Unrelenting Grief II

 

“I scared my wife when I got home from here last week,” Scott says. “I thought I’d cried myself out, but I took one look at her and fell into her arms sobbing. She kept asking me what was wrong and all I could do was cry. She asked if I was sick, if someone else died, if Gram died. And that made me cry even more. I don’t think I’d survive if Gram died right now. I know I told you Gramps was my protector and he was, but my Grandma is an incredible woman, so warm and loving. They had a great relationship. I’m afraid she won’t make it long without him. And you were right, both my grandparents just loved me for who I am. My parents each wanted me to be how they wanted me to be. And the thing that was most crazy-making was that they wanted totally opposite things from me.”  

Scott and I have very different stories, but his intense love for his grandparents and his profound sense of loss touches me greatly. Memories of my grandparents come flooding back, like the time my grandfather and I walked for what seemed to my little girl legs to be miles and miles, looking for a record that had struck a chord with me, “I’m a Lonely Little Petunia in an Onion Patch.”  

I bring myself back to my patient. “Sounds like you’ve been thinking a lot about your past.”

“Absolutely!” Pause. “You asked why I was so afraid of my father. That made me wonder if he had sexually abused me, but I don’t think so. I know some people forget that stuff, but I really don’t think so.”

“There are lots of reasons to feel frightened other than sexual abuse.”

He sighs. “Good. I’m glad. There are other reasons.” Pause. “He’s big. And loud. And anything can set him off. Especially in relation to me.” Pause. “I actually think he hates me.” Pause. “You didn’t rush to say you’re sure he doesn’t hate me. That’s what most people say, especially my mother, but even my wife.”

“I have no idea whether your father hates you or not, but I’m certainly interested in why that’s your perception.”

“He has such contempt for me. Even my choosing to be a nurse. He’s constantly calling me a wimp or a pussy or an almost-doctor or wondering if I chose to be a nurse so I’d see him be ashamed in front of his friends.”

“That’s awful, Scott. What do you say when he says those things?”

“Usually nothing. I gave up fighting with my father years ago. When I was little and stood up to him he’d beat the shit out of me. I feel like I remember him saying he wished I was dead rather than my brother. I don’t for sure remember that, but I seem to.”

“Perhaps whether he said it directly or not, that’s the feeling you had and that’s a terribly painful, scary feeling.”

He nods. Tears fall from his eyes. “Gramps would never let him beat me. Gramps rarely screamed except at my father to keep him from beating me. Once I thought they’d get physical, but they didn’t. Maybe my Mom intervened. I’m not sure. But if she did then my Dad would just scream at her and I’d feel scared about that too. Like I should protect her, except I was too scared. Unless Gramps was there. Then everything would be all right.” Pause. “Now nothing will ever be all right again,” he says, burying his head in his hands crying.

“You’ve carried a lot of fear and pain with you for many years, Scott. And it’s like your grandfather’s death has literally opened the floodgates.”

“But I hate my tears! It’s just proves my father is right. I’m a wimp!”

“That’s your father’s voice. That’s the voice of your father that you have taken in and that you hear beat you up when you cry and probably whenever you’re sad and sensitive or perhaps even caring. We’ll need to work on helping you moderate his voice so that you can be kind to the sensitive child you were and the man you continue to be. I suspect you have your grandparents loving voices inside you as well, and that their voices will help you to become kinder towards yourself.”

Scott sighs deeply. “Sounds like a good goal, but one not so easily reached.”

“We’ll work on it.”

Meeting the Family

“Well, I started World War III,” Patrick says sighing deeply, as he settles into the chair across from me. “I knew Vi wouldn’t go down easily with my parents, but I didn’t think it would be that bad. My mother literally gasped and my father’s rage permeated the entire dinner. He didn’t say a word to her the whole time, but he had a lot to say to me afterwards. I guess I shouldn’t have just sprung her on them, but she surprised me by coming down for the weekend and I was supposed to go to my parents for dinner so, I guess I just decided to bring her along.”

“Wait, Patrick. You mean you hadn’t told your parents that Vi is African American? And then you just showed up with her for dinner?”

“Yeah. You know, she teaches law at Columbia University in New York, I’m down here in Florida, I knew my parents, particularly my father is very prejudiced, so I guess I kind of avoided the whole thing until I couldn’t anymore. Vi wasn’t very happy with me either. Obviously the dinner was awkward for her.”

Internally I find myself yelling at Patrick, ‘Awkward? That’s an understatement! She must have been consumed by anger she had to swallow. How could you have allowed this to happen? To everyone.”

Wondering if I’m feeling not only my anger, but Patrick’s as well, I ask, “Who are you feeling angry at Patrick?”

“Angry? Well, I’m angry at my parents, particularly my father. He really let me have it. He guessed no nice white woman would want me since I was such a loser; had to go looking in the gutter for some black chick.”

“And you felt and said what?”

“I hung up on him.”

“And felt?”

“Angry. Disgusted. Vi is this incredibly accomplished, smart, beautiful woman. I’m honored that she’d want me. And all he can see is her black skin. Except I don’t know if she still wants me. She’s pretty angry with me too. She didn’t know I hadn’t told my parents she was African American. She kept saying we’re not children, we’re in our 30s, what gives them the right to think they can decide our lives.”

“And can they? Can they decide your lives?”

Patrick hesitates before saying, “No, not exactly.”

“What do you mean, not exactly?”

“Well, I couldn’t figure out the long distant part of Vi and my relationship anyway. I mean, it would hard for me to start all over again as a financial planner in New York and to say that there are no law schools down here equivalent to Columbia would be putting it mildly.”

“You’re confusing me Patrick. Are you thinking of breaking up with Vi? Were you thinking of breaking up before the dinner with your parents? Is your parent’s reaction influencing your decision about breaking up?”

“I don’t know. I love Vi, but I can’t figure out the logistics. I couldn’t figure out the logistics before the dinner and I can’t figure it out now.”

“Have you talked to Vi about your concerns? I know you hadn’t talked with me about it.”

“No.”

“Did you set Vi up, Patrick?” Realizing my anger is seeping through, I try to temper my question. “I mean, did a part of you think taking Vi to dinner with your parents would precipitate World War III, as you said, and might lead to her breaking up with you?”

“I hadn’t thought of that at the time, but now that you mention it … I mean, she’s such a perfect woman for me, I can’t see how I could break up with her. Except she lives in New York and I don’t see how that’s workable.”

Now I feel more sad for Patrick than angry. “You know, Patrick, it’s difficult for you to take charge of your life, to decide what you want for you and make it happen. You don’t talk with Vi about your concern about living in two different cities and whether that can be worked out. I suspect you haven’t even looked at the possibility of becoming a financial planner in New York. You don’t confront your father about your feelings about what he said to you.”

“I guess I always take the coward’s way out. I run.”

Now that I am no longer angry with Patrick, I realize that I had been reacting to him much as his father did. “I wonder, Patrick, if you’ve heard your father call you a loser your whole life and if you’ve come to identify yourself as a loser, despite your obvious success and accomplishments. You feel you can’t do it, whatever it is, and so you don’t, you opt out.”

“I think that’s true. But it’s a hard pattern to break.”

“Yes, it’s a hard pattern to break, but we’ll work on it.”  

Together Always

“I came to see you because I thought you would understand,” Mara begins. “When my father insisted I see a therapist I did a lot of research. I was looking for someone who understood loss. I didn’t read your whole book, but I read enough to know you believe it’s important to stay connected to the person who died, that it can provide comfort. My father just doesn’t get it. As he would say he’s ‘moved on,’ and that I need to too.”

Thoughts and questions swirl through my mind: Who died? Mara seems so young. How old is she? She’s the first person who’s come to see me because of my book. I wonder if she’ll be anything like the other young woman who started treatment with me many years ago after reading a book I co-authored. That woman was fragile, defensive, and crying out for love. 

Mara continues. “That’s all well and good for him. He can get another wife. I can’t get another mother. I know it’s been a long time since she died. But it’s not like I’ve stopped living. I did well in high school. I’m doing fine in college. The letters don’t interfere with my life.”

“The letters?” I ask.

“I’ve written my mother a letter every day since she died.”

“And when did she die?”

“Nine years ago, when I was twelve.”

Uh oh, I think. What I say is, “That must have been very hard.” 

Mara’s eyes fill with tears. Her eyes are big and brown and bring to mind a deer which, in turn, makes me think of another young woman I saw many years ago who covered her terror with rage. Whenever I saw her I thought of a deer caught in the headlights.

“It was terrible. She died of breast cancer. She seemed to be getting better. And then she was suddenly dead,” Mara says shaking her head. “I cried for days and days. For weeks, really. I couldn’t go to school because I couldn’t stop crying, I mean like continually. I don’t know how I got the idea to write her letters, but I did. I wrote to her every day. And I still do. It helped me stop crying.”

“What do you do with the letters, Mara?”

“I keep them. I have boxes and boxes of them. Some are pretty short, others are longer. Sometimes I tell her about my day or a problem I’m having. But I end them all the same way. I tell her we’ll always be together.”

My stomach tightens. It wasn’t only Mara’s youth that made me think of those two other young women. Mara is another fragile doe, holding onto her deceased mother as a drowning person clutches a life vest. 

“Can you tell me about your relationship with your mother, Mara? I ask.

She smiles, nodding. “We had a wonderful relationship. She loved me so much. She stopped working when I was born. She’d walk me to school, read me bedtime stories, kiss and hug me all the time. She was the perfect Mom.” She pauses. “Until she got sick.”

“When was that, Mara?”

“I was seven.”

“So she was sick for two years.”

“Yeah,” Mara says. Her doe eyes look downward. “It was really hard for her. She had to have a mastectomy and then chemo and radiation. It was awful.”

“You must have been really scared then. And pretty lonely too.”

“Yeah, I was really scared. I’m not sure I got it completely. I mean I knew she was really sick …”

“Did you worry about her dying?”

“I guess.”

“Did you spend time with your Mom when she was sick?”

“Depends. Sometimes I’d crawl into bed with her and it would be like always. She’d stroke my hair and tell me everything would be OK. She’d tell me we’d be together always.” She pauses. “Other times, other times she’d just want to be left alone.”

The room fills with sadness. I feel sad for Mara’s loss and for my losses as well. Mara was a dependent child when she lost the person she was closest to in the world. Is there also anger at her mother’s desertion? No doubt. But she is nowhere near ready to deal with that.  

Yes, I do believe that mourning is a process of taking in images and memories of the deceased which then provide a sense of connection with the person who is no more. But there’s more going on here for Mara. She is trying to keep her mother alive, compelled to make good on the promise that they be together always. 

 I suspect this will be a long, intense, and painful treatment.