On processing and resolving pain
This will be the last email for 2023. Enjoy your holidays. Take a deep breath when you need to. Give yourself permission to do nothing/say nothing/feel everything. Happy New Year, friend.
I am reeling from a revelation last week and I can’t stop thinking about it.
A childhood friend posted on Facebook about his mother passing away. In the post, he let loose about the pain and heartache he suffered. He wrote about how there was a difference between having a child and being a mother. The entire post was vitriolic, filled with anguish and pain. He was finally free, he wrote, of one of the primordial sources of toxicity in his life.
He carried on to explain how his mother had let him down, walked away, left him in the hands of an abuser - his father. He shared an anecdote of asking his mother if he could come live with her to escape the abuse and her refusal to allow him into her home. I read the post once, then again, and then a third time before I could respond with words of support and kindness.
I’ve known this man MY WHOLE LIFE. We grew up on the same floor of our apartment building. His place was at the end of the right arm of the Y; my mom and I lived at the end of the left arm. I spent countless hours in the apartment he shared with his two older sisters and his father. I remember once asking my mom what happened to their mother and she could only tell me they were divorced. I don’t even remember meeting his mom, ever, in the sixteen years we lived down the hall. He was the first single dad I ever knew.
The kick in the gut was that I liked his father. He was kind and sometimes funny. Finding out that he was emotionally and physically abusing his son knocked me off my feet. I had no clue. My friend hid it so well. He was funny most of the time, but sometimes a bit…inaccessible.
I remember, hanging out at his place one Sunday afternoon, listening to music and clicking through cable channels as 11- and 12-year-olds looking for something to do. He went into the kitchen to get some milk and when he came back to the living room, he rushed me out of the apartment before his father came home. It made zero sense to me. I knew his dad. I’d hung out here countless times.
“Why do I have to leave?” I asked him.
He shrugged. “You have to go.” He opened the door, holding it open, while I rose from where I sat on the couch, not understanding what had happened. I took it personally, thinking my friend didn’t like me anymore. My pre-teen brain tried to figure out what I had done that made me so…unsavoury.
Now that I know he was being abused, his fear becomes clear. Maybe he drank too much milk. Maybe there were dishes in the sink he forgot to wash. Maybe he wasn’t supposed to have a girl over without permission - even if that girl was someone they had known forever. I can now see with clarity why my friend rushed me out, why he sometimes seemed so distant, why he sometimes refused to open the door when I dropped by, talking to me instead through the mail slot at the bottom.
I hope his sharing on Facebook allows him to heal a bit more. He is a good person. He is working hard to be a better dad to his kid. His post opened the door for others to share their own pain. That’s what writing words can do.
While we are taking about writing pain, I have to share something else. December started off really rough for me with a couple of rejections. I had applied to two writer-focussed programs and was turned down by both on the same day. For the rest of that week, I went into the dark that lurks within. For me, it starts in my esophagus, making me feel like I want to vomit. The anger and hurt worms it’s way into my head, and suddenly everything that happens is coloured with suspicion and disappointment.
By the end of the first week of December, I was mostly pissed off, and I didn’t like how it felt. I felt compelled to write it down, but instead of using my keyboard, I took pen to paper. I scribbled quickly, pressing so hard on the paper that the ink bled through. I felt a bit better when I closed my notebook.
The following week, I pulled out my notebook to work on chapter summaries for a new novel. I flipped past the note I had scrawled the previous week, then turned back to re-read what was there. I only read a few sentences. All the anger I had spewed out had already lifted. I couldn’t - and didn’t need to - read anymore. I tore out the page, ripped it into pieces, and dropped it into the trash.
I know in some self-help or healing classes it is common practice to write down what is hurting you or holding you back and then burning it. It’s a form of release. I had never done this before, but tearing up this sheet of paper was the same thing. Writing down my feelings was the relief; tossing the scraps in the trash was the release. It felt good. 10/10 recommend trying this with whatever is in your way.
xo
Dana