Memoir of my Father. New

York: Picador, 2008.

Grealy, Lucy. Autobiography of a Face. 1994. Afterword by Ann Patchett.

New York: Perennial, 2003.

Kidd, Sue Monk. The Secret Life of Bees. New York: Penguin, 2002.

Layton, Deborah. Seductive Poison: A Jonestown Survivor’s Story of Life

and Death in the Peoples Temple. New York: Anchor-Random House,

1999.

Maugham, W. Somerset. Of Human Bondage. 1915. Afterword by Maeve

Binchy. New York: Signet Classics, 2007.

McBride, Karyl. Will I Ever Be Good Enough?: Healing the Daughters of

Narcissistic Mothers. New York: Free, 2008.

Mennis, Bernice. Breaking Out of Prison: A Guide to Consciousness,

Compassion, and Freedom. New York: iUniverse, 2008.

Niffenegger, Audrey. The Time Traveler’s Wife. New York: Harvest-

Harcourt, 2004.

Olbermann, Keith. “Special Comment: U.S. Future Depends on Torture

Accountability.” Countdown with Keith Olbermann. 16 Apr. 2009.

MSNBC. 19 Apr. 2009 <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30254776/>.

Obama, Barack. “President Obama’s News Conference.” The New York

Times 24 Mar. 2009. 25 Mar. 2009.

87

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/24/us/politics/24text-

obama.html?pagewanted=12&_r=2&sq=march%2024%20transcript

&st=Search&scp=2>.

Tomasulo, Daniel. Confessions of a Former Child: A Therapist’s Memoir.

Saint Paul: Graywolf, 2008.

88

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY

Angelou, Maya. Letter to my Daughter. New York: Random House, 2008.

If I could bundle this book up into a beautiful, golden charm, I would

proudly wear it around my neck and let it hang over my heart.

Angelou—witty, wise, powerful, and nurturing—writes this book for

all women, “Black and White, Jewish and Muslim, Asian, Spanish-

speaking, Native American and Aleut. You are fat and thin and

pretty and plain, gay and straight, educated and unlettered, and I

am speaking to you all” (xii). She offers her advice and life lessons to

the daughter she never had. I am moved by her lyrical prose, her

magical storytelling, and her stunning poetry. I absorbed each word

as if she was speaking directly to me, and I loved the experience. I

cried with her and laughed with her and finished the book feeling as

if I had an earthly, fairy godmother looking out for me. Exactly what

I needed at this time.

Burroughs, Augusten. A Wolf at the Table: A Memoir of my Father. New

York: Picador, 2008.

If you are a fan of Burroughs’ previous books, be warned. This one is

not written with his usual voice of shocking humor. This one is

shocking in its haunting detail, its genuine emotion, and its

terrifying topic. This is the voice of a young boy trying to make sense

of his earliest years in a home with a sociopathic, alcoholic father. I

have read Burrough’s previous two books, and I quickly became a

89

fan of his acerbic wit and his hysterical humility. I am now a fan of

his writing. What is the difference when reading a memoirist’s

work? Is there a distinction between voice, storytelling, and writing

skill? Does humor lessen my rating of a writer’s skill? I hope not,

because I don’t intellectually believe one style of writing is easier

than the other, perhaps the opposite! All I know is that with A Wolf

at the Table, Burroughs earned a deeper level of respect from me. He

does not protect the reader from the horrific or humiliating details.

He walked me through his childhood as if I were his best friend,

living the nightmare with him, and I genuinely feel for the adult man

who is also trying to make sense of it all. Bravo for this brave book.

Cafagña, Marcus. The Broken World: Poems (National Poetry Series).

Chicago: University of Illinois, 1996.

From the beginning of my study I knew I wanted to include some

poetry. This book was handed to me during an office move, and I felt

it must have crossed my path for a reason. I enjoyed listening to the

word choices Cafagña used throughout this collection, but I was not

always able to follow his imagery. I found these poems disturbing,

but couldn’t exactly tell you why. I did like his use of near-prose,

breaking up long sentences into poem form. It inspired me to take

my own writing, condense it, focus it, and see what evolved. I just

wish it had been easier to understand what his near-prose was

describing. I don’t fully enjoy what I don’t fully understand.

90

Edwards, Kim. The Memory Keeper’s Daughter. New York: Penguin, 2006.

Edwards writes a beautiful novel covering the broad canvas of love,

loss, guilt, and grief. The story starts in the mid-60s and continues

through the growth of twins born to a doctor and his wife, except as

the doctor delivers his own children he decides to give away the

daughter, born with Down syndrome, and tell his wife the little girl

died. I was moved by the theme of how all our decisions affect the

path our lives take. Secrets live. Loss takes up its own space and

energy. Can we ever make up for past mistakes? What defines a

mother? How do we define a successful life? The characters are

brilliant, each carrying their own burden. Bittersweet love is imbued

throughout. Well worth reading.

Ellroy, James. The Black Dahlia. 1987. Afterword by James Ellroy. New

York: Mysterious, 2006.

This book was republished when it was turned into a motion picture,

and the new afterword by the author is most revealing. A novel, it

pulls from both historical events of the 1940s and 50s and images

and feelings from the author’s experiences to create a story

surrounding the brutal murder of a young woman in Los Angeles in

1947. Ellroy writes with a cadence and rhythm that lends itself

easily to the movie screen, but his story is filled with so many details

I find it hard to believe it can be fully translated into visual art

without a lot being missed. I have long believed this must be true for

91

adaptations of good books. I enjoyed being immersed in the time

period, the mindset, and the culture that Ellroy describes so well.

However, I was not prepared for the extremely dark side of this

story, the grisly sexual images, and the relentless obsession.

Learning the author’s desire to pull the images of his mother into the

story makes the book fascinating on much deeper levels. Having

experienced the entire journey, I am not sure I would have chosen to

travel that path if I had known about it in advance.

Fisher, Carrie. Wishful Drinking. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2008.

I selected this book because I’ve read Fisher’s Postcards from the

Edge and I wanted to read an updated memoir of a daughter of a

narcissistic mother. Sadly, I think Fisher has simply assimilated her

mother’s narcissistic characteristics. Do you remember during our

awkward times of adolescence when you would see someone who

was trying too hard to be “cool” and it only made them seem less so?

If I could sum this book up into a single sentence, it would be Carrie

Fisher whining, “I’m not doing this because I’m famous. I’m not.

Really.” Well, that’s technically three sentences, but hopefully you

get the message. While Fisher seems to be defending herself

throughout this attempt at humorous memoir, I couldn’t help

thinking that this would never have been published if she weren’t

the child of Debbie Reynolds and Eddie Fisher or the cultural icon of

Princess Leia from the movie Star Wars. Just as she’s lamenting

92

about these very facts, she is trying to write as if there is deeper

meaning in her experiences, but I never believed her. I was

disappointed in the simplicity of her writing and the lack of genuine

humility in what could have been great life lessons learned. Instead,

it felt like she was faking being a writer and trying too hard to sound

wise. It only made her seem less so in my eyes. This was an example

of how I do not want to write.

Frey, James. A Million Little Pieces. New York: Anchor, 2004.

This is a book worthy of a group discussion. Multiple discussions. On

varying topics. This is a book about a young man who entered a

rehabilitation center at the age of twenty-three and the six weeks

that followed. This is a book written without paragraphs, avoiding

the standard use of grammar. This is book that replicates the

endless thoughts of an addict, every movement, every waking

moment, every run-on sentence of repetitive thought. This is a

rebellious book, both in its format and its subject matter, its

protagonist rejecting the teachings of the rehabilitation center and

remaining sober against all odds. This is a book that was published

as a memoir, but later revealed to contain embellishments and

untrue facts, causing conflict and controversy. This is a book that

makes me think, and I loved it!

Grealy, Lucy. Autobiography of a Face. 1994. Afterword by Ann Patchett.

New York: Perennial, 2003.

93

Soon after I was born, I began to develop a hemangioma on the end of

my nose. Infant hemangioma is a rapidly growing, benign tumor,

filled with blood, that is actually part of the vascular system. This is

to say that I quickly grew a bulbous, purplish, clown-nose that

attracted the curiosity and blatant stares of strangers. While plastic

surgery before I was two years old finally eliminated the

disfigurement, I no longer doubt that this experience deeply affected

my infant psyche and my perception of self. In Autobiography of a

Face, Lucy Grealy bravely tells her story of being diagnosed with

cancer at age nine (eventually losing a third of her jaw), years of

intense chemotherapy and radiation treatments, and a lifetime of

various unsuccessful “corrective” surgeries. This is not only an

inspiring story; it is the creative work of a talented author and poet.

While maintaining her child’s viewpoint, Grealy infuses her prose

with wrenching honesty and pain, and ultimately her indomitable

spirit wins. Grealy passed away in 2002 at the age of thirty-nine,

and this edition of the book includes an afterword by her close friend

Ann Patchett. While the book certainly stands on its own, I especially

appreciated the input included by Patchett. She clearly states that

Grealy did not want to be famous or inspirational for her survival of

cancer but for her talent as a writer, and I believe she deserved both.

94

Kidd, Sue Monk. The Secret Life of Bees. New York: Penguin, 2002.

Quite simply, this is a beautiful novel. I read this on pure instinct

alone, because I really didn’t understand intellectually how this

would fit my study. However, I relished the visions, the emotions,

and the sounds this book evokes. The heart of the story is about Lily,

a motherless daughter, and her coming of age in South Carolina in

1964. This is not a location or time period I thought I could relate to,

but Kidd’s gift of imagery is breathtaking. I felt like I was living this

story and learning about bees—and life—right along with Lily. In the

middle of my own reparenting experiment, I chose a book about

finding a nurturing mother within ourselves. I applaud Sue Monk

Kidd’s talent as a writer and my instincts for finding what I need at

the perfect moment.

Kostova, Elizabeth. The Historian. New York: Back Bay, 2006.

With all the pop culture existing around Vampires these days, this

novel is a refreshing story that is full of rich historical context,

descriptive world travel, and excellent storytelling. A unique father-

daughter relationship turns into an adventure to unlock the

mysteries surrounding the historical details of Vlad the Impaler, the

original Dracula persona, and to save their entire family from its

own demise. I thoroughly enjoyed Kostova’s plot twists and

character betrayals, and becoming familiar with parts of the world I

had known nothing about through her infusion of well-researched

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historical and geographical facts. It taught me how much work can

go into any story and how important realistic facts are to the

authenticity of an author’s writing.

Layton, Deborah. Seductive Poison: A Jonestown Survivor’s Story of Life

and Death in the Peoples Temple. New York: Anchor-Random House,

1999.

This is a heartfelt look into one woman’s experience of her life from

age sixteen, when she first met Reverend James Warren Jones, to

age twenty-five, when she escaped Jonestown, Guyana before the

infamous massacre in November 1978. Layton wrote this book in an

attempt to deeply understand her own past, to be able to answer her

daughter’s questions honestly about her family’s history, and to give

her reading audience the opportunity to see into the often

misunderstood lives of those people seduced into the tragic world of

Jim Jones. Her memoir reads like a novel, with emotion, suspense,

and carefully crafted characters. Interestingly, the day after I

finished this book, MSNBC replayed a special documentary, “Witness

to Jonestown.” This entire story and Layton’s bravery to delve into

her painful and often shame-filled past gives me courage to return to

stories of my own experiences of a lesser, but no less powerful,

degree of the effects of a growing up with a narcissistic, mentally ill

authority figure.

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Maugham, W. Somerset. Of Human Bondage. 1915. Afterword by Maeve

Binchy. New York: Signet Classics, 2007.

This classic is a 680-page autobiographical novel, set in the late

1800s, about a club-footed orphan’s coming of age. Maugham

changed the details of the main character’s life to be different from

his own while maintaining many of the true emotional aspects of

growing up without family and with a humiliating disability.

Maugham also wrote the early parts of this novel when he was

relatively young and then went back to finish the novel later in his

career. This gives both the youth’s and the adult’s perspective,

which imbues the novel with an authenticity of emotion that might

otherwise be difficult in such a long story. I found myself responding

with both empathy and annoyance to the main character. I enjoyed

Maugham’s strong descriptive style and the main character’s wildly

fantastic and dramatic internal world. However, I was ultimately

disappointed at the end. I felt like it ended abruptly and without

deeper meaning or resolution, but then again that is life, right?

There is always the next day and more to our story.

McBride, Karyl. Will I Ever Be Good Enough?: Healing the Daughters of

Narcissistic Mothers. New York: Free, 2008.

With a sound foundational understanding of Narcissistic Personality

Disorder, I dove into this book for its specific focus on daughters of

narcissistic mothers. While I underlined and notated previous books

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on this topic, I held this one with more reverence. McBride writes in

direct dialogue with you, the reader, as if you are experiencing a

personal therapy session with her throughout the book. She gives

you questionnaires, checklists, and benchmarks to help you gauge

your level of entanglement or individualization in relation to your

narcissistic mother. She explains the generational implications of

how narcissistic traits are passed down from mother to daughter.

She gives you space and permission to accept, grieve and, finally,

heal from this sometimes-devastating childhood experience.

Sometimes the value of a book may not lie in the beauty of the

writing, the skill of the editing, or the talents of the author.

Sometimes it might simply be timing, the right book about the right

topic for the right reader at the right time. At least it was for me.

Mennis, Bernice. Breaking Out of Prison: a guide to consciousness,

compassion, and freedom. New York: iUniverse, 2008.

For once, I must say, I am at a disadvantage writing an annotation

because I have yet to read this book multiple times. The depth of

insights and offerings shared by Mennis can only fully be harvested

after delving into her book many more times than once. Having had

the unique privilege of working with Mennis during two school

residencies, I can confidently say her personal voice is clear in her

writing, as is her passion and tenderness as a teacher. Her

overriding theme of internal and external prisons pulled my

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culminating study together in many ways: finding my voice, giving it

freedom, having compassion for my experiences, and allowing

myself to be all that I am able to be. I look forward to all my future

readings.

Niffenegger, Audrey. The Time Traveler’s Wife. New York: Harvest-

Harcourt, 2004.

The premise of this novel involves an imaginative genetic disorder

that makes one of the main characters involuntarily pop in and out

of the present time, experiencing different periods of his life

simultaneously with his own sequential experience of life.

Niffenegger goes into significant detail to “explain” this disorder, and

if the reader is willing to go along with the idea, there is a beautiful

story included that demonstrates the bonds and bounds of love. I

enjoy authors who play with the standard model of storytelling, and

Niffenegger’s ability to teach the reader how to follow the

nonsequential aspects of her story is quite a triumph. Not only did I

love the realistic aspects of a painful love story, I was also inspired

by the author’s creativity.

Payson, Eleanor. The Wizard of Oz and other Narcissists: Coping with the

One-Way Relationship in Work, Love, and Family. 2002. Royal Oak:

Julian Day, 2008.

March 2009 marks the twentieth anniversary of my first

hospitalization for acute depression. I consider that the starting

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point of my adult recovery. Having now spent as many years

recovering as I did growing up, I found a book that reflects back to

me exactly what I lived through as a child. Using the well-known

characters from the Wizard of Oz, Payson creates a well-ordered and

accessible book containing invaluable information. Through various

means, storytelling, medical definitions, and real world examples,

Payson paints a mural of all the ways narcissists may exist in our

lives and exactly how they affect us, both in childhood and

adulthood. I consider this a must-read for everyone because I do not

think enough people fully understand the realities of narcissism. It is

so often masked by other, more commonly discussed disorders of

addiction or hidden beneath our cultural admiration of power and

success. I will be forever grateful for having found this book.

Steinbeck, John. Of Mice and Men. 1937. New York: Penguin, 2002.

My immediate reaction is: wow! Reading this after finishing Woolf’s

To the Lighthouse will make your head spin. This was my first

introduction to Steinbeck, and I am eager to read more in the future.

He is shrewd in his choices of words, masterful in his use of dialogue.

While the story is short and the characters are vulgar, the sharp

images and theatrical descriptions of each scene will stay with me

for some time. Steinbeck showed me that, in some cases, less is

more.

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Stevenson, Robert Louis. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. 1886. New York:

Bantam Classic, 2004.

This classic story was originally published in 1886, and yet, my only

experience of it had been the Warner Brothers cartoon version

complete with Bugs Bunny. I equated the title with the timeless

battle of good versus evil. However, I am grateful to have not only

experienced the original writing but the biographical sketch of

Stevenson, the author. More accurately, the true battle here is our

public image against our shadow self, the collective parts of our self

that we deny, stuff, and attempt to ignore. Those parts may or may

not be evil; they are simply kept in the dark. To learn that it is

hypothesized that Stevenson may have been a homosexual,

something he would have felt compelled to keep secret in Victorian

times, sheds a completely new light onto the Mr. Hyde character, an

angry, frustrated person who so desperately wanted to experience

life. I found here a tragic story that continues to have modern

implications.

Tomasulo, Daniel. Confessions of a Former Child: A Therapist’s Memoir. St.

Paul: Graywolf, 2008.

Joy! It was pure joy to return to the pages of a witty memoirist.

Tomasulo does an exceptional job of using flashbacks and multiple

angles to tie a single theme together in each chapter. He also does

not shy away from the difficult therapeutic topics he has dealt with

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in his own life. Being the son of both a narcissistic mother and

grandmother, Tomasulo writes humorously about painful stories. I

admire his way of weaving through the past and present and his

knack for painting the vivid details of a child’s experience. He gave

me the gift of humor and perspective at just the moment I needed

the lift.

Wharton, Edith. Ethan Frome. 1911. Introduction and notes by Elizabeth

Ammons. New York: Penguin Classics, 2005.

This was my first Edith Wharton book, and I was delighted by her

writing style. "He kept his eyes fixed on her, marveling at the way

her face changed with each turn of their talk, like a wheat-field

under a summer breeze" (35). While this was one of the rare positive

images in an otherwise dark and tragic story, I became immersed in

the stark, New England, rural winter that so encompasses the theme

of the book. I think it would be a fascinating exercise to write an

essay discussing and comparing the use of horses throughout the

story. Their color, use, and temperament mirror the energy and

unspoken emotions of the main characters. In our current world of

Hollywood happy endings, I enjoy the discussions wrought from a

rough and realistic story.

Woolf, Virginia. To the Lighthouse. 1927. Forward by Eudora Welty. New

York: Harvest-Harcourt, 1981

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I have long been a fan of Virginia Woolf, since being introduced to

her in a Women’s Literature class at a community college in 1990. I

not only respect her as a foundational figure in women’s literature,

but I genuinely love her long, lyrical voice. That is why it came as

quite a surprise to me that I had the hardest time finishing this

novel. Eudora Welty’s forward was a helpful introduction into

Woolf’s mastery of the novel, especially when I was more familiar

with Woolf’s shorter pieces, her pointed essays and vibrant

speeches. This story is told primarily through the internal voices

and thoughts of each of the characters of this book, and it is an

integral part of the novel. To the Lighthouse is written with Woolf’s

same beautiful use of language and is commonly heralded as one of

the finest novels of the twentieth century. This brings up the

question of the separation between the author and the characters in

a novel. While I understand that a part of Woolf must be speaking

through her characters, I found that I prefer to read her pieces

where she is speaking directly as herself.

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STUDY BIBLIOGRAPHY

Angelou, Maya. Letter to my Daughter. New York: Random House, 2008.

Burroughs, Augusten. A Wolf at the Table: A Memoir of my Father. New

York: Picador, 2008.

Cafagña, Marcus. The Broken World: Poems (National Poetry Series).

Chicago: University of Illinois, 1996.

Edwards, Kim. The Memory Keeper’s Daughter. New York: Penguin, 2006.

Ellroy, James. The Black Dahlia. 1987. Afterword by James Ellroy. New

York: Mysterious, 2006.

Fisher, Carrie. Wishful Drinking. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2008.

Frey, James. A Million Little Pieces. New York: Anchor, 2004.

Grealy, Lucy. Autobiography of a Face. 1994. Afterword by Ann Patchett.

New York: Perennial, 2003.

Kidd, Sue Monk. The Secret Life of Bees. New York: Penguin, 2002.

Kostova, Elizabeth. The Historian. New York: Back Bay, 2006.

Layton, Deborah. Seductive Poison: A Jonestown Survivor’s Story of Life

and Death in the Peoples Temple. New York: Anchor-Random House,

1999.

Maugham, W. Somerset. Of Human Bondage. 1915. Afterword by Maeve

Binchy. New York: Signet Classics, 2007.

McBride, Karyl. Will I Ever Be Good Enough?: Healing the Daughters of

Narcissistic Mothers. New York: Free, 2008.

104

Mennis, Bernice. Breaking Out of Prison: a guide to consciousness,

compassion, and freedom. New York: iUniverse, 2008.

Niffenegger, Audrey. The Time Traveler’s Wife. New York: Harvest-

Harcourt, 2004.

Payson, Eleanor. The Wizard of Oz and other Narcissists: Coping with the

One-Way Relationship in Work, Love, and Family. 2002. Royal Oak:

Julian Day, 2008.

Steinbeck, John. Of Mice and Men. 1937. New York: Penguin, 2002.

Stevenson, Robert Louis. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. 1886. New York:

Bantam Classic, 2004.

Tomasulo, Daniel. Confessions of a Former Child: A Therapist’s Memoir. St.

Paul: Graywolf, 2008.

Wharton, Edith. Ethan Frome. 1911. Introduction and notes by Elizabeth

Ammons. New York: Penguin Classics, 2005.

Woolf, Virginia. To the Lighthouse. 1927. Forward by Eudora Welty. New

York: Harvest-Harcourt, 1981

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APPENDIX

Eulogy for Eldora Johnson

Daughter, Sister, Cousin. Aunt, Mother, Friend. For each of us

assembled here, Eldora embodied a special relationship. For me, she was

Grandma. Just over a week ago during our final visit, I hugged her and told

her she was the best Grandma. Just four days before her passing, she

chuckled and replied with her usual cheekiness, “I’m your only Grandma!”

In a way, she was right. My father’s mother was much older when I

was young, and she left us early to the sad recesses of Alzheimer’s disease.

So, my Grandma Johnson was the only Grandma I truly knew well. The

relationship between a grandparent and a grandchild carries with it a

special set of rules. You get to skip over all the parenting baggage and get

right to the good stuff—the grand part.

I was her first grandchild. She was with my mother when I was born,

and when I was less than a week old and not able to keep food down, it was

Grandma who identified what was wrong. She’d seen it before: pyloric

stenosis. The valve that was supposed to let food pass out of my tiny

stomach had grown shut and surgery was required. I still carry the scar on

my midsection, and even as my midsection has grown considerably over

the years, I consider it my growing mark of love. It was due to her care and

attention that I survived.

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In Grandma’s eyes I always felt special, valued, adored. Much to my

chagrin as a child, I knew each of my visits would include showing me off to

her neighbors and friends. During my difficult early adulthood, she was my

rock. She respected that I had to find my own way; I made my own family

traditions. When my adult lifestyle didn’t adhere to her church teachings,

still, she found a way to accept me. She never wavered in her love for me.

Grandma was a master knitter. If you were to look at snapshots from

my early childhood, you would frequently see me wearing brightly colored

sweaters and vests that Grandma made for me. When I took ice skating

lessons as a child, I was always decked out in matching sweaters, knit caps,

and mittens made with devotion by Grandma. As an adult, I still have a

couple of cherished blankets that she made especially for me.

Grandma taught me that if you lose a tooth in North Dakota you

don’t put it under your pillow. Instead, you put it in a glass of water and

each night the Tooth Fairy puts coins into the glass. Every morning you

check to see if the tooth is gone, because only then can you count your loot.

She taught me that, in North Dakota, Santa doesn’t come on

Christmas Eve. He has entirely too much ground to cover in one night, so

instead he puts your presents under the tree while you are attending

church on Christmas morning.

Grandma taught me that the best brownies were made when she let

me mix the ingredients with my hands.

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But my favorite thing Grandma taught me is to play cards! Sharp to

the very end, she was able to keep up with the most complicated rules—

some of which I thought she made up as we went along because I could

never remember them all—and she never went easy on me. I will always

think of her whenever I play cards and remember her furrowed look of

deep concentration and her elated cry and chuckle whenever she won.

Over the past couple of years, we spoke frequently on the phone. She

kept up with my jobs, my relationship, my schooling. She shared with me

her frustrations, her fears, the realities of her fading health, and her

gratitude. I know she genuinely felt blessed with a long and well-lived life.

I believe her greatest gift to us was her last week of life. She could

have passed quickly and suddenly on October 24th, perhaps she even

wanted to, but that wasn’t yet her time. Instead, each of her children and I

had the opportunity to spend one night alone with her in the hospital. We

each had the time to say good-bye, to tell her how much we loved her, to

care for her, listen to her, and be present with her. Throughout that

difficult week and even after she went home, she kept her sense of humor

and her positive outlook on life. During my last visit I asked her, “As you

look over your life, what is the one thing that makes you happiest?” She

thought about it and said, “To see my friends happy!” Looking over all of us

here, I know we continue to bring her joy by remembering fondly all the

laughter and happiness she brought to us.

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Erik Erikson said, “Healthy children will not fear life if their elders

have integrity enough not to fear death.” My Grandma had this integrity. I

believe she did not fear death, and having her in my life—having her in

your life—gives each of us the freedom to live our lives without fear.