Today is my birthday. So far it's been a pretty good day with plans for more festivities later on. I'm fortunate in being surrounded by love, family and friends.
I can't help but reflect today on the past year with my difficult child......... all the ups and downs, sorrow and joy, heartaches so big I thought it would break me into pieces, relief so great I thought the renewal could cure all my pain...... and everything in between those two poles. And then life continues along it's usual path, except the usual is no longer usual, it's highly unusual and brings with it a mixture of feelings which are now beginning to define me. Underneath my days, beneath the surface is the knowledge that 'out there' in the world existing on some other plane, is my daughter who by my own request, is keeping herself and her mental illness away from my door. I have accepted that that is the way it is, that is what I chose to stay sane and healthy and keep the sharp teeth of insanity from taking continuing bites out of me and my family. It is what it is.
I have really good days now that I'm not embroiled in a world where I have no power to change or help or support or alter in any way. I can slide easily into laughter, peace of mind, routine, sleep and ordinariness. I recall a therapists response many years ago when I asked her what her opinion of what the goal of therapy is. She said, "living within all the paradoxes of life and not going crazy." I have always thought that was the best answer I ever got and as I've gotten older, I see that as the truth.
This whole last year with my difficult child has brought that truth home, for this is one of those paradoxes. Life goes on, with or without my acceptance of 'what is.' Do I wish it were different? With all my heart, yes. Can I change it? Even with all my heart, no. So, today, on my birthday, amidst all the frivolity is the recognition that there is an empty space where my difficult child used to be and along with the joy and love and fun is the ever present sadness of that. She just called a little while ago to wish me a happy birthday. We talked for a little while, she is still doing battle with life with all her armor intact and all her mental 'weapons' at the ready. Oh my poor difficult child, living in a world all her own.........
Today I was thinking of one of my brothers who shares my birthday. He is a paranoid schizophrenic and has an extremely limited life. He also lives in a world all his own. I thought of all the horror I went through as a child to 'save' him.........and then did the same thing with my sister, who has bi-polar, Aspergers, and a host of other diagnoses. It seems as far as my immediate family has been concerned, all I've ever done is go through the 'agonies of the damned' to save them...... only to reach a point of reckoning, a point where there was just no where else to go ........but to let go...........to accept............Good Lord it's been hard.
I didn't mean for this to get maudlin, for in many ways I feel as if I landed in a pretty good place. All of that pain and all of that grief and sadness has all cooked together and is now simply a part of who I am. By everyone's accounts I am a very joyful person, somehow it's all incorporated inside me and mixed up with the end result being one of a rich and very colorful embroidery of a life lived on the edge of what we call sanity. Teetering on that precipice has given me a unique perspective and for some strange inexplicable reason makes me feel rooted in a very deep way into the earth. As if all the pain grew roots from the center of me right straight down to the center of the earth where all of us, in all ways, are connected, regardless of how we live "up here." It brings me peace to feel that way.
So, today is a special day for me, the day of my birth, but also the time in my life where I understand that paradox and can live in it not only without going crazy, but with a joy and a sense of wonder and awe that life is a mysterious, heartbreaking, wonderful, exhausting, exhilarating, fabulous ride and with all of that............. it is still way too short...................
I can't help but reflect today on the past year with my difficult child......... all the ups and downs, sorrow and joy, heartaches so big I thought it would break me into pieces, relief so great I thought the renewal could cure all my pain...... and everything in between those two poles. And then life continues along it's usual path, except the usual is no longer usual, it's highly unusual and brings with it a mixture of feelings which are now beginning to define me. Underneath my days, beneath the surface is the knowledge that 'out there' in the world existing on some other plane, is my daughter who by my own request, is keeping herself and her mental illness away from my door. I have accepted that that is the way it is, that is what I chose to stay sane and healthy and keep the sharp teeth of insanity from taking continuing bites out of me and my family. It is what it is.
I have really good days now that I'm not embroiled in a world where I have no power to change or help or support or alter in any way. I can slide easily into laughter, peace of mind, routine, sleep and ordinariness. I recall a therapists response many years ago when I asked her what her opinion of what the goal of therapy is. She said, "living within all the paradoxes of life and not going crazy." I have always thought that was the best answer I ever got and as I've gotten older, I see that as the truth.
This whole last year with my difficult child has brought that truth home, for this is one of those paradoxes. Life goes on, with or without my acceptance of 'what is.' Do I wish it were different? With all my heart, yes. Can I change it? Even with all my heart, no. So, today, on my birthday, amidst all the frivolity is the recognition that there is an empty space where my difficult child used to be and along with the joy and love and fun is the ever present sadness of that. She just called a little while ago to wish me a happy birthday. We talked for a little while, she is still doing battle with life with all her armor intact and all her mental 'weapons' at the ready. Oh my poor difficult child, living in a world all her own.........
Today I was thinking of one of my brothers who shares my birthday. He is a paranoid schizophrenic and has an extremely limited life. He also lives in a world all his own. I thought of all the horror I went through as a child to 'save' him.........and then did the same thing with my sister, who has bi-polar, Aspergers, and a host of other diagnoses. It seems as far as my immediate family has been concerned, all I've ever done is go through the 'agonies of the damned' to save them...... only to reach a point of reckoning, a point where there was just no where else to go ........but to let go...........to accept............Good Lord it's been hard.
I didn't mean for this to get maudlin, for in many ways I feel as if I landed in a pretty good place. All of that pain and all of that grief and sadness has all cooked together and is now simply a part of who I am. By everyone's accounts I am a very joyful person, somehow it's all incorporated inside me and mixed up with the end result being one of a rich and very colorful embroidery of a life lived on the edge of what we call sanity. Teetering on that precipice has given me a unique perspective and for some strange inexplicable reason makes me feel rooted in a very deep way into the earth. As if all the pain grew roots from the center of me right straight down to the center of the earth where all of us, in all ways, are connected, regardless of how we live "up here." It brings me peace to feel that way.
So, today is a special day for me, the day of my birth, but also the time in my life where I understand that paradox and can live in it not only without going crazy, but with a joy and a sense of wonder and awe that life is a mysterious, heartbreaking, wonderful, exhausting, exhilarating, fabulous ride and with all of that............. it is still way too short...................
