by Lynne Spreen of Any Shiny Thing
I had a rough childhood, with a dad who was overwhelmed with work and financial stress, and a mother overwhelmed with him and four small children. How can I say this gently? Dad was violent. I grew up angry, and even into my late forties I had nightmares about punching him in the face. I’d wake up crying at the futility of it, and so pissed off I wanted to break something.
Around the time I turned fifty, I wrote him a letter saying his brutality and scorched-earth behavior was wrong, that he hurt us terribly and the least he could do now is apologize.
A great silence emanated from his part of town. Three weeks later, my sister told me he was pouting. He assumed I had severed ties, so he would sever ties longer. Yeah, of course he would interpret it that way. He always had to win every argument. So I called him on some business pretext and we talked politely, as if nothing had happened. Then we said goodbye and hung up.
The phone rang.
Him: “I want you to know I got your letter.”
Me, heart pounding: “Okay.”
Him: “And I want you to know I’m not offended.”
Me: (biting back astonishment, which corroded to mirth, which died in bitterness on my tongue). “Great.”
Him: “I’m sorry you had to carry that around all these years.”
Me: “Thank you.”
The End
The nightmares vanished. Our relationship improved overnight. I felt sorry for him, instead of hating him. For the next seven or eight years, until he died suddenly of a stroke in 2008, I was able to love him like a regular dad, to appreciate all the good stuff he did for us. All it took was that one sentence.
Now here’s the quirky thing: a few years later, I wondered, what if I misinterpreted his apology? This man NEVER apologized. What if I heard what I wanted to hear? What if he didn’t mean it the way I took it? What if he really meant he was sorry I was so stupid as to let a little thing like a broken eardrum or bloody nose bother me? Because that would have more been in character.
I’ll never know, so I chose to believe the first interpretation. And that’s what I’m thinking about today, a few days before what would have been my dad’s birthday: sometimes the prison in which we live is self-constructed.
The implications are staggering.
I just finished reading a memoir about a woman who had a rough childhood. Adopted as a toddler by inadequate parents, she was poorly nurtured and emotionally abandoned – and having survived that, she became an adult who was forever doomed to seeing every development in her life through that filter of rejection, of being unloved. Then, in her early sixties, she had an epiphany: she realized her parents had done the best they could, even though they should never have been given a child to raise. This caused her to rethink everything. She wasn’t trapped anymore. My friend was much happier from that point forward, but what a terrible waste.
In her case and in mine, our parents relinquished some information late in life, thereby freeing us. You can accurately say this wasn’t within our control. But what if either one of us had made up some excuse of our own and freed ourselves sooner? I could have told myself Dad was sorry and moved on. She could have done the same. Instead we waited, seething (in my case) and pathetic (in hers).
To this day I don’t know if I read Dad correctly, but I’m free. I should have done it thirty years earlier. Freedom was within my power to achieve, but I didn’t realize it.
I lost my mom to cancer when I was six years old. As childhood passed, I became fearful and phobic. But my relationships with animals helped me through. Tough childhoods can make us strong and teach us compassion for others by first feeling for ourselves. Thanks for sharing your wonderful post!
Maggie-
BringingBackTheMagic.com
I have been harboring a grudge toward a family member for a year now. Your thoughts give me hope that I can find a way to forgive. I’m just not there yet.
This is an absolutely beautiful story and we should all learn from it. Life is too inpredictable and short to carry around anger.
It is that, Cyndi. If only we could be so strong. But a good thing about aging is – well, scroll down to the answer I gave Flora Brown, below. Thank you for commenting.
What an amazing story. I am going through emotional turmoil with my mother and I am just not ready to move past it yet. Everytime I think I am – she does something else that sets me back. Your story is giving me food for though and maybe I will get there soon too. Thanks for putting your story out there.
You’re welcome, Kathy. I usually can’t move on until I roll around in it a while. When I get sick of it and myself, freedom seems more appealing, but for a while, examining the horror of it is kind of useful. Sad to say. Just as long as you don’t get to a point where it holds you back. Best wishes, my friend.
Yes! I have been thinking a great deal on this lately. One day in church, my pastor asked us to consider that we could stop telling the same old stories about our hurts and instead say “I don’t know why they did that (to me).” That was huge for me. It freed me to stop carrying around a hurt I had had from my old boss, who had seemed like a sociopath to me. I chose instead to say “I have no idea why she acted like that. She must have had her own reasons, which I will never know.” I felt such freedom.
Sue, it’s so weird, isn’t it, that we have the power to free ourselves? I’m glad you’re free now.
Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor says the chemistry that results from a horrible encounter only lasts for 90 seconds, and after that it dissipates from the bloodstream. However, if we relive/think about the conflict again, the chemicals erupt again for another 90 seconds. Theoretically, if we figure out a way to move on and stop reliving the encounter, we might heal sooner. Also within our power. But honestly, sometimes the pain feels good. I’m reeling from a recent painful incident and I sort of enjoy mulling it over, because it’s so shocking and appalling. But by doing so I’m also torturing myself. Must. Develop. Willpower!
Wonderful and helpful.
I’ve just allowed a fellow filmmaker to overwhelm my morning with her (mass email) request to donate to her kickstarter: “we hope you can return the support we gave you for your projects”. HA. (I’m hearing on a loop…) What help! When you didn’t even ‘Like’ mine on fb??
I want the freedom! I know that compassion/forgiveness is the way but needed your post to set me straight. Thank you for this! I so needed it.
Anne, it took me until I was in my early 40s to start seeing reciprocity as a reasonable thing. (Before that, I had been convinced it was kind of selfish!) I still fall into the trap of GIVE, GIVE, GIVE without anything in return, but at least now I’m aware of my martyr tendencies. And what changes everything is that wonderful self-awareness that most of us don’t earn until we’re older. Best wishes, and thanks for commenting.
Lynne,
This is such a powerful realization. We free ourselves by how we decide to perceive things. Whenever we get to it is the right time. It’s a waste to regret that we didn’t get to it sooner.
Thanks for sharing your story.
Thanks, Flora. I’m also reading “The Secret Life of the Grown-Up Brain” by B. Strauch, and she provides research that shows that as older peeps, we are more able to regulate our emotions – no small advantage in life! Thanks for stopping by.