I am blessed to be able to access the support of a Cruse bereavement volunteer who is also a very dear friend and she’s offered me walk and talk sessions once a week.
I’m so grateful for her time, support and unconditional love.
During the first session I couldn’t stop the tears pouring from my eyes for over two hours and dipped my head when dog walkers passed by. At one point my chest felt like it was going to cave in with the heaviness of sadness and it was such a relief to let it go and not restrict my mind or myself.
Friendship means so very much to me and I feel no divide between close friends and family and maybe that’s because we didn’t have extended family living near us growing up so friends became family.
During our first session, I shared my feelings about something I’ve been struggling with for the past two years which felt impossible to let go of and also the frustration and hurt surrounding it.
The situation involved what I thought were close friends and repercussions of an ongoing problem which hurt like crazy. The continuous going over it in my mind was relentless!
Why the hell can’t I let it go and move on?
It would seem a familiar pattern in my life!
Why can’t we move on?
When you see your child curled up in a foetal position in the middle of her bed, totally defeated and sobbing for absolutely no other reason than other children being unkind to her, your heart breaks with hers.
It was the final act in many years of unacceptable and unfathomable unkindness from kids that need to release their own pain and difficulty on to a weaker child in order to save themselves.
I get it, I really do… I hate the fact that I get it and understand the bully-my heart goes out to the bully too, every time but it doesnβt mean that I can accept their behaviour. I’ve spent years talking through difficulties with parents and their kids, trying to teach them other ways to manage struggles in life and in the end, my child suffered such deep and lasting pain and was left to feel worthless and alone.
Match my unresolved pain with hers and bingo you have a double whammy of I’m not good enough and that, leads to an avalanche of extremely painful feelings!
Their ignorance to the sheer depth of the impact of the continued hurt, felt unjust and insignificant along with the idea that my daughters life was insignificant too-were they ready and waiting for her to make an attempt on her life because at one point, she screamed in sheer brokenness; “I don’t care if I die!”
I felt deeply hurt by their behaviour and in part felt like theyβd been disloyal because when I needed them most, they’d all closed ranks and not bothered to reach out to try and find some solution.
I just couldn’t move past this feeling of them being disloyal after all that Iβd given in friendship!
My Cruse lady listened openly and without judgement then offered a possible clarification with regards to the disloyalty – two nights before my father died I had to make a choice that would haunt me for the rest of my days. At 13 years old and drowning in fear, I prayed to God to make my father die because if he didn’t die he would kill my mother!
I was disloyal to one parent in order to save the other and I’ve punished myself ever since.
My heart felt like it had been stabbed a thousand times and I caught my breath for a second… then what she said, sunk in!
Is this why I struggle with my mother so much because the 13 year old child part of me had a terrible choice to make when faced with a life or death situation and she chose to save her mother, not her father?
Can you even imagine having to make that choice? It’s just unfathomable and my heart aches for the child that was involuntarily put in such a dreadful situation.
Although he terrified me, I was always much closer to him than my mother and I think she knows this and has always known it and maybe that’s why a part of her resents me and an even bigger part of her hurts like mad.
It’s the same pattern just dressed up differently when she had no choice but to hand her youngest child over to be cared for by her mentally ill husband whilst she worked several jobs to keep her family afloat.
I spent so much more time with my father than with her and as she has spat out at me on numerous occasions; “after all I’ve done for you!”
Maybe I wasn’t grateful enough?
There are times when I’ve tirelessly given myself and my energy to my mother and felt so angry and hurt at the insignificance I’ve felt with her lack of appreciation and maybe that’s why my 13 year old part is still angry with her because she chose her and yet it’s still not enough… she’s not enough and in turn I don’t feel enough!
It may take a life time to understand the layers of a damaged past and when you get the lesson, although extremely painful, you can heal a small fragment of your heart just by understanding and of course acknowledging the much younger part of you that’s still in pain.
Don’t be afraid to tell your story it needs to be heard and healed.
Β©All Rights Reserved – The boy in the chip shop 2019 – 22
The boy in the chip shop 