Never a Fit Parent
Today was Trauma Therapy Tuesday and we nudged my memory from age 4 ever closer to integration. I forgot my mask going out today and it left me feeling so anxious!
⚠️ ⚠️⚠️⚠️CW: Childhood abuse; neglect, emotional & physical abuse.⚠️⚠️⚠️⚠️
It wasn't a big shift because it suddenly got me that the memory of homelessness was caused because my Mother was fired from her job for lying about being out sick. I had answered the phone while home alone and truthfully told the caller that my Mommy was out shopping.
She told me repeatedly that it was my fault we were homeless. It seemed pretty obvious that if I hadn’t answered the phone, she wouldn’t have been fired.
Of course this is ridiculous, I was 4, how could her bad decision be my fault.
What finally really landed for me today was that my Mother had left me home alone at age 4 to go hang out with her friends. That it was not unusual for her to do that. She did it knowing I’d play quietly because I was already terrified of what she’d do to me if I got into anything.
The scenario of my getting into something while home alone, then violently punished by my Mother, plays out several more times. She would leave me alone all the time.
“That’s a CPS call.” My therapist noted as I was talking through this realization, “Maybe age 10, some kids can be left alone.”
“Your Mother never was a fit parent.”, she commented, as we unpacked the knowledge that she regularly neglected me this way.
Cupcakes for Victory
I'm always behind the cool kids. It takes me ages, usually, to decide to follow a trend. Baking while sheltering on place is over of those tends. Today I made cupcakes.
They're not awesome, it wasn't a recipe I'd made several times before CK discovered she's gluten intolerant, so I can't really account for how the change of flour affected it. I'm trying another more familiar recipe later this week or next. My buttercream really did not come out well.
More students asked if I'd facilitate a discussion about the yoga of social justice. It honestly is so far out of my comfort zone, really into discomfort around correcting women my Mother's age. At the same time I recognize I'm being asked because I'm trusted.
It also is a powerful act I can take as a white woman to help educate older adults about dismantling racism. It's begging a better ally if I can be in this discomfort.
Eating and Other Irritations
Lunch defeated me today.
I felt like a failure. I made a lunch for CK, but she couldn't really eat it. Today that felt like I'd dropped the ball of the I've thing I was getting right.
I kept reminding myself, and her, that it wasn't really about the lunch. It was about the pandemic and the protests and the lack of accountability of the police and the Mayor of Portland who's on the side of Money instead of the City and the People.
I wanted to bake cupcakes, testing the gluten free version of the cupcakes I made for CK on the first of her birthdays we spent together. Instead I got so nauseous that I couldn't eat and we played a game until I felt better.
A decent day overall, but I feel exhausted and all I want to do is curl up and read all day and nap.
Freedom as a Practice
I shared a quote from Angela Davis' book Freedom is a Constant Struggle today, party of a project I started the first to highlight the voice of a Black artist, activist, etc. In some posts I'm sharing a familiar person with a less familiar quote. I'm slowly growing a list of resources as well to share with students.
I often remind students and myself there's a reason we call what we do with yoga a practice. It's what we're always doing, there's no end point, there's only the doing. It's why the first word of the Yoga Sutras is "now".
Eradicating racism, staying healthy in a COVID world, these aren't tasks we check if they list and move on. They're a practice we all need to take on, together. We must keep doing them.
It's this willingness to keep doing hard work for the good of others, indefinitely, that's they problem. How do you teach this to someone who doesn't agree that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few?
Irritation
I’m tired and my pain has been higher, tonight everything feels too irritating to do for more than a moment. Reading. Standing. Playing my game.
Usually I can push through being tired and in pain and do the dishes. Folding laundry is a soothing task usually, good to ground me at bedtime. Tonight I want to throw things, only it’s too much effort.
My pain has slowly improved, but tonight I’m exhausted by it and feel pathetic, mostly worthless. I know logically this isn’t true, but increased physical pain exacerbates mental pain and hater I am tonight.
Tomorrow I’m teaching art online again despite feeling uncertain.
Growth Opportunity
I find myself in the role of helping white Boomer women understand they cannot help but be racist sometimes. We are steeped in hundreds of years of it, living in a country built in it. Oregon itself was founded as a white paradise with laws in place prohibiting Black people from settling here.
I find it a little astonishing to be here. Teaching my Mother's peers how to be better than she was willing to be. Six years ago I'd never have imagined this.
Grateful my back isn't hurting as much today. I took a nap when I realized that I was feeling down on myself and worthless, plus unable to even concentrate on a video game!
Grocery shopping manages to be tedious still, trying to get what you want all in over go is nearly impossible. Learning to make do and be creative anchor meals now and more.
When
I shared a question posed by James Baldwin in 1989, "You always told me ‘It takes time.’ It’s taken my father’s time, my mother’s time, my uncle’s time, my brothers’ and my sisters’ time. How much time do you want for your progress?"
And people ask why the protests are angry.
My back pain has been high the past two days. I called my PT and made an appointment. There's a list of pandemic protocols to follow, not surprising at all.
My pain slowing me down didn't help with my mood. I get so frustrated by being unable to get more done. Feeling like I'm getting caught up on the house helped me with the anxiety about everything.
Telling
I went to the dentist and he cleaned my teeth toast and I didn't cry before, during, or after!
I got to practice telling a new care provider at the practice how my anxiety is heightened at the dentist due to intersection of multiple traumas. She was awesome about it and so was my young, less experienced dentist. Again.
It will never be easy revealing trauma history. I am learning that sharing it can be helpful. I'm really touched at the consistent patience I'm down. I never am made to feel like I'm overreacting.
Over 1000 people lay down on the Burnside Bridge this evening. I gave advice to a protestor on using a neti pot to help recovery from tear gas. Students asked me to facilitate a discussion on, essentially, how to be better white people.
What Next
The President all but declared martial law today. Peaceful protestors demanding justice, prayer groups, families, meet with tear gas and rubber bullets. Republicans are inciting violence against protesters.
Another unarmed Black man was killed in Louisville in the early hours of the morning. The National Guard fired on people breaking curfew. David McAtee was feeding people when he was killed.
I was feeling so wound up after doing some yoga therapy for CK that I just wasn’t feeling settled. I let myself sit and play my video game for a little while, Puck on my lap, until I feel tired.
We’re struggling with wanting to eat. I feel hungry now, past midnight, and I haven’t all day. CK is really finding it harder than usual. I’m learning to be creative with leftovers and frozen veggies. We still haven’t eaten out since March.
There’s still the pandemic, so we’re still isolating. Planning a third online art class for Saturday.
A friend’s roses are today’s photo. My goodness nature is so beautiful, it hurts in contrast to the racism.