It is not often that one can affect change with an immediate effect. Today I was given that opportunity.
I went to give an estimate to a man 25 years my senior. He was four weeks out from his third or fourth surgery this year, which had followed on the heels of an elbow, shoulder and knee surgery, also in the past year. When I arrived at his house, he was in tears because of the pain. He said the pain medications made him angry, that he felt he wasn't in control of his own emotions while taking them, so he had thrown them out. While he was in the recovery center, his teenage children moved in with their mother, an alcoholic from whom he had been divorced 10 years. Because of the woman's alcoholism and reckless lifestyle, the court awarded custody of the children to him with monthly visitation to the mother if the children desired. He encouraged the children to visit. When he arrived home after his surgery, he found his home empty with a note from the children stating they were tired of chores and rules. He sent them a letter saying that they could come home any time, they could have any of the belongings they desired, that he always loved them and that he was sorry for being angry with them. He said that he stopped taking the medications that made him angry, and he was always thinking of them. He cried while he spoke. The pain was beyond fathomable. The surgeons and doctors were astounded to see him upright at all. He had lost 2 discs and all the cartilage between them. His nerves had been pinched between the vertebrae, and he had been unable to stop the constant stabbing pains up and down his legs, in his feet and toes, and in his back. The surgeons encouraged him to continue with the meds, especially through this period of mourning. For two hours, he poured out his heart, repeatedly begging the universe for some kind of sense to be made of this. The loss of his children was overwhelming. He was completely wrapped up in the thoughts of despair.
In watching this man suffer like this, I was of two minds. The first was to exclaim that he ought to snap out of it. Quickly I dismissed this thought as callous because, in a truly connected world where we, as humans, act with humanity befitting our species, we would express emotions as they occur, especially the vulnerability of mourning. He was mourning, and how inhumane it would be to quench that. The second thought was to offer the things I had so recently learned, few as they are, new as they are, to the suffering being in front of me. What I saw when I looked at him was myself a mere two years ago. It wasn't long ago that I was in a similar position, albeit without the surgical inhibitions. My children gone, I was alone. I was in despair. I felt like it would be better to be dead. I wished I was dead. I felt the most horrible feelings about everyone involved, wanting revenge, wanting healing, wanting my children back no matter the cost. I spent many months in tears, not knowing what direction I was facing, not knowing which way to turn, or what to do. The next step wasn't appearing. The next step seemed to be thousands of miles away. Breathing was unfathomable. Impossible. Overwhelming. Drowning.  I know where this man is standing. I know the hell he is going through. I feel his pain acutely. He is a mirror of myself two years ago. I see myself in the questioning. How could they betray me after all I've done for them? How could they? How could they? HOW COULD THEY?? I have given my life over to the for nearly 20 years and this is the gratitude? This is how they repay me? This is the love I'm supposed to receive? Is this how families treat each other? The cowardice, the betrayal, the ultimate hatred they must feel towards me to conceive of such plots!
The mirror was more evident the longer he spoke. I realized that in the midst of mourning, one tends to go over the same thing over and over. Ruminate. We do this, psychologically speaking, in order to make sense of things. Children will reenact a horrific event to the chagrin of their parents, teachers and therapists, in order to make sense of that event, or desensitize themselves to it. They will often change the ending or details within the event to reconcile it to their typical belief systems. For example, a child who witnesses a violent event will re-enact the event but will stand up for themselves in the re-enactment, or the ending will change with a rescuer. With adults, and many children, they will defer responsibility to others and attempt to present themselves as helpless in the event in order to justify their actions or inactions. We often prefer to not be accountable because we think it won't hurt as much. The fact is that it hurts more, and longer. The pain doesn't go away, and it doesn't get easier to bear when one changes the events to suit their mentality. The only way to conquer the set back is to step forward. The best way to step forward is to look at everything from every angle, albeit briefly. Ask yourself why. Why would the circumstances turn out this way? What would cause the people in my life to act thusly? Would they really be acting to hurt me? Or would they be coming from a place of pain themselves, or perhaps even a place of not knowing what was right, so they act in accordance with what they know, which might be limited? Walk in their shoes, get their perspective. Once you know why a person acts the way they do, it makes it a lot harder to get stuck in the anger and grief. It gets easier to take that step forward.
So back to today. I got to glimpse into the mirror of my soul when I saw a man suffering with the grief of losing his children. So open and vulnerable was he that I was impressed and compelled to listen. he repeated his stories several times in the two hours, but I finally began to ask him questions about his situation and offer feedback.
First, he felt so guilty about feeling bad, about losing his kids, about having surgery, about crying. I offered reassurances about his tears, saying it's ok to cry, how much more would we like to have connections, but he has been pushing people away, insisting upon always offering service but refusing to take anything in return. People who love you don't want tit-for-tat kindness, they want connection. He consistently saw things only from a negative perspective. He wouldn't recognize that he was breathing, walking, talking, capable of thought. He didn't want to see anything positive about his situation because the negative felt more comfortable, like he deserved it. It's his time, his chance, to make changes, to improve himself. I explained that his kids will come back. They always do. It may be in 10 years, but what kind of man will he be? Will he be the kind of man they want to come back to, or the same, stubborn, strict, man who demands having what they ran from?
My job as a woman right now is to improve myself so that when my children come back, I will be a mother worthy of them. I will be capable of guiding them. Most of all, I will be capable of listening to them and loving them. I may have a year, I may have ten. The people who wronged me will dig their own holes, and knowing them, jump into it. I don't have to do anything except improve myself.